Alicante, Spain 38° 20’N 0° 29’W
We arrived in the early morning hours and I remember looking at my watch sometime around 2:30am and that was when we were done tying the boat to the dock. The red line is our path into the marina. It looks all squiggly because it was late, dark and we kept turning around looking for somewhere to put this boat. Remember, this is a big unwieldy boat and we were trying to park it next to multi-million dollar yachts in a marina that appeared full. The last thing we wanted to do was a Captain Ron entrance and leave a mark.
I just wanted to get back to bed and those two went walking in to town to get some food. The last marina and this one for some reason both had us about a mile from the main street. The walk is good for us but gets to be a hassle. Especially when carrying provisions.
Woke up this morning to a very messy boat. They worked on getting the water and power hooked up. I worked on oatmeal. Alan, true to nature, started working on the boat, which included some cleaning. John told me to get going and see the sights before the sun went down. I did go walking through the town and gave up on climbing the hill with the castle on it. I was too fatigued and tired.
Earlier in the morning while we were getting some gear out of the rear lazarette I mentioned to John that I was sore and tired from doing isometrics for the last couple days. He looked at me with a funny expression and I said, oh yeah, you fell in the hole and you should be hurting more than me. He agreed. One of the side effects of making a rough passage is that you need to rest when you get there. It’s 4:40pm and I am already thinking that I am going to watch a movie tonight and do nothing. Unless, John coaxes me to the local yacht club bar.
The night before we left Mellorca we needed to provision. I am working backwards now. John and I bought way too much food again. We originally said bread, eggs, cheese, and produce. It really took its toll carrying it back to the boat and then halfway there it started to rain, big rain. Why did we buy so much food? I guess you might as well ask why did we drink so much beer before going food shopping. OK, why did we drink so much beer? Well, on the way to the food store we made a little stop in the yacht club. John needed a beer and I guess I needed a beer, also. So, there we are dinking our first beer and it was gone way too fast and that called for another. Then, some guy comes walking past us and says something like, it’s great to hear an American talking around here, and he offers to buy us a drink. That guy was Julian Moulton originally from Santa Barbara, CA. and decades ago relocated to Mellorca. He had been around the block and had stories to tell. He told us some pretty far out tales of him on a sailboat west of Gibraltar and how he fired his Uzi to scare off the bad guys, and the time he was in…
This all started earlier in the day when the 3 of us in the cockpit were discussing what food needed to be purchased for the next passage. Items were offered and I would say whether they were in the food storage already or not because I had already done a food inventory of what was currently on board. Several items that Alan stated we needed were in fact in the hold. He challenged me and I got up, removed the cushions and lids and said look for yourself and get familiar with what is here and then there will be no question. He walked away.
John is a people manager by trade and now he had to step up to the plate. I went for a walk and he and Alan had a discussion. I honestly thought that Alan was going to walk. So, John and I went food shopping and stopped for a beer and he told me everything he wanted to. He even called Nancy and let her know that he had to talk to Alan, again. He has respect for him but Alan is going too far. I’m not the only one having a bit of trouble with him. He is in his own world and my impression is that he lacks global awareness about many things. He seems to get immersed in the minute details of his projects but fails to connect with the big picture. These issues are what happens with crews and how they get along. I have many gripes and am not instigating any change because John seems to have some of the same gripes. For example and then I will get off the soapbox, for the last several days there has been a freshwater problem on the boat. We expect to get the parts in Gibraltar and be done with it. But, in the meantime we have had to deal with it. Dealing with it means when you want freshwater you must turn on the breaker and turn it off when done because the pump keeps running and won’t stop. Alan has been leaving it on. When you want to use the toilet, and since they are freshwater electric units, we have been pouring in dock water that we keep stored in containers in the water locker on the gunwale. Last night? Yesterday? Alan used the purified fresh drinking water in the galley. I did mention this issue to John because I think we all know that if you pay for the purified water and put it in the galley and say that it is only for drinking… don’t dump it in the toilet!
No comments:
Post a Comment