11/3/24 Marina Luxure, Montenegro
Up with the sun after a quieter than expected night. The weather
man said high winds, 25-30, in the early morning, but they never materialized.
Perhaps they did and we are well protected here.
Suzette was finishing up her effort to vacuum all the bilges
when she discovered some moisture where there should not be any moisture. This
led to me clearing my work room and dismantling the area over the fuel tank.
Finding nothing we reassembled and dismantled the cabinet. Here we found the
culprit, a tee in the cold-water line to the washing machine. Fortunately, it
was simply a matter of tightening the hose clamps and reassembling the cabinet.
Returning to my chores I dismantled the flexible solar
panels, cleaned and stowed them. Next was washing of the bimini and dodger in
preparation for their removal after they dry. Somehow this, a few other small
chores managed to fill the short day.
It seems to be getting cooler by a degree each day. We were
happy to enjoy a hot shower, close the boat up and turn on the heater. A good
opportunity to catch up on my blog.
11/4/24 Marina Luxure, Montenegro
Up with the sun, 59 in the salon. Today was laundry day, all
the laundry. Unlike at home where this is simply a walk down the hall, here we
had planned to go out to anchor and run the generator. First, we needed to stop
at the Marina Office and retrieve our tourist Vignettes. I also wanted to know
when the boat next to us would be leaving, we are scheduled to take their space
for the winter, and I need time to set up the lines. She would let us know.
We left the dock at about 0830 and headed first out to sea
to blow out the turbo. According to the manual you need to run the boat above
2600 RPMs for an hour periodically, I rarely run above 2200 RPMs. This put us
out past 3 miles of shore, you know what that means. Job done we headed back to
the bay and an anchorage off of Herceg Novi. The skies were clear, wind and sea
calm. Suzette was already on her 2nd load of laundry. I worked on
setting up our lines and new chafe gear.
After 4 loads of laundry, she turned the generator over to
me. I did an oil change, sounds simple enough, but, like everything on a boat,
there is some gymnastics. I wrapped up about 1530 and we headed to the fuel
dock to top off the tanks, but found it closed. Only open M, W, F 1000 – 1500.
That is going to through a monkey wrench into my plan, but we will adapt. Back
to the dock as the sun passed below the mountains.
Our boat neighbor was returning just after us, a 50’ cabin
cruiser. The captain is pretty spoiled, he single hands the boat into the slip
with a remote that he wears around his neck! It must be like a joystick because
he can move the boat in any direction. He picks up the lines, bow and stern in
complete control at all times.
Another good day of work, check a few more items off my
departure list. Suzette had been brewing homemade soup all day, filling the
boat with heavenly aromas. As the night cooled quickly the soup was a very
satisfying dinner.
11/5/24 Marina Luxure, Montenegro
The weather continues to be calm, clear and beautiful. We
each enjoyed a massage at the spa in the morning. A very beautiful spa with all
of the amenities. My therapist did a great job, very relaxing for my tired
muscles. A nice lunch on the boat and back to work.
It is Election Day at home, but the time difference makes it
useless to pay attention until tomorrow. We are just happy that we were able to
vote from afar.
Walking the marina, I noticed that the pool had been drained,
the swim markers in the sea were on shore and the gazebos were gone. It looks
like the season has truly ended. Each day seems to be a degree cooler in the
morning, but the abundant sunshine is making the days very comfortable, I do
not have to give up wearing shorts just yet.
We brought down all of the canvas and folded up the
stainless steel frames. We did not take down the jib on the last trip due to
wind and rain, but there is no excuse this time, down it comes. Being a self-tacking
jib, 90%, it is a manageable job. In the afternoon we met with the Maintenance
company and signed them up to care for the boat in our absence. Two nice young
guys that appear to know what they are doing and they come highly recommended.
In honor of Election Day, we watched the movie The Candidate.
This was a movie from the 70’s and it is amazing how the issues depicted are
the same as today. It just reenforces my opinion that the elections are all
about fear mongering and not solutions. The business corollary; We keep doing
the same things over and over again expecting a different result.
11/6/24 Marina Luxure, Montenegro
A few chores in the morning and then out of the slip to be
first in line at the fuel dock, this is our last chance to top up the tanks. We
motored 2.5 miles east to Porto Novi and the fuel dock. We tied up and waited
for them to open. A very nice lady opened the station early and brought the
fuel nozzle to us. 318 liters later we were filled and on our way. This was
probably the nicest fuel dock we had ever patronized, plenty of bumpers, lines
at the ready on the dock, clean and inexpensive, 1.32 euros/ltr.
With the boat secure in the slip we got ready for our drive
back to Dubrovnik. The marina arranged for a car to be delivered to the marina
for us. At noon we were on our way. I was a little worried about crossing the
border back into Croatia, but it was no problem. A short wait at the exit
border and stamps in our passports. Less wait at the entry border, more stamps.
“Anything to declare?” “no” “proceed”. The scenery was familiar, the high
mountains to the NE and the Adriatic to the SW, but this time we were looking
down on the calm seas. We passed Dubrovnik airport and noted the time, we will
fly out of this airport in a couple days. From our vantage point we could see
the old city of Dubrovnik and in no time were driving the road into town that
we had walked and biked a few days earlier.
At Marina Frapa we happily picked up our fed ex package, the
new membrane for our water maker, and headed back to Montenegro. At the border
there were no lines, quick stamps and no questions about having anything to
declare. We were in! I was feeling a little bit like a smuggler, but we have
been outlaws in Croatia, why not Montenegro.
In our travels the various people we interacted with were
curious about our election. At this point it was obvious that Trump would win.
In Croatia they were not happy to see him win, in Montenegro they were ambivalent,
maybe even glad to see him win.
Since we had a car, we decided to go to Porto Novi, this is
the yacht basin for the mega yachts. Commensurate with that were beautiful
condos and high end shopping. We walked the quay and took in the shops, but
there was nothing that we needed…or wanted.
I made a huge Frittata for dinner using up the foods we had left
on board.
11/7/24 Marina Luxure
Calm and cool with high wispy clouds. Today would be a busy
day wrapping up the boat chores and moving off the boat. The first order of
business was to change the oil in the engine. The biggest issue here was
finding a place to recycle the old oil. We checked with the marina staff who
were unsure but thought that for 120 euros the port captain could take it, not!
We still had the car, so we drove to several likely places, auto shop, boat
yard and auto parts store…no one new where to take it. A customer at the boat
yard said he simply finds a place to dump it. We did not do that, exactly, but
we did put the oil in someone else’s care.
The balance of the day was filled as we finished our
decommissioning and packing. We checked in to the hotel at the marina and made
ourselves presentable for an evening out with friends. We met up with Ray and
Alison from Australia and Patrick and Christine from the US at the Wine Bar in
the marina, Wine O’Clock. Wine, appetizers and lots of great cruising stories
made the evening pass to quickly. We will likely see these people in the spring
as they are spending the winter here in the marina.
Our hotel room was more like an apartment, very elegant and
spacious. Sleep came easy after a busy week.
11/8/24
One last trip to the boat to do a final check and unplug the
umbilical cords. A couple pictures of the boat and a farewell to Raffaellesco
until next season. We reflected that this was a very different trip this time
around. We enjoyed many anchorages and very few marinas. We covered less than
700 miles. We managed lots of sailing time and we had no drama at sea. As boat
adventures go this may have been boring to read about, but very relaxing and
enjoyable for us. We are hoping for the same kind of experience next season in
Greece.
We passed the last bit of groceries on to the neighbors, Ray and Alison. I gave Patrick my book, The Great Sea, as he seemed to be a history buff. We had a great brunch at the hotel, a beautiful buffet, not quite the Sunday brunch at the Coronado Hotel in San Diego, but fabulous.
We checked out of the hotel and waited for our driver who
was right on time for a noon departure. Like everything here, it was just a
little off, I was informed I should be looking for a Silver Mercedes driven by
Marko, instead it was a black Mercedes driven by someone else. Once we
confirmed this was our ride, we were on our way to Dubrovnik airport. The border
crossing was painless and we were at the airport on time. The flight was on
time and the weather for flying was perfect.
In Barcelona we found the train station at the airport and, with a little guidance, found that we already had a ticket for the local train to get us to our train to Madrid. We were running ahead of schedule, which was good because we missed our train stop in Barcelona and had to catch a local train back to the Barcelona Sants Station. Again, with a little guidance, we found our train to Madrid with minutes to spare. In the first-class coach we enjoyed roomy leather seats and food service making the 2 hours and 40 minute ride go by quickly. It was dark so we did not get to take in any scenery.
We arrived at Madrid Station on time and grabbed a cab for a
slow ride to our Airbnb, lots of traffic that we are not accustomed to lately.
We have found on several occasions in Europe that accessing our apartment is
not always easy, this was no exception. They had an automated system to get in
the building, but it seems that it was not working. We called the host, but I
think we got lip service when they said they would come and let us in, but it
would be a half hour. At 2300 I was not the most patient guest. Two more people
arrived to access the building, and they could not get in. Finally, a tenant
arrived with a key and surprisingly let us all in. I was quite happy to crawl
into bed after 12 hours of planes, trains and automobiles.
11/9/24 Madrid, Spain
Refreshed in the morning we walked to the train station
which turned out to be literally across the street, 5 minute walk. We scouted
out the station for where our departure train would be so we would be confident
in our timing when we left. Departure level, platform 6, easy.
Just north of the station we walked the Botanical Gardens, Real Jardin Botanico. It was a crisp fall morning, and the trees were displaying fabulous fall colors. You could walk for hours here and see such a variety of plants and trees, maples, oaks, pines and palms. From here we headed west into the shopping district stopping at a very cool little pub for a bite, Los Gatos. The fare was a wide variety of tapas, raw cod on toast with sundried tomatoes, dill pickle with sardine and sundried tomatoes, mushrooms, tomato and cheese on toast and a skew with a boiled quail egg, pepper, sardine and olives. A Mahon beer rounded out the snack. Suzette wanted a cappuccino so we stopped at a small café up the road.
From here it was shopping…Gran Via, Calle de Preciados and Calle de Fuencarral the three interconnected shopping avenues lined with great shops and beautiful buildings. We managed to find a few things, Suzette found what she was looking for, a new top for the Commodores Ball. There were a lot of familiar shops from our previous visit to Spain and a number of boutiques. Shopped out it was time to work our way home. We stopped at Cerveceria La Fabrica for delicious grilled octopus, marinated mussels and a glass of wine, all very tasty. The sun was setting as we arrived back at the apartment and dumped our bags.
Back on the street we went in search of a grocery store, it was a little hard to find one open on a Saturday night, but we did succeed. Coffee, fruit, wine and some nibbles for our room. We had been on the go for 9 hours. We were quite happy to crack a bottle of wine and watch a movie.
11/10/24 Madrid, Spain
A lazy morning before setting out in the town. We were on
our way to Parque de El Retiro, a huge city park, when we stumbled on a folk
festival forming up for a parade. The were colorful costumes, bagpipes,
drummers and dancing. We made our way to the park which is about 6 times the
size of the botanical gardens with a labyrinth of paths punctuated with
fountains and statues. The park is not as curated as the botanical gardens, but
it is very well maintained. Along the way there were various musicians playing,
very entertaining. At the north end was a large pond filled with people in
little row boats flitting about in the sunshine.
Departing the park on the north end we found ourselves in Salamanca , a district of high end homes and haute couture shops. It was fun to walk the Golden Mile, Calle de Serrano, Suzette’s latest mission was to find a unique coat. She came close in one of the shops, but I suggested that rather than carry it for the rest of the day we could come back for it. It turned out to be a shrewd move on my part as she decided it was probably not the right coat for what she wanted.
At the edge of this district is a wine bar called The
Library where we stopped for a glass of wine and a small bite, simply delicious,
Wagyu Pastrami Panini and a Mango, tomato, avocado salad to die for. The walls
were some 20 feet high with bottles of wine displayed to the rafters. I think
that my wino friends, Rob, EJ, John, and I could easily spend a 1000 euros
tasting wine in an afternoon at this place.
From here we went to The Museo de Prado and enjoyed the beautiful classic art, a few of my favorites, Rueban, Goya, Velasques to name a few. All the art had ties to Spain or Madrid. By the time we were finished here we had been out and about for about 8 hours walking everywhere. Time for a glass of wine and a comfortable sofa at the Apartment. The lights of the city were just coming on, presenting us with a whole new perspective on the city.
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