Cartagena to La Linea

Hi everyone,

We arrived in La Linea last night after a 60 hour passage from Cartagena.  We had a great 9 day stay there.  The stay was quite social and we enjoyed further exploring the city.  The passage to La Linea was good for the Med with 2/3 of the time sailing.  We had some great sailing, and some challenging sailing too.  Two knots of adverse current while sailing downwind in 25 knots of breeze produced a very unpleasant sea state.  We also came upon an abandoned inflatable boat.

Abandoned Boat

We took the first reasonable weather window from Cartagena after waiting a week for a package which didn't materialise.  The weather window promised at least 36 hours of easterly breeze.  The breeze came in 6 hours after we departed Cartagena.  The track below shows we crossed the shipping lanes twice.  That kept us busy!  Once north of the lanes again we stayed so, gybing north to remain clear of the traffic.

Track

The graphs below show many things but the most interesting is the current we experienced.  The current is well known to flow strongly into the Med through the Gibraltar Straits.  The current flow extends well into the Med.  We had up to 2.5 knots of current against us for the second half of the passage.  This included the period in which we had 25 knots of easterly.  To make things even more interesting we sailed over a sea mount.  Even at 300m deep it seemed to significantly affect the sea state.

Graphs

The speeds graph below clearly shows the adverse current which added 32nm to the passage, or about 6 hours.

Boat Speed and Ground Speed

And here are the vital stats for the passage…

    • Distances/Speeds

        • Route Distance = 244nm

        • Logged Distance = 309nm

        • GPS Distance = 277nm

        • Duration = 2d12h (60 hours)

        • Average boat speed = 5.1 kt

        • Average speed over ground = 4.6 kt

        • Minimum boat speed = 3 kt

        • Maximum boat speed = 8 kt

        • Note the 32 nm lost to adverse current!

    • Weather

        • Minimum wind speed = 0 kt

        • Average wind speed = 15 kt

        • Maximum wind speed = gusts to 31 kt

        • Apparent wind angle range = 0 to 150

        • Seas up to 2m

        • Swell up to 2m

        • Mostly clear skies with a full moon!

    • Engine

        • Total = 22 hours (37% of passage)

We departed Cartagena in very light winds.  After about 4 hours motoring we spotted what appeared to be a drifting boat.  We altered course to investigate and found it was a new-looking inflatable boat, about 7m in length.  There was no one aboard, no motor, clothes lying in the bilge and one oar.  A set of numbers were painted on the hull.

We called Cartagena Radio and gave them its position and description.  They called us back saying we could proceed on our passage.  We inferred the boat had been intercepted and people (and the engine) taken off by the Spanish coastguard.  They probably painted the numbers.

Farewell Cartagena

A couple of hours later we had a sailing breeze which steadily filled in to become a 20-25 knot easterly. We gradually reefed down until we had a trisail-sized main (2 reefs in our cruising main) and three furls in the yankee.  Initially we were doing 6+ knots over the ground.  Gradually this reduced to 4 knots as we entered the adverse current.  We used the WindPilot for much of the passage and it handled the difficult conditions beautifully.

WindPilot in charge and lovin' it

On our second evening at sea we were joined by a pod of small dolphins.  They stayed with us all night and reappeared the following evening as we approached Gibraltar.  It's always nice to have a friendly escort!

Small Dolphin Leaping

Still Leaping at Sunset

On day 3 the winds gradually died and the engine eventually went back on.  With our diesel supplies running low we transferred our last jerry contents into the main tanks.  We've been running down our fuel level so as to refill cheaply in Gibraltar.

Approaching Gibraltar

We motored quietly into Gibraltar Bay mid-evening.  Twas interesting avoiding everything from large cargo vessels coming to anchor to tiny fishing boats.  We anchored off Alcaidesa Marina for the night.

Dawn anchored off Alcaidesa Marina, La Linea

This morning we motored around to Gibraltar's fuel jetty and took on 180 litres of diesel.  Now we're heading out of the Med our full 240 litres should keep us going for some time.  From the fuel dock we returned to Alcaidesa and entered the marina.

Refuelling @77p/litre

We expect to stay here in La Linea for a week or so.  Hopefully our packages will catch up with us - we're looking forward to having a working RodKicker again!