Croatia. Having over 1,000 islands is regarded by many as one of the best
places on earth for sailing. Exploring Croatian in the winter means tranquil
solitude on the water, but that comes at a cost of extreme winter weather. In this
episode, together we will brave over 60 nautical miles across the eternally
transient Adriatic Sea.
We're anchored just off of Dugi Otok. It's an island in Croatia. We're anchored
just outside of this small village of Luka. This is our second day here. We're
in the middle of a storm. There hasn't been really much rain at all but the
wind has been geting up to 30-32 knots coming from the South, pretty
intense so we're just sitting here on anchor. It's been a nice anchor all
things considered. We're nice and protected in this Bay so we're not
getting hit with any waves. We're just getting blown around a lot. It's kind of
like being in a log cabin in the woods during a snowstorm you just hang out
inside crank up the fire. We're now close to
96 hours since we've touched land.
After two days on anchor here weathering the storm the weather has cleared up. The
wind is now coming out of the opposite direction it's coming out of the north
and we are going to head out of here sail through the National Park and then
go find an anchorage because it looks like this evening and tomorrow we'll
have heavy weather again and it looks like we should be clear for the day.
We are headed through this channel into Kornati
National Park.
We marveled as we peacefully sailed through this natural wonder. Kornati National
Park boundaries stretch near 19 nautical miles enclosing 89 islands. The Kornati
Archipelago is the densest group of islands in the whole of the Mediterranean.
We set the main and headed east northeast towards our next anchorage
just off the island of Posma.
The rain is coming. We have about two miles.
We might get wet.
On arrival we found some open moorings which we gladly tied off
to. The sound went dead on this clip so let me explain what I'm explaining. We
dropped the sails and we turned on the engine to motor into the bay.
Wind picked up to over 20 knots and it began to rain. As we were headed full
bore into the bay I found the throttle was more attached
to my hand than it was the throttle. The screw that held it in place had
sheared. Thinking and moving fast we were able to wedge a screw into the shaft. Now
we don't have another exact screw so we have a temporary fix that works although
the throttle has some wiggle room.
Open the clutch to let the mainsheet run free.
Alright, that feels good. It feels like we just picked up some speed.
We're sailing! Five knots. Five knots? Five and a half. Almost six.
Seven knots. Six and a half, seven knots.
Heavy weather sailing no doubt about that. We did nineteen point nine nautical
miles in three hours and 45 minutes. This first experience with that much wind.
In Croatia you have short fetch so the waves don't have a long distance to develop so
you get these steep waves that are really close together so you would get
just get tossed around a lot. That was intense.
That was awesome! We just went through a really intense windy storm, probably
about 35 knots and just super wavy. We got splashed in the face a
bunch of times and I think we were the only sailboat out there. It was
absolutely incredible, just such a fun ride. A good day.
We're all dry. We kept dry
with our heavy weather gear so now the only thing left to do is to...
start a fire. That one's a little green. *laughter*
It's about nine thirty seven. Last night we anchored off of the island of Kaprije.
We are sailing to Sibenik today and that is an inlet. It's kind of like
a lake almost and then we'll be anchoring in fresh water in a
freshwater lake. It's a 15-mile sail should take three hours. Wind is blowing
about 10 to 15 knots out of the Northeast so we'll have to beat windward.
We'll only have to do that one tack that we already did. We'll take this pretty
much all the way less than a mile to the entrance of Sibenik then from there we'll
drop the sails and motor.
After eight days on Arianrhod we were elated to see the city of Sibenik.
As you're making way into Sibenik, you can see a few of these tunnels which
were built by the Yugoslav army this one specifically is referred to as Hitler's Eye.
We are in Sibenik just got fuel somewhere around four hundred four
hundred and fifteen dollars but we're full on diesel full on petrol. We're
gonna move the boat back, leave the boat, go do some laundry, get some food
provision. As soon as we start going up here we should hit fresh water and so
then we'll be boating in fresh water which will be a absolute first for
Arianrhod, I think. I don't think, I don't know if Andre's been here. Not sure.
Thank you for watching and subscribe to join us next time as we make our way through the
fresh water up to the quaint town of Skradin. Big Love.