Month: October 2023 (Page 1 of 2)

We are not going to suffer for want of fresh fruits and veggies this winter season. I took fellow cruiser Kristy to one of the local Tivat produce markets. It’s in a dank and dark underground basement-like area, which doesn’t look nice but it means that vendors & customers can come regardless of weather conditions. They set up their goods every day except Saturday. I’ve been going to the same woman who kindly always tucks a couple of extra apples in my bag after I pay. Shopping on a daily basis isn’t a chore when these are the conditions.

We didn’t have the chance to explore the coast of Montenegro as we had to come straight into the bay of Tivat to clear-in a month ago, so we decided to hop a bus one day and head over (it would have taken a day to get there by boat, but only an hour by bus).

Budva, at 2,500 years old, is one of the oldest towns on the Adriatic coast. Founded by the Illyrians, it has undergone Greek, Roman, Serbian, Ottoman, French, Austrian, and Venetian rule, all of which are apparent in the Stari Grad (old town). Budva is actually a huge modern city, but we don’t have much use for casinos, fancy hotels, and ritzy beach bars, so we focused on the old town which is manageable in an afternoon.

The old city is right on the waters edge, surrounded by typical high stone walls and includes a citadel and a few churches. It’s like a maze wandering through the streets. We were very much reminded of Kotor, though hipsters have definitely moved into Budva, judging by the trendy little shops.

Though there were plenty of tourists, we pretty much had the citadel and the local history museum to ourselves . It’s evident that the season is coming to a close, and we were lucky not to be fighting the crowds.

Budva suffered a lot of damage in 1979 from an earthquake, but you wouldn’t know it from the detailed rebuilding that preserved the original structures.

We love the Buddha Bar music collections, but have never actually been to one of the bars in person. Little did we know Porto Montenegro has their own right next to the marina. I can only imagine how crowded this place must be during the summer, but at the end of the season the place was nearly empty and we had it all to ourselves for a couple of gin & tonics at the end of the day.

When we first came into the marina, a marinero helped us pick up the slime lines that run from cleats on our stern to chains and anchor points on the sea bed. He also helped us tie off our bow to cleats on the dock. That, combined with plenty of fenders on either side of us, should lock us into position for the season. However, a week later with moderate gusts into the 20’s one night, the boat was moving back and forth way too much for our liking. Knowing that Montenegro routinely experiences much higher winds in the form of the ‘bora’ that blows from the north/northeast, we needed a tighter tie down.

Trip contacted the office and two marineros came immediately. They used our winches to get even more of the slime lines out of the water. They used a trick of standing on the bow lines to make the boat slide forward, and then quickly take in the slack. Trip added chafe guard and snubbers to protect the lines. We also added spring lines.

We slept through the next storm (gusts in the 30s, maybe 40s), snug as a bug this time.

We were also happy to later learn how responsive the marineros are. The marina had already sent out an email blast asking boat owners to take precautions for the upcoming storm. Trip notified them of a neighbors boat that was swinging in the wind (the owner had flown back to the UK), and they came over immediately to better secure the boat. Things like that make me much more confident about leaving the boat this winter.

We are in a part of the world that many friends and family still say ‘Where??’, and go look it up on Google maps. But one of them happened to stop here on a cruise up the Adriatic Sea! Trip’s cousin Britt and friends made a stop in Kotor (which is only a ten minute drive from here). We took a bus over while they were doing a walking tour of the old town, and then we all piled in taxis so that they could see Tivat. We had a fabulous lunch on the waterfront, strolled past the mega yachts in the marina, showed them Kalyra, and then just sat and relaxed with cocktails. It was much too short a visit, but I love that the Salander family keeps finding us in some of the more uncommon places in the world (Mark [Britt’s brother] and his wife Minda were with us a year ago in the Azores – another place that invites ‘Where??’).

One of the things that really attracted us to Porto Montenegro was the vibrant winter live aboard group. Though we don’t spend the entire winter on the boat, we stay well into November and come back in March to explore more. The entire winter crowd isn’t even here yet, but we’ve been slowly meeting new neighbors.

We’ve got both a FaceBook group and a WhatsApp group for letting each other know about logistics and events. One of those important events is Curry Night. Every Wednesday night, the local cruisers message a local Indian restaurant their orders, and then we all show up for dinner. The inaugural event for the season had more than 30 people turn up! (We were told the final event last year had 120 people.). And the best part was that Trip, who historically has had a bad reaction to curry, can now eat Indian food with no ill effects!

It’s October and we’re settled for the winter! It’s become quite difficult to find a winter berth in the Med, for a few reasons: We have to cope with Schengen rules (90 days in, and 90 days out of most EU countries). That leaves limited places where we can winter the boat and feel free to stay on board. In the past, Croatia, Turkey, Montenegro, Tunisia, Albania were all options in the eastern Med. However, Brexit meant that British boats are no longer free to winter in Schengen waters and have increased the competition for slots in these limited places. Croatia entered Schengen this year and took themselves out of the running. Albania simply doesn’t have the infrastructure for what I consider a safe and comfortable winter experience (yet – it’ll be there in a few years). Demand for Turkey has skyrocketed (Brexit, Russian boats no longer permitted in the EU with the war, inflation, etc) and prices are now exorbitant. That left us with Tunisia and Montenegro. By chance, last winter (January 2023), Trip and I came across two videos and blogs from cruisers staying in Porto Montenegro. We had never heard of the place, and it was wildly more expensive than what we would normally pay (with far more upscale services than we would use). But as we began researching our options we realized: a) Montenegro made the most sense given our sailing plans, b) The history, ancient cities, and landscapes were amazing, and c) Options were running out fast due to demand! As it was we booked our berth back in February and there were only two berths left (we would have normally done so mid-summer with far less pressure). Porto Montenegro it was.

We’ve never stayed in a luxury mega yacht marina, and probably never will again, so we are making the most of it! We got a special offer of; pay-for-6 months, get-one-month-free, so our contract started October 1. We came in a few days later because we didn’t know if there would be a rush, and the weather was so nice why not stay out at anchor. (And maybe I calculated how many clean clothes we had left before I needed to do laundry and I’m tired of doing wash by hand!).

Med-mooring would be a new thing for us. We use marinas infrequently, and in the past we’ve always had a side pontoon or finger dock to tie onto. With med-mooring, you back into a slip, tie off your stern on either side to the dock, and take ‘slime lines’ (named for the marine growth as they sit under the surface many a day) that run parallel to your boat, and tie them off at your bow (they are attached to a heavy chain running parallel to the dock). We have too much COTB (crap on the back) like our low davits, solar panel, wind vane, so we need to go in bow first.

A marinero (generic term for a boat handler within a marina) guided us in by dinghy (we had also already been round to the marina office and studied the map of the docks to know exactly where we would be going). We passed by mega yachts (more on that later) and what I call the mini-megas (the big boats wanting to be mega yachts but not quite qualifying – still enormous to us).

Eventually we turned into our row and came into the pontoon. Tying off the bow was easy enough, hand the lines to the marinero on the dock and he wraps them around the cleat and hands them back (so you can control all aspects of securing the boat from the boat). The slime lines were a little trickier. The smell and feel of the slime was awful (I had been warned to wear gloves but forgot). And we just simply couldn’t get the boat straight in the slip, she was sitting cock-eyed. We tugged and tugged and finally gave up, she was tight and we were locked in. We were home for the winter.

Topaz had already left for Croatia, but Juventa and CaMaLa were in Risan. We hadn’t been to that part of the Bay of Kotor yet, so off we went. There wasn’t much wind, but we were able to set the jib and make 3 knots. As we passed Our Lady of the Rocks (a church on a tiny island in the middle of the bay), we realized that there was a wedding going on. They were in the midst of photos, and we were going to be part of the background – good thing we were looking shipshape!

Risan is an ancient town, that people don’t know much about, and very few remains exist because of a devastating earthquake centuries ago during which most of the town slid into the sea. Remnants of a Roman villa, with beautiful tile work, is one of the few pieces of history that remain. The villa was walled off to create the Mosaic Museum.

After the ruins we walked through a local park and explored one of the churches.

Risan also has one of the best Sunday markets we’ve experienced. (Good thing, as stores are closed on Sundays.). I stocked up on lots of produce, and splurged on their local prosciutto, which is sliced to order. I was excited to pick up cranberries, which I later discovered had pits/seeds that made cooking a sauce a very labor intensive process!

Greece was calling to George, so we had a final movie night onboard Juventa, and then headed back to Kalyra, where we tested out our new chain in 30 knot gusts from the katabatic winds that race down the mountain every night (no surprise, anchor held).

Unfortunately, our luck ran out with the toilet the following morning. Instead of a leisurely day ashore, Trip was hunched over the toilet dissembling everything he had put back together in the boat yard. It was a long, hot, smelly job, but such is boat life some days….

The boat had not been out of the water in two seasons, and she was due for some TLC. There is a boat yard just 5 minutes from where we are wintering that is expensive, but has a phenomenal reputation. Seven crew members met us at the well, and we were hoisted out of the water in no time. Milos started pressure-washing the bottom immediately (desperately needed as we had gotten lazy about cleaning the bottom this summer). I did get some rather nice shots of the marine growth that had occurred in the last few months. This is particularly amazing when you consider that the hull had been cleaned by a diver back in April, and the waters that we were in this summer were some of the hottest on record. There’s hope for life during climate change, even if it’s not human life.

We went out for pizza with another American couple prepping their boat for the winter, and by the time we came back the boat was on jackstands and ready to go. We dropped the anchor first and played out all the chain, as we were getting rid of the old and getting new. I set to work painting the new chain (it gets painted in 20 foot increments so we know how much is out, as different conditions and depths require different amounts).

Unfortunately, Trip realized that all the supporting wood in the anchor locker had fallen apart. The yard foreman put him in touch with the on-site carpenter who stopped what he was working on and cut all the pieces that we needed. This was a huge relief to us, as unplanned jobs can take hours or days to source and this was none of that.

Despite the full day, we managed to shower and head back into town (only a 5€ taxi ride) for a final dinner with Topaz, CaMaLa, and Juventa crew. The wine and stories flowed, and we were able to relax for a few hours. Then it was back to the grind the next day.

The yard was painting the boat bottom (Yay! The first time in 13 years that it wasn’t my job!), so we went to work on other projects. We disassembled the toilet and rid the hoses & fittings of calcification buildup. I scraped and varnished the cockpit coaming. I scrubbed the deck and filled the water tanks. Trip rebuilt the anchor locker, spliced an 30’ length of line to the new chain (which we then reloaded), and reassembled the toilet. I painted the prop with a special anti-foul paint, and changed the zincs on the rudder and the prop.

We also had arranged for a welder to come by. Our augmented davits had both cracked during the season, and after scolding us in Montenegrin for using too thin pipe, he welded plates in place to reinforce the tubing.

There’s not much for restaurants since we were on the outskirts of town, so the second and third nights (with Loki second time) we ate at a Turkish restaurant. It turns out the family had lived in Chicago for 14 years, so we traded lots of stories about the US. They plied us with lots of rakia (white lightening moonshine), beer, and meat. Trip nearly adopted a kitten who took to him immediately and fell asleep in his arms after dinner.

And just like that, we were done. We had worked hard for three days, and the yard came through in every way. They run a top notch operation and we were both impressed and grateful. Next thing we knew, we were back in the slings, lowered into the water, and they were waving us off as the next boat waited to come in.

The eastern Mediterranean, especially up here in Montenegro is famous for their storms. The mountains can stir up some incredible localized storms that come out of what feels like nowhere. We had come back to the Tivat anchorage and were having drinks onboard Juventa with George watching one such storm approach. We barely made it back to Kalyra in time. In a matter of seconds we were slammed with 55 knots of wind and rain. The dinghy had her lines attached, but we had not had time to hoist her, so I was letting the painter (line) in and out to control her movement while Trip managed the helm of the boat. Three of us at anchor dragged about 50 feet and then our anchors all managed to reset. The storm passed in about 20 minutes and we were able to hoist the dinghy. Then round two of the storms hit. It brought less wind (gusts only into the 30s) but a lot of fetch this time from the other end of the bay. We were pitching and rolling, but again, things calmed after 30 minutes. The final storm brought much less wind, but the horizontal lightning had the sky completely alight at 1 AM. It was a truly exhausting night, but we all made it with no damages, just tired bodies and fried nerves.