Petra

Great night on the bouy my favourite way to moor. That wild bay feeling without the anchor stress ⚓😎. Then headed to a bay to have our last swim before heading home. Way too many rocks and steep drop offs so we tried another bay. same thing! 🪨. Third bay lucky we made pancakes on the boats BBQ and tried out the fender swing! 🎉. The trip back to base was a little rough with gusts up to 30 knots and 1.5 metre waves, fun dodging the rolly waves though. Back safe and sound an amazing holiday 🥰

We planned to head to Panarea but soon realised it was hidden by rain and forecast thunderstorms. We then decided to do a lap of Lipari but soon realised the north was also covered in rain clouds and after bashing through some 2m waves we decide to point in the direction of 🌞. First mooring bouy of the trip! Standard hams and cheeses lunch then off to black sand beach. Beers and swimming in the waves while watching the sunset 🌄. Perfect day!

Our new friend Claudio helped with our morning decisions. The original plan to sail to Salina needed a change - getting out in winds gusting over 25 was not going to be our sailing story! So instead we decided to play around in the bays! A lovely barbie for lunch and many backflip attempts later, we saw the signs from the skies to head back! Koya brought us in beautifully and an evening of chilling awaits 💛

Anchor night went well for us, anchor held just fine and we dropped in sand so no worries this morning when picking it up. Bad weather for the day meant that we had to motor but we also got rain. Still managed to make some pancakes on the hot plate at the back of the boat though. We got into Lipari for some shelter for a couple of nights, the weather shifted a bit so we got some rain but no storms. We are meant to have big winds today and tomorrow morning though. Lipari centre was very cute, little shops and restaurants, cool bars.. despite being out of season things are still open as the island has a population of 10,000

Sooooooo last night was pretty rolly but we woke up to a much calmer bay 🥰. After watching sunrise we had a Cappuccino ashore for breakfast, a stroll around the sulphuric rocks and a look at the black beach. BBQ as Salina in a very beautiful but quite rolly bay, after which we decided to take a look at Fillicudi. Yesterday 10 minutes into our trip we saw 4 dolphins. Today I saw a puff of mist on the horizon and seconds later a beautiful big tail. We saw a sperm whale! Tonight a beautiful spot on Anchor ⚓. Best set an ⏰!!

Headed to the Aeolian islands today!! Strong crew of 5 day Skippers + 1. Very proud to see Koya, Petra and Audrey on the first trip together as Day Skippers, after sailing with them from their first trip as Comp Crew through many holidays to now. :-) We had a choice of anchoring in a very busy bay that would be dark as we arrived or play it safe on a bouy but with some rolly swell. We picked the bouy, as we were 10 minutes out however and already too late to make the bay they canceled on us! So we have ended up on an even more exposed rolly floating pontoon :-/. All good though, settled in and planning a Sunrise stroll around Vulcano at 06:30 tomorrow 🌅

The last day of the course! Always sad to depart a boat after so many fun filled days together with the crew. Was a great five days especially practicing doing everything under sail. 😍⛵️

This was fun! Pretty incredible to see the cruise ships close up at night. They are monsters!

Day 3 of the guys Day Skipper. I’m just along for the ride but had lots of fun today! Did some great skills under sail - On and off of buoys etc. got a better appreciation of checking that you can de-power the main - And how to adjust your course if you can’t. Spill and fill is great to control your speed on the approach. Remember: - Close hauled on the headsail, main sheet off, kicker off when putting in or taking out Reef - Beam reach when putting in / taking out headsail. - When sailing onto a bouy, sail into tide. If wind is behind the beam use headsail if forward use main.

Second day was filled be navigation practices! Found it quite challenging to spot the buoys and landmarks as we were sailing through the channel but managed to jibe through it ⛵️ We also did some man overboard practice in the afternoon!