Aeolian Islands

Salina to Sicily


23/07/06: Having spent the previous day, recovering from the passage across, with lots of swimming, watching the hydrofoils and ferries coming and going regularly between the islands and the mainland, we decided it was time to escape the swell created by these vessels and go ashore. The swell no doubt was exacerbated by where we had anchored, the bottom had shelved fairly quickly, but not having confidence in our anchor winches ability to deal with 10meters plus of depth, we had moved into shallower water of about 5m, which brought us close under a cliff between two short promontories, this had the combined effect of creating taller waves and we were caught by the wave as it came back after bouncing off the cliff. The holding was a mix of weed rock and gritty sand, and our anchor was nicely set into a clear batch of sand, so I was reluctant to move it. We launched ‘Bob’ by now using our trusted method of hauling the dinghy up, using the spinnaker halyard, swinger it over the guard wires, and lower into the sea, it is both easy and controlled, until that is you try doing it when the wind is blowing, when instead of it being nice and controlled, you end up with a dinghy swinging backwards and forwards trying to knock anyone in its way overboard, this we do have first hand experience of. However on launching ‘Bob’ we discovered a new problem, we had a leak, not only in the floor letting in water, but in the starboard tube. We pumped it up and went ashore to explore. The town of Santa Marina, is built on a slope, with what appears to be one main street, it is full of typical holiday type shops, selling loud shirts, lilo and fishing stuff, along with a couple of places selling diving gear. Along the high street, we found a couple of shops selling fresh provisions, so we stocked up with bread, drinks and fruit. Having spent a couple of hours walking round we returned to Dreamcatcher. That afternoon as the temperatures climbed we needed to keep cool the children cool without exposing them to the midday sun by swimming, we found the ideal solution, out came the hammock, which was rigged athwart ships from the shrouds, with the body passing under the boom, which meant it was covered by the cockpit tent, it became the children’s favourite spot, and that evening as we watched the setting sun turned Lipari a wonderful deep red colour, the children were ensconced side by side in the hammock, with Phoebe reading a book to Nick while he played with his stuffed toy gorilla. Later that evening I stood on the aft deck watching Stromboli in the far distance, as it occasionally lit up the sky with its pyroclastic display.



24/07/06 The wind got up a bit during the night, and I kept waking up in the night to peer out of the window to check that the marina lights were still where they should be. Sara had found things too hot in the cabin so had moved her bed up into the cockpit, where she continued to sleep for the next 7 days. Andre had told us about a small village of Lingua, at the foot of the island, where we thought his house was, so before it got too hot we went ashore and caught the bus to Lingua. Our journey ashore the previous day had acquainted us with the incredibly slippery boat launch ramp, even forewarned as we were dragging Bob out was a bit like watching a dog on ice, as our feet kept shooting out, and it was only by keeping a firm hold on the dinghy that we did not end up falling. After walking round a deserted Lingua for half an hour or so, we had drunk all our water, and the ubiquitous drinking water fountains you seem to find in all Italian towns, were not working, fortunately we found a shop selling cold drinks. Once re-hydrated and in some shade, I telephoned Fedirica to discover that she was in Santa Marina, however we arranged to meet at four o’clock that afternoon in Lingua. We waited patiently for the bus to take us back to Santa Marina and Dreamcatcher. Then we waited some more, and after about an hour a bus arrived. The distance from Lingua to Santa Marina just over 2 kilometres, but we did not fancy walking that far in the heat.

What a difference four hours make to an Italian village, we decided to go to Lingua

in Bob, and tied up behind a rock breakwater, to find the promenade full of people, and children playing in the sea. Fedirica appeared in a blowing Beach dress, draped and dragging an assortment of towels, and beach toys, while her two children were buzzing round her. We just added to the noise and confusion, as language obstacles were overcome, and the kids, dragged us all off to go swimming. As we picked our way gingerly across slippery sharp rocks, into the warm sea, the procedure to avoid nasty falls seemed to be to get into water half way up your shins, then semi float drag your way into deeper water. The kids didn’t understand this are tried to run and walk, with much falling over fortunately Phoebe and Nick had their lifejackets on, so survived the falls with only minor bumps. However the life jackets were a problem in there own right, Danieli who was younger than Nick, was a veritable fish in the water, and with his goggles on was happily diving down to the bottom to pick up rocks for his mother, our kids decided it was time for them to learn to swim. Into the confusion of trying to keep your balance, engage in conversation and keep an eye on the kids, there came Ros.

Ros, Frank and the their two children were the English Family living on Salina that Andre’ had told us about. Ros had been living on Salina for a couple of years while trying to write a book, while Frank an Antiques dealer, would fly back to London for a couple of days every month or so, to do some trading, Issy was a year older than Phoebe attended the local school, while Juno, who was the same age as Nick stayed at home with her mum. It took all of about one minute for the kids to get introduced and strike up friendships, it now became a near impossible task even with four adults to keep track of the six kids, as they climbed onto rocks and jumped into the sea, and ran around on the promenade. Ros was a fluent Italian speaker, and we found we had a willing interpreter, who helped with introductions to numerous people, and we found Salina had a number of English speaking Italians, some of whom had been living abroard and had now returned, however without the introductions by Ros and Federica we would just have been another group of tourists. We had many a confusing conversations swopping between Italian and English, which usually involved people being spoken to in the language they did not understand.

Once the kids had tired of swimming, we all went up to the promenade, where the adults conversations were interrupted regularly by, one or another of the children asking for something, or the sight of one of them suddenly appearing on a bicycle or scooter that they had just found, it seemed to be the norm that all the children came onto the promenade, with their toys, which then seemed to be fair game for anyone to play with until it was time to go home, when the children would get rounded up, relevant toys gathered up, and everyone bundle off. How the children found the time for these activities, as Juno and Izzy had set up a stall selling rocks they had gathered off the beach and painted with designs, Phoebe joined in the stall and spent her time trying to organise everyone. It was only later when Sara and I had time to confer that we realised that the mob, as a like to think of the children, had got themselves organised, and had managed to illicit numerous trips to the shop for drinks, granita’s (crushed frozen fruit drinks) or crisps, by trying approaching which ever of the adults was by themselves to ask for money.

After a pleasant laid back evening, during which we had arranged to meet the next day and go to Lipari on the hydrofoil, we returned to find Bob a bit flatter than when we had started, and had a bit of a windy, bouncy trip back to the anchorage in the dark, without any torches. Finding the anchorage was easy due to all the boats, finding Dreamcatcher was not, we had not anticipated returning after sunset and had not left an anchor light on, plus we were a lot further in towards land than the other boats, we went up and down the anchorage, until I recognised the lights of a catamaran that was moored close to us. It was a tired but happy crew of Dreamcatcher who went to bed that night.

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25/07/07 Todays trip to Lipari had to be cancelled, I had gone to check something in the engine room to find the bilge full of oily water, The stern gland was dripping and filled the bilge with water, it was not too worrying as I measured the drip rate and figured it would take three days to fill the bilge, but it was something we needed to keep an eye on. The water in the bilges was oily and I did not wish to empty my bilge this close to land, so we hauled up the anchor and ran before the wind, once we were over four miles from land we pumped out the bilge, stopping as soon as we saw a trace of oil on the surface. We decided to alter course and head towards the town of Lipari, passing between the islands of Lipari and Volcano. The crew soon all fell asleep, Phoebe in the hammock, Nick on his knees in the cockpit, and Sara while assisting with the lookout duties. I had a lovely sail slowly closing on the magnificent southern side of Lipari, and watching the fumes rising from the top of Volcano. We approached Lipari town but could not see anywhere to moor up, where we could just go to the shops and return without having to pay for the priviledge, so we returned to an anchorage Delle Genti. After four attempts to set the anchor in water deeper than we usually did, we give it up and headed back towards Salina, with a possible overnighter on Volcano. I had read about the supposed therapeutic effects of the sulphurous mud pools found on Volcano, on relieving the aches and pains of arthritis, so I was hoping to get a chance to visit the island. The harbour and main anchorage is on the East side of the island at Porto Di Levante, the name in it self is enough to make you wary, with another anchorage to the North at Cala Di Mastro Minico, with anchoring forbidden in the bay off Porto Di Ponente. However this is Italy so they bay off Ponente was filled with boats at anchor. We slowly nosed our way in, the bottom seemed generally free of rocks, sandy and gently shelving, we dropped our hook in 8 meters, and let out all 30 meters of chain, there was no wind or swell, it was open to the Northwest and North only, and if it did blow up, from their we could either nip round to the main anchorage or head back to Salina. We were close to some other boats and having watched some other boats come in, come to a stand still dump all of their chain, and just left the breeze set the anchor, we decided to rig fenders just in case any of the dragged during the night.



26/07/07 We woke the next morning, and I revisited the stern gland, looking at it more closely, A good nights sleep, had allowed me to recall some advice given to me by Paul about the stern gland, two minutes later the job was done no more leaking stern gland, now all I had to do was remember to loosen it off a bit before using the engine. We took Bob ashore to check out the town, the mud pools and find more fresh provisions. The town and the shops had a kind of scruffy, in a hippy kind of way, feel to it, but it seemed very relaxed. The island is most definitely on the backpacker route, with the ferries disgorging them in their droves, it was difficult to walk round near the ferry port without tripping over a rucksac or two. The town has boards up dealing with the emergency evacuation procedures in case of an imminent eruption, along with klaxons. Taking this all together, the backpackers, active volcanoes and natural therapies, probably helps explain the atmosphere, temporary, noisy, laid back and just generally cool.

With all this laid backness I was disappointed to discover that the free mud pools had been converted into a business, with fences and gates, but I suppose it had to be done to protect them from damage and over use. The children had been told that people are a bit smelly after using the mud pools, and we certainly passed a number of people with an overpowering rotten egg cologne, it seemed unfair to the other crew members to confine them in the boat with me smelling like that, so I elected not to play in the mud.



We returned to Bob, after first stopping at a shop to buy both Phoebe and Nick some goggles and snorkels. In short order Phoebe was swimming, The snorkel let her breath with her face in the water, and then her bottom came up and she was in the perfect swimming position, and Phoebe was off without any buoyancy aids. Nick was not quite there but he was trying. On our return to Dreamcatcher, I went to go speak to the crew of a Brit flagged boat to find out where they were going and had been. I was bit longer than expected, and Sara swam over to join us. The kids thought this looked fun, and wearing their lifejackets they swam back to Dreamcatcher with Sara.



The next morning we were up earlyish, to walk up a volcano. By the time we got ashore the it was getting warm. We walked out of the town heading towards the volcano, and found the entrance, a rickety fence and gate. We set off up the path, beginning to walk past a little hut, when we were hailed. We thought there might be problems with the kids ages. The man beckoned us towards his hut, and then proceeded to explain, while using a map to illustrate, ‘You walk up here, then you go this way. Do not go this way, you die. Then you come back the way you went. Ok have a good visit.’

And that was it. Safety briefing over off we went. The hill was a lot steeper than it looked, climbing over sharp volcanic ash. We passed a hut selling drinks, and kept going, then the going got harder. The path got steeper and as you walked you stirred up the dust, people coming back down stirred up even more dust, and every step forward you slid back half a step. The kids carried on, although we did have to have some stops. Round the next bend things got worse, the ash gave way to a pink coloured powder, that reminded me off face powder, touching it seemed to instantly dry your skin, and it was slippery. Still we went higher, the path got narrower, with gulleys erode by rain, then with a last effort, we arrived at plateau. Now we were on a moonscape, the ground was barren of vegetation but littered with rough edged grey rocks varying in size from loafs of bread to dog kennel size. We could seem yellow sulphurous gases coming out of the fumaroles, and we could at last seem the edge of the crater. The walking here was easy with fantastic views across to Salina and Lipari, the final 100 meters or so was covered quickly with excitement mounting, at last we were at the lip and able to stare down into the crater. Nick summed it up ‘Wow!’

The children were excited about having climbed a volcano, an active volcano. Although there were no lava flows, and the bottom of the crater looked like dried mud, we could see the sulphurous gases coming out of the ground, the scientists walking round in their white suites, measuring the gases and temperatures. We sat and looked down at Dreamcatcher and savoured the moment, and watched tour guides issuing respirators before taking their charges into the ‘You die’ area.

Getting down was lot easier apart from a really tricky part at the top, as we transitioned onto the face powder, where the gullies were. Our feet were sliding on the fine powder on the hard surfaces, with big drops off the edge. Phoebe, Nick and I all arrived at the refreshment hut in plenty of time to get our drinks before Sara finally arrived. Then it was straight back to the beach for some more swimming practice. We weighed anchor at 14:00, and at 17:00 after having we sailed close alongside the west side of Lipari, looking at the magnificent rock formations, and coves formed by the folds in the rocks we anchored back at nearly the same spot we had left at Salina. We were all straight into Bob and off to Lingua, for another pleasant evening.



28 July. The wind had picked up the previous day, while at Lingua, and we had had a bumpy, wet and exciting ride back. We woke up after a disturbed night as the wind continued to blow, we had planned on meeting Ros and the kids, but due to the wind we cancelled, and spent the day on board. Towards late afternoon I went snorkelling to check the anchor. I couldn’t find the anchor at first, as it was completely buried. At least I knew my anchor, and therefore our boats was not going anywhere.



29 July. Santa Marina shopping, while walking towards the town, I saw a young lad go past on a scooter, with his foot on an enormous tuna, draped across the foot plate, the tuna was so big it tail was dragging on the ground on one side with its nose grinding a groove in road on the other. Phoebe was upset about missing her only chance of seeing a tuna on a scooter, but she saw him fifteen minutes later when he came back, with slightly shorter tuna by now. We bumped into Ros and her family in town, and brought Izzy back to Dreamcatcher with us.

On our now regular evening journey to Lingua, we arrived at the beach at the same time as the wash from a hydrofoil, it completely swamped us. I was sat in a dinghy up to my waist in water, surrounded by giggling soaked kids, and frantically trying to keep my bag with the camera in out of the water. Sara was trying to get the kids out of the dinghy and I wanted her to take the bag, on the grounds that the kids were wet, not broken and not in any danger. The kids jumped out of the dinghy and ran off into town, while Sara and I unloaded the dinghy, removed the outboard, and used our hands to bail out, a dinghy full of water is very, very heavy.

When we finished we walked into Lingua, without the faintest idea where our kids were, we must have been coming to Lingua fairly often, as a couple of men sat on their boxes greeted us. We returned to Dreamcatcher in the dark, having once more forgotten to turn on the anchor light before departure. It took us bit longer to find Dreamcatcher this time, as we mistook a new arrival as the boat closest to ours.



30 July Another windy night, requiring another swim to the anchor, it had moved! It was now facing in another direction and had moved about two feet. I swam back to Dreamcatcher and hung off the anchor chain, I was amazed by how much Dreamcatcher moved with the wind. While at anchor we leave the mizzen up, and as the wind blew, it would power up the sail, and we would move forward with surprising speed until the mizzen brings the head to wind, then the boat drops back slowly until the next wind shift starts it all over again.

We were invited to Ros and Franks for meal, the kids bouncing all over Dreamcatcher in their excitement, we gave in and went to Lingua early. We meet up with Fedirica and Ros, and were waiting for Frank who was doing the cooking. There was an art competition which all six children joined in, it got a bit chaotic at prize giving, with loads of kids pushing and shoving, but Nick won a star prize of a Pizza and drink at the local restaurant, he was not happy, he wanted a water pistol like the one Juno had won.

While waiting for Frank to arrive we were once more expertly fleeced by the kids for drinks, crisps and icecreams. The art competition ended at about 19:00, with no sign of Frank. I was beginning to get hungry. 20:00 still no sign of Frank, or of Ros getting ready to move. 20:30 I am now leeting the kids buy crisps in order to nibble some for myself. 21:00 OK maybe we have got this wrong, is it tonight, was it an actual invite, or have we misunderstood. 21:30 Ros stands up time to go, at last, we gather up all the kids and head off, but first we have to stop to pick up another couple. We then wind our way up a footpath to Ros and Franks, where Franks appears from inside his tiny outside kitchen, hair plastered to his face. While the kids run round on the open terrace, and we sit round in the warm evening, Frank disappears back into the sweatbox, it must have been a very unpleasant experience for him, in the tiny room, with a small window and a hot cooker.

The meal was lovely, and we finally rounded up our kids and left at 01:00. Along the way we pasted the other guests who had left before us, having a conversation with a family on a balcony, it appeared as if no one went to sleep in this town. The kids had done really well and despite the lateness of the hour, there had been no arguments, and they walked back to Bob without complaint, although Phoebe did admit to falling asleep in Bob on the way back.



31 July Pumping up Bob before going ashore, I heard a tearing noise followed by a loud bang, it took me a while to realise that and internal baffle had blown. I set off in to go get some fuel for Bob, the engine kept cutting out, but by wiggling the engine from side to side I made it to the entrance of the harbour, from where I had to row the rest of the way to the slipway. With the coming of August every one was heading off, Ros and Frank to the UK, Federica back to Rome, it was time for us to say goodbye and head off towards Greece. Eva and Hokan, our friends from Port Saint Louis, had contacted us to let us know they were in Sicily, looking at the charts it was a small detour on the way to Greece.



01 August, we weighed anchor at 09:50, and left our holiday island, and set off towards Sicily. I pulled the winding arm out of my watch and bent it. It was not worth fixing, I asked the kids if I should throw it in the sea, they said yes, so in it went, only to have Nick burst in to tears, it turned out he wanted to keep it to play with it. The entrance to Capo Orlando is tricky as there is a large sand bar across the entrance, which is marked by a bouy, a green bouy, we had not seen a navigation bouy since leaving Port Saint Louis, it took us a while to realise that this meant we had to pass on the far side of the bouy. At 17:15 we were moored up alongside the Viking pirates, after they had had to move their boat to make way for us.