Spain

Sailing the Mediterranean Sea

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Friends of ours were going sailing on Sunday and invited us to come along. Sunday was a beautiful sunny day with a nice breeze, perfect for sailing.  We headed down to the marina to meet them and go out onto the Mediterranean sailing for the day.

The marina in Alicante
The marina in Alicante

We arrived around 11 a.m. and climbed aboard the “Hegaldi” sailboat. Mike and Liz were preparing the sailboat for the launch. We wanted to help but not knowing anything about sailing we were more of an observer than a worker.

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Mike preparing to launch the sailboat

Once we were underway it was a slow maneuver out of the large and crowded marina. There are boats of every  shape and size in the marina.

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Different boats in Alicante Marina

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Once we were out of the harbor Mike and Liz raised the sails and we were underway. We stayed within sight of the coastline and sailed east. The water in the Mediterranean sea is a beautiful azure colour.

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Azure colour of the Mediterranean Sea on coastline of Alicante

It was such a peaceful and quiet way to travel on the water. There was only the sound of the waves lapping at the boat and the wind in the sails. We travelled around six or seven knots on average and had a beautiful view of the coastline.

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Shelley and Ray with the coastline in the background

We sailed for approximately two hours and then anchored at a nice beach area. We enjoyed lunch on the boat and chatted for a while before heading back to Alicante. On the way back Mike gave us the helm and let us steer the boat, (not really there is an autopilot that kept the boat going the right way) but it made for a good picture.

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Ray pretending to sail the boat

Like any good team, my co-pilot also gave it a try.

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Shelley at the wheel of the boat.

We had an enjoyable sailing trip and saw the Alicante coastline from a different vantage point. I brought along my brand new selfie stick and tried it out. Mike and Liz were good sports and let me take lots of pictures.

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Ray, Shelley, Mike and Liz sailing on the Mediterranean sea

We were sailing for about four hours and the sun was quite hot. When we finished sailing and docked the boat we decided to head to a local bar for a nice cool and relaxing drink.

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Ray, Shelley, Mike and Liz at local bar having a nice drink

The bartender was quite attentive and generous with the alcohol. There was plenty of gin in the gin and tonics.

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The bartender poured the gin and tonics using a  freehand guess as to an ounce of gin. He wasn’t very good at guessing correctly.

We finished off our drinks and said our goodbyes. It was a wonderful day and very enjoyable.

“Adios y que tenga un gran dia”

3 thoughts on “Sailing the Mediterranean Sea”

  2. Lovely Yacht. I skippered it from La Rochelle to Alicante with Terry and his Partners on board as crew.
    Happy Sailing to you both.

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