Hi from us in Morocco.
It has been a while since the last update but between being caught in storms and held up in marinas we had not travelled far.In the last entry we mentioned that the marina in Cascais was substancial which it is but with an 8 metre swell running the wall did not cope and huge waves broke over the wall and rushed into the marina causing yet some more difficulty. Again we came out with no damage but check out the pics and you can see it was a bit of a concern.
We stayed in Cascais for about 2 weeks and whilst we were there hired a car and went up to Peniche to check out the world surfing tour event which was awesome. We watched it for 3 days with the last day including the quarter finals, semis and the final which Kelly Slater won. The surf was a bit average the first 2 days and they moved the comp but the last day was excellent with good waves at super tubos and the surfers only about 20 meteres from the beach so close up action. I also managed to catch a few waves over the few days but strangely no crowds or photographers turned up.
After that we returned to Hullabaloo and sailed about 24 hours down to Lagos in Southern Portugal. This was pretty much a British holiday enclave with poms everywhere. Beautiful old town, great restaurants and beaches but also a good marina with a shipyard and extensive chandlery. We took the opportunity to get a few things done on the boat which included fitting wind vane steering and sorting out some electronics. An English friend, Ted Devey,whom we met earlier in Povoa sailed into the marina and helped us out which pretty much involved him fitting the wind vane with Craig as the assistant.
After a couple of weeks hanging out with our English friends the forecast was good and we set sail for Rabat in Morocco, a 40 hour sail and we have been here now for a week. The sail down was fantastic with 15 to 20 knots of following breeze. However there were a couple of hazards. At one point in the middle of the night whilst Julie was on watch I woke up to the boat rolling and heaving. I yelled out to Julie who said everything was fine which it was but when I went up on deck she was steaming along at 8.5 knots with a rolling confused sea. Half an hour later Wilson the bucket got a work out with Julie needing to hit the bunk and recover from a bout of sea sickness. We shortened sail and continued along at a more leisurely pace for the rest of the night. The other hazard was the heavy shipping traffic with about 100 ships coming and going into and out of the Med through the Strait of Gibraltar. Our Ais system and radar were working overtime!
Anyway we arrived safe and sound at Rabat and after a 2 hour customs exercise including a sniffer dog coming on board we tied up in the marina for a well earned rest. Rabat is an amazing city with crazy traffic, old town and new, mixture of run down areas and well kept, amazing crazy markets and new infrastructure going in everywhere,Arabic muslim religious chanting streaming out from mosques. A really interesting and enjoyable place.
The marina here has excellent security so we hopped on a train and headed to Marrakech for a few days which included a day trip to the Atlas mountains. Here we emersed ourselves in a weekly market with the Berber people streaming in from the surrounding mountains into the valley on donkeys and camels to pick up their weekly supplies. A short hike up to a waterfall and taking in the awesome views of villages nestled into hillsides and valleys was another highlight of the day. Marrakech itself is a manic place with a huge square at the centre packed with locals and tourists eating at the stalls and watching various busking type acts including the snake charmers which are a well known part of the scene down there.
Well now it`s pretty much waiting for Doug, our friend from Lorne who is due to arrive here on Thursday and as soon as the forecast looks good we will head to the Canary islands which is a 4 or 5 day sail. From there the long stretch of about 21 days across the Atlantic to the Caribbean.
A new lot of pics have been uploaded if you are interested.
Cheers from Craig and Julie on board Hullabaloo in Morocco
