We have vowed never to winter again....
Watching the bottom of the boat grow barnacle encrusted green stringy weed is not inspiring. January and February was cold, wet and windy, not freezing, but cold enough. 4 children and 2 adults in a confined space (albeit in a spacious confined space) with the rain and wind belting on the coach roof, and the nights of a clammy cold bed with condensation dripping from the windows certainly puts a strain on the family. Relationships between all become fragile. But yet being in close proximity to the family enables the fragile ness to be attended to, and issues to be resolved in a close way. I will attempt to summarise the 5 or 6 months spent in Malta; the highs and the lows, the way of life on board, our friends - the other live a boards, in general: the life of “Dolphins” in Malta.
We arrived at the end of October and the last logbook suggested that we might stay in Malta and move on to Tunisia after Christmas. We decided to stay in Malta for the whole time. It worked out cheaper to pay for a full 7 months in Malta rather than to pay for 2 months in Malta then 4 months in Tunisia. We also heard too many stories about the need for bribing and back-handing in Tunisia. We also had our good friends Ocean Breezes in Malta. The weather seemed pretty good.
Most days are the same in general; School in the morning, a walk in the afternoon, Dinner followed by Games and then bed. I sometimes wonder why we have stopped though. The weather is November and December was warm and the winds are variable and moderate. Sometimes it blows from the NW and the next few days it could be from the SE. This in my mind makes for great sailing and passage making. There have been a few “blowey” days when the wind has been over 30 knots. But nothing that hasn’t been forecasted at least 24 hours before hand.
First some bits and pieces on wintering;
Condensation
When it rains it becomes damp below due to the condensation build up. We have found that the storage lockers under the berths become slightly mouldy. (Nothing bad that a tidy out and clean wont solve). Using Gas to cook when it is cold and wet causes the condensation inside, not to mention the breathing and sweaty bodies. Various solutions have been discussed over dinner and on the pontoon with Ocean Breezes and other boats. The usual approach is to sleep with doors and windows open, which is fine for weekend or weeks sailing with a hardy crew prepared to sleep in their clothes in there sleeping bags. When living aboard it needs a few more “home” comforts like being able to sleep with the door closed (and even locked sometimes).
So the remedy hot on my mind during the winter was to line the hulls where the lockers are with carpet or polystyrene sheets (maybe even with those mats that you sleep on when camping). By all accounts this will insulate the hull (where it is most cold) and will stop the condensation forming in the lockers. This will also stop moisture from collecting under the bunks, which, although are slatted to provide ventalation, will reduce the mattresses from becoming damp. The next thought is to get solar powered extractor fans for the hatches. This should constantly extract the damp air from the boat. They are about 50 pounds each and one in each cabin would suffice. Unfortunately the hatches in the aft cabins are too small to accommodate the vents, so maybe just the forward cabins……? I have bought stainless steel vent covers for all the cupboards and storage lockers. These are 6 inch diameter stainless steel vents that screw over a 6 inch diameter hole to be cut in the top and bottom of each locker. A job to be done…. Another thought is to ventilate the whole boat with cowl vents from the front of the boat out through the aft. The preferred method is to vent the boat through the Anchor locker so that in the event of so called “Solid water” coming on the boat that this water will flood the anchor locker rather than the cabin. (Water becomes solid when it travels more than x miles an hour, usually found in crashing breaking waves in severe storms. – I don’t recall what x is, and don’t intend experiencing it.) By having the Cowl vent in the anchor locker and then the boat vent high up inside the locker, this should prevent water from draining into the boat. This would allow good airflow through the boat extracting the damp air from inside to the out. After experiencing the Caribbean Im not sure how this would work in high 90’s humidity, air conditioning would solve it, or maybe lots of ventilation.
I have installed 2 electric fan heaters (that run off shore power as they are 2000watts a piece), one in each hull. They are actually too beefy for the 20 amp circuit breaker so I run them at half power each. They have built in timer switches so they can come on at 6am and warm the boat for when we wake. The heaters tend to keep the humidity down, and the goal is to keep the humidity around 70% and the temperature in the boat at around 20’c.
Space aboard
There seems to be a phenomenon that the boat shrinks when you are moored up. Even though there is the pontoon for the kids to run up and down, wash dollies in the pontoon taps and buckets, make potions in plastic bottles from water, Weetabix, fairy liquid, pepper corns and god knows what else, the boat itself seems to get claustrophobic. Maybe we tend to mess it up more with day to day living, and have to do more tidying. Or maybe we just aren’t going places. As the winter draws near we are not able to sit out in the cockpit (apart from some lunchtimes when it is still hot in the sun. –except January and February) This means the evenings are spent with one less “room” and we are all around the table until the kids bedtime (7:30 – 8:00pm). It has to be said that we are looking forward to long warm evenings and going places. Rainy days obviously make it worse. Plenty of games and no English TV make it fun however. I have revived “The Sailing game” and have made the board from Lego. The islands can be created from Lego pieces and the buoys from red, green and yellow Lego. Another favourite is “Go Fish”. Harry Potter books and tapes are always being read and Im trying to introduce Arthur Ransom books at the moment but feel that I am going to have to hide all the Harry Potter books so they read something else. Sophie and Emma are bookworms.
Projects
We are having book shelves made for Sophie and Emma/Louisa’s Rooms. Also a chart table book shelf to keep Nav books in. All the kids clothes cupboards are going to have shelves going all the way across. They don’t need hanging space but more storage space for folded clothes and easily accessible toy boxes. I have found a local carpenter that will do all the work for not much more than the cost of the materials. Labour in the winter is cheap as people don’t have much work on, so as long as you haggle the price down, you can get a very reasonable deal. A reasonable labour rate is around 100 pounds a week for engineering work or carpentry. So for 6 book shelves cut to fit awkward angles and curved shapes against the hull, in Marine ply (stained) with Mahogany fiddles and coamings, will cost 120 pounds labour and 120 pounds materials. This is Maltese pounds so this would be 180 UK pounds and 180 UK pounds respectively.
I am also getting quotes for awnings for the boat. First the Bimini in Nylon Canvas, webbed so it can be pulled taught. The other awning is to go across the boom and pulled right out to the guardrails and all the way back to the Davit Frame on the stern. This will have fold down flaps to cover the guard rails too. The idea for this awning is to give the cockpit full rain protection for the winter, and in the summer to give sun protection.
Connors Birthday.
Three weeks ago we went to a birthday on Ocean Breezes. Connor was 5 years old, we played pass the parcel, pin the tail on the donkey and had home made chocolate cake, which was so rich it was like eating raw chocolate. It was covered in a rich chocolate icing. 5 candles and lots of sweets. Everybody enjoyed it – it was sickeningly lovely. I made a Video of the day and gave it to them as a present. This including taking the dinghy (with Jack) out to the entrance of Valetta to take some “Malta” background shots. The girls gave him some chalk, a chalkboard and some “monstors inc” squirty toys.
Transport around Malta.
We have had plenty of trips out either in the dinghy or on the bus. Seeing as though you can go anywhere for about 15p the bus is very worthwhile. We take the dinghy to Valetta to save time (and its fun) and it only takes 5 minutes to get there as apposed to 20 minutes by the bus (and a walk to the bus stop first.) The dinghy with its 9.9 hp 4 stroke engine gets up onto a plane easily with just me and Jack. But when the whole family in, it takes us all to move as far forward as possible to keep the bow down, and after about 3 or 4 minutes we just about get it up onto the plane. Planning makes the boat go faster as it is not pushing the water out of the way of the boat, it is skimming along the surface. Almost going twice as fast. We also discovered that we could take the dinghy to Selima (the closet town to us). What was a 20 minute walk and a 5 minute bus journey can now be done right from the boat in 5 minutes. The place to tie the dinghy up just so happens to be outside Selima Burger King, so I can imagine a weekly blast to burger king being a regular occurrence.
The Film Studios
We hired a car for the day along with Ocean Breezes and we went to the open day of the “Internationally acclaimed” filming studios. They filmed “Gladiator” “Cleopatra” as well as hundreds of other top films. It is renowned for its great weather, surroundings, abundance of sandstone rock and plenty of people for extras. It was very interesting but maybe it was island mentality or something else, as it was a poorly organised event. There was no information describing each area, no leaflets or people to ask.
The 100 Ton Gun.
Another weekend we went to see the 100 ton gun. It was a beautiful morning, sunny with a few clouds in the West. I made the terrible mistake of answering the question “what’s the weather today, and will we need fleeces today or just T-shirts”. We walked to the bus stop and got a Bus from Msida to Valletta and changed there for Rinella Fort. Then there was a 10-minute walk to the Fort where the Gun was housed. It is the largest canon in the world, equal to the same design in Gibraltar. The fortress was great for running around in and playing at armies, pretending to defend Malta from the invading, Germans, Turkish, Italian or Arabs. The poor old Maltese seemed to be always a victim of invasion and was the most bombed country of the 2nd world war. The day ended a bit bad as the clouds came in and it started to Rain. The kids were cold, Helen was Cold, and even I was cold (but didn’t admit it even though I was in Shorts and a Vest.) We ended up dodging the showers to the bus and then stood for 45 minutes at the bus stop waiting for the bus back to Valletta. When it arrived it only took us half way and we had to get off in the middle of nowhere and wait for a further 15 minutes for another bus. We got to Valletta and went for a Macdonalds to cheer us up, as we couldn’t muster any energy to be able to cook when we got back home, we were soaked through.
Harry Potter
We had another dinghy trip to Valletta. The kids have been excited for weeks ever since I told them that the new Harry Potter film was coming to Malta. “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets”. We walked around the town for a bit then had lunch up in the cinema/shopping complex. The kids had burger and chips and Mum and Dad had a Donner Kebab with extra chilli sauce. The cinema was great; a big screen, good sound and the chairs were mounted steeply so that everybody could see. It was the opening day for the film and we booked for the 2pm showing. When we got in there were only 8 people in. We almost doubled the audience size. Jack watched the first 45 minutes and the girls were mesmerized. Sophie was actually squeaking in delight. They really are Harry-Potter-Mad. Then came an intermission, a good old-fashioned break in the middle of the film. Im surprised a little old lady with the ice cream tray didn’t appear. The girls went to get some popcorn and Jack fell asleep. The second half of the film turned scary. It was very scary. I was scared. The girls were petrified. They absolutely loved it.
Swimming Pool
WE found a hotel in Selima with a swimming pool behind the Towers hotel. We have been going swimming about once a week.
Gozo.
Weds 20th Nov 2002. Wind: S force 4. Distance 15 miles. Sunny 25’c.
We set off with ocean breezes left in convoy just before lunch. They only have one engine (one is being repaired on land). And they find it difficult to manoeuvre and we help them with the dingy to act as a “tug boat”. They got away from the pontoon with no problems. They set their foresail and set of for Gozo. We stopped in the entrance and heaved the Main. I struggled with the lines and the lazy jacks and after lots of cursing and muscles eventually got the main up. (Note to self: “must make sure I put the main up with food in my stomach”) We lost 30 minutes on them and we set north after them goose winging. We managed 7.5 knots in 15 knots of True wind. I then moved to tacking downwind and on the Broad reaches managed 8.5 knots. I set the Geneka (Half a Spinnaker) ready to unfurl, but decided against it just in case the wind increased. My thoughts recently though, have been that my plans of reefing based on the manufacturers recommendations have been too cautious. I have been swatting up on borrowed books and based on formulas around, displacement, beam, sail area and centres of effort and gravity, show that I don’t need to reef in winds below 35 knots. (This is assuming a moderate sea and minimal heal). So in hindsight I should have used the Geneka. I should be able to push along at 10 knots in maximum broad reach conditions. And that day was perfect conditions with a flat sea and winds from behind. However we caught Ocean Breezes up 2 miles from Gozo and cruised in with them. The Gozo Ferrys were being stubborn and although overtaking us, did not communicate back on channel 16 when we wanted to make contact to come up into the wind to get the sails down before the harbour entrance as we were running down wind. I had to let the Jib fly and run the main sail close to a gybe to slow us down to allow them to overtake us and I was able to come into the wind very close to the ferry’s aft. We decided to anchor for the night in the “Blue Lagoon” which was ½ mile from the harbour and should be sheltered from the ESE winds forecasted for that night. We left Ocean Breezes to go into the harbour alone. (They were happy to moor up without us as the winds were ok for them to go straight onto the pontoon. We heard them on channel 16 trying to communicate with another Gozo ferry…. “ We are a vessel restricted in our ability to manoeuvre – we have only one engine and have limited steering way” They did not answer.!!!
We anchored in the Blue Lagoon at 4pm and settled down for the night. “Kilovar”, another older smaller catamaran with Dave and Ellen arrived soon after us and rowed over to say hello. They ended up staying for Dinner of pasta. 4 bottles of wine and half a bottle of vodka later at 11pm they rowed back to their boat. The winds picked up to 25 knots through the night and came around to SE. By the morning the anchorage had a reflected swell in it that was very uncomfortable and by 9am Jack had awoken and after going all floppy, was sick. We headed across to the harbour after breakfast leaving Kilovar to wake up to the swell and close breaking waves. As it happens the night in the harbour was very uncomfortable with bad swell tugging the boats on their mooring lines.
We “pontooned” in Gozo, the small Island (pop. 6000) north of Malta. It was mainly blue skies, sunny and daytime temperatures of 23-24 centigrade. The harbour is open to South-easterly Swell and ESE winds but other than that it is a very pleasant harbour with lots of fishing boats coming and going. Every half an hour the GOZO channel Ferries come in and out towering above us, but they are quiet and unobtrusive.
There was a 7000 year celebration going on in Gozo. Gozo has the oldest human built remains in the world. Older than Stone henge. We hired a car for the day (15 UK pounds) and went around some sights. We saw the 6500 year old remains, the Ggantijla Temples. Then drove to the Azure window a sandstone arch on the west side of Gozo. The sun was setting and we played on the flats which were like the moon surface. There was also a secret inland hidden bay which had fishing boats (which were more as toursist boats.) The bay was accessed by a hole/tunnel in the high cliffs probably only 10 feet by 10 feet. We picked up a Macdonalds on the way back and met Ocean Breezes at the local “pub” for a nightcap drink while the kids all played on the veranda.
We had a mixture of weather in Gozo. Hot sunny weather and wet and windy. The swell comes in mad to the moorings and snatches the ropes hard. There were plenty of rope-squeaking nights. One night the ropes chaffed so much that it pulled the stern rubber protective strip bending the screws that was holding it. Another job to do…
After 9 days in Gozo we headed back to Msida Marina in about 2 knots of wind on Friday after school. We motored all the way, leaving 45 minutes after Ocean Breezes and catching them up at the entrance. (We managed 7.5 knots at 2900rpm on both 29 hp engines). The trip was uneventful apart from the left over swell which was a bout 1.5 metres and the kids had great fun on the fore deck in the sunshine on the roller coaster of a ride. We moored back up in Msida and I took the girls in the dinghy to help Ocean Breezes slot into their berth. We nudged the bows and eventually after lots of fending off they managed to get in.
