I only have photos from Saturday's sailing taken inside the marina...It all got a bit hectic after that!
The regatta was a two person event, the last in the series. We set off in beautiful sunshine with more wind that the previous outings, but all under control. As soon as we got out of the shelter of the marina the waves started to roll us from side to side and the wind picked up a little more as we headed over to the starting line.
Racing starts still completely baffle me as different classes of boats set off at different times and I'm trying to decipher the Spanish instructions from the skipper. From what I was able to gather though we made a decent start and picked up speed as we crashed into the waves. We were quickly soaked and had a panic change into essentially pac-a-macs which helped a bit! Steering was a big challenge with the tiller which the skipper excitedly compared to a wild horse.
We spent the race hanging on for dear life but improving with our sail changes and communication. We finished midway through our class and many boats retired due to the conditions. Our euphoria at actually having beaten some boats was quickly sidetracked by a problem getting one of the sails in and we had to go in the wrong direction, dodging other boats, to fix it. By the time we managed to turn around we realised not only had we drifted a long way from our marina but had also past the next one. Around this time the radio kept piping up with more boats asking for assistance to enter marinas and we put the engine on and tried make progress against in the wind and the waves. I had to break it to the optimistic skipper that the coastline still looked disappointingly similar and we weren't making progress, especially as every so often the waves would get too much for us on the tiller and spin us right around. We made the call to abandon the mission and head away from the wind and waves to the next marina down the coast.
Immediately the sailing became at lot less white-knuckle ride and we arrived fairly serenely, although soaked with white faces from the salt. It was a good adventure, as sailing tends to seem once you're home and dry! The skipper directed me to a forum discussing the conditions and results which confirmed although we started off in 25 knot winds, they continued to build until we were experiencing 40 knot gusts. It's a small boat and with only two people as crew it explains why we were up against it a bit!
On Sunday I was still glad to be on dry land as the winds had continued whistling through the night and even the waves on the rocks by the station were impressive. We headed back to Gracia which turned into a bit of a graffiti tour. We attracted some bemused looks from the locals as we stopped to take photos of garage doors and disused buildings.
It was a lovely crisp autumn day, showing off the tree-lined streets and squares in dappled sunshine.
The highlight was definitely stumbling across some Castellers! This is a tradition throughout Cataluyna of building human towers and is seriously impressive. We arrived as the last team in the competition were gathering to start their tower attempt. The base is assembled carefully and the subsequent people all climb up quickly, using the previous layers' belts and shoulders as footholds, so as to not put prolonged strain on the bottom layers. The band provided a soundtrack to add to the tension.
I found it both entertaining and worrying that only the top layers of small children were wearing helmets. My research after seeing the show has shown that there are lots of different possible configurations for the towers and the ultimate aim is for the small child to reach the top and raise a hand with four fingers to symbolise the stripes of the Catalan flag.
We continued rambling over to a park at the base of Montjuic mountain to see the changing season with the falling leaves and peer into peoples' roof gardens. The photos don't do justice to how steep the roads are as they fall off the slopes, parking the car must be quite a challenge.
On the way back to the station we had the treat of seeing some good drumming and hilarious dancing by some enthusiastic passers-by. It's all about the effort!
