By Frank Griffith

Kathy and I have just returned from Europe where we took delivery of our new Bavaria 42 Ocean sailboat. This is
a story that started in the fall of 1999 with an idea of buying a small used boat in Europe. There was an upcoming boat show in London in January of 2000, which would have a large selection of boating goods, boats and used boat dealers. In January I went to London with a friend to look at the possibilities and spent six hours a day for four days at the boat show. It is a grand show that should not be missed, if you ever have an opportunity to go.
        While at the show we boarded and inspected every size and kind of sailboat that you can imagine. I went aboard boats from 25' to 63'. There were some big name manufacturers Oyster, Parr, Hunter, Bavaria, Swan, Gib Sea, Moody, Westerly and so on. I went aboard all of them but was especially struck by many things about the Bavaria. Once I had been aboard the 42' Bavaria the other new boats lost their appeal, and used boats were out of the picture.
        When I returned to Tucson and I shared my exuberance with Kathy, I also
Did some figuring and economically it didn't make sense to buy such a boat, so I discarded the idea. However a boat broker in San Diego pointed out the flaws in my reasoning and convinced me that if we would sell our Cal 39, the Bavaria made perfect sense.
        I got out all of the literature, from the beat show, regarding the Bavaria and began to compile a list of options and specifications that would make up the desired boat. I then went to the www and searched the Bavaria site where I found the e-mail address of many of their distributors. A rather complete letter, request for a proposal (RFP), was generated and sent to about 15 of the European dealers. Within a few days there were 5 replies with one coming to the top of the list. Thereafter a series of e-mails converged to a very well defined boat and a price for that boat. Kathy and I went to Germany in March to visit the factory and make some equipment selections. White there it became clear that the center cockpit boat would be more desirable, due to the galley layout. Our broker explained the process of delivering the boat to Slovenia, so that the
17.5% Value Added Tax (VAT), would be avoided. This was part of the original RFQ we went to Izola Slovenia to acquaint ourselves with the territory and view the facilities. This turns out to be one of the most popular marinas in the northern Adriatic. It is the closest salt water to Austria, Switzerland and southern Germany.
        So our new boat is now ordered and we come home to sell our Cal 39. A fellow from Seattle bought the Cal almost immediately and we were boatless until the Bavaria was launched. The initial delivery date was September22 but due to the fact that one of the three molds for the 42 was damaged, the delivery slipped to October 17. This took a very valuable 3 weeks cruising time away from us. The sailing season was at an end and one had to be ready to lay the boat up by mid November in the Adriatic. It was no fault of the factory but they offered electric genoa winches to take away some of the pain associated with the later delivery. We have Lewmar 48 Electric winches and I don't know how one gets by without them. Kathy can send me up the mast at the push of a button. They also act as a backup for the electric windlass and are helpful when winching towards the quay in a stern to, Med Tie, docking situation. We flew to Germany in mid October and enjoyed the small villages of Bavaria and a visit to the factory to see our new Traumerei exit the factory as a completed boat. The boat was loaded onto a trailer and driven by Freddy to Izola Slovenia. We rode with the broker through southern Germany past Salzburg Austria through the Karawanken Tunnel, by Liubljana Slovenia to the seaside town of Izola Slovenia. There we watched as Traumerci was rigged and commissioned by Edgar from Austria and Stanislas from Slovenia. I bring this up because neither of these two spoke the others mother language, they communicated in English. I know they were speaking English but I could not understand them all the time. It must have been a regional dialect that I had never heard. We found this to be characteristic throughout our trip. People of different countries would each revert to their knowledge of English at whatever level and communicate. We are either fortunate to know what seems to be the international language or unfortunate in that we are not encouraged to learn a second and third language.
        It took five days after the boat was in the water for the added equipment to be installed and all of the systems to be pronounced serviceable. About this time we are joined by Lee Kochert, who will accompany us on our initial voyage down the Adriatic. We had a very brief introduction to the boat and it was time for us to leave. The season is ending, weather patterns changing and free time to get the boat to the storage place for the winter was dwindling.
        The first stop was Umag, Croatia, about 30 miles south east of Izola. These two towns are on the Istrian Peninsula. This would be our first check in to a foreign country and an opportunity to find how the system works. The cost to cruise Croatia is $160 per year You clear in, pay your fees and the next time you must see a port official is when you leave Croatia. The permit allows you to enter and leave as many times as you wish in a 12-month period. There is no hassle about clearing migration, aduana and customs at every port. It is a clean procedure that makes sense, no bureaucracy. We found that the quay that we tied to in Umag was such that a side tie had us in 15 feet of water beneath the keel. We could step off of the boat and cross the street to a tavern, cafe' or grocery store. This water depth right up to the quay would be common throughout our trip. The water here as well as throughout Croatia was as clear as your drinking water. I have never seen cleaner water anywhere. The port captain had served 20 years in the merchant marines and had sailed all over the world. Lie had been to both Ouaymas and San Diego, which opened a conversation. I asked which wine he would recommend and he said that the labeled bottles were for tourists. The Croatians drank wine that was generally purchased in the market from the vegetable stands. It seems that the farmers also produce wine and bring it in bulk to the market. The wine is distributed in those 1.5 liter plastic bottles that one usually buys water in or perhaps Sprite or Coke. Sure enough there was a vegetable stand in the farmers market that sold us our first Croatian wine, $1.50 for 1.5 liters. The port captain also was very pleased to see visitors from the USA, he said it would improve his statistics, not many Americans here so soon after the recent years of conflict.
        The next few days saw us cruising SE and visiting such towns as Porec, Pula, Veruda, Rogoznica, Ilovik, Hvar, and Korchula. In Porec we find ourselves to be the only boat in the downtown area. There is no trouble tying to the main quay and departing the boat for a walkabout the town. When we come back to the boat after a short visit and as I was getting on the boat a lady got my attention and began telling me NO NO NO. It was finally clear that she did not want me to move the boat before her husband got her picture standing in front of it. This town is more than 2000 years old and was badly bombed in WWII.
        In Pula the marina is immediately across the street from a Roman Coliseum, built in 408C to 60 AD, which is something to see from your boat as the sun rises over the coliseum. The downtown harbor is full and we find that we must go another 5 miles to Veruda. There is a marina that is just up the river and around the bend. There are more boats here in Veruda than there are in Dana Pt. and Ocean Side together We find that there are many marinas along the way, but one must remember there are more than 700 islands and 300 miles of mainland for these marinas. This is the first time that I have to back into a slip and it somewhat a threatening thing to do. I back successfully and we are tied to the pier with other boats of our size. Some fellows from Austria back in next to us and I try to learn from his technique, he is very good at backing into the slip. This is also the first time that we have to walk the PLANK to get ashore. This is a 10' board that is 10" wide and 2" thick. The docking technique is to tie the bow to a large mooring and back as close as you will before tying the stem to the pier One then leaves the boat by a plank from the stem to the pier A good night sleep and a walk-bus to town to see the sights which include the Coliseum.
        We sailed past several of the smaller islands and notice that the water is getting deepen In the upper Adriatic the water is relatively shallow, 60 to 70 feet. It is now over 200' deep and deeper in color approaching the "Wine Dark Sea" colon we entered Ilovik just ahead of a group of 10 Austrian sailors who were having a race. Ilovik is a very small island separated by 200 yds from another smaller yet island, Sv. Peter it takes almost 2 hours to get our dinner served. The place is really remote and the kitchen was over- run with orders from we three and the Austrian sailors. As we were eating one of the ustrians asked us "How did you find this place?" This got to be some thing we asked each other as we found small and quaint places throughout our journey.
        The next group of islands is the Kornati Islands National Park, which have very different scenery. The islands we have passed have been lush with green growth; these are bare rocks of the type the Romans would have used to build their coliseums and monuments. They are in large strata and one could separate building blocks that would be 3' thick with about any length or width you might need. The vegetation has been gone for years because of fires. There are two islands that are separated by a very small strait that has a bend in it. The islands are about 5 miles long or more with a strait that is probably 50' wide and 50' long that separates them. The strait is clearly narrow and the water runs through it very fast in a changing tide. There was only 3.5' of water beneath the keel. There are two piles of rocks on the islands that act as range markers. You must have them lined up astern and forward before entering the narrow part of the divide, never at night. We passed through and were about two miles from the place where we were to spend the night, VruUe. This is a village that has no electricity but has about 10 houses and a dock. Like the others it is deep right up to where you tied to a bollard. A young man comes to the boat and speaks no English but does say Habla Espaflol?" It seems that his mother is from Chili and father is a Croatian. We purchased a fish from him and had a great fish dinner it sure was dark after the sun went down. It rained on us that night and washed some of the salt away.
        Rogoznica was our next port where we again back into the quay. Easier this time, thanks to the instructions received from Kosta, our Greek boat captain of two years ago and author of the Cruising World March 2000 article "Med Mooring Made Easy". Antonio's bancafd is just off of the stern of our boat and we make ourselves at home there. We eat the afternoon meal afternoon drink, evening meal and evening drink. Antonio moved to the town from a small village and tells us that the best wine he has comes from his father's farm. He sees our desire for a better wine and says that he will have some from the village before we come for dinner It is a private squeeze that comes in a bottle labeled from some other place. We have to move the boat from our side tie and make room for two larger commercial boats that will arrive in a couple of hours. For being so cooperative in doing so we are rewarded with evening toddy bought for us by the town dockmaster.
        The names of some of the islands are really tongue twisters such as Ugijam, Zverina, Povljana, Vransko, Zverinac, Zut, Vrgada and Brbinj. Continuing SE we arrive at Hvar to find that the wind makes it impossible to stop here so we go 2 miles to a resort island, Palmizana, where the sailing and charter season has just ended. As such we found ourselves almost alone with very little company. They were closing for the winter after a 7-month tourist season. Kathy noticed that there were fresh water spigots on the dock, which she checked and found to be working. We needed to wash the boat so we got out the hose and prepared to wash the salt off. I connected the hose and, lo and behold, there was no water. Kathy had released the residual pressure after the attendants had shut off the water for the winter and that was it.
        This is our last day to be in the islands of Croatia and we will go to Korcula. The town was first occupied by the Romans in the third century BC. We arrived on Nov 1, which is All Saints Day and almost everything is closed. We are alone on the quay, but there are people strolling the town and we have to stop to talk. The first is the Intelligence Officer from the USS George Washington. He is on a day tour with his wife and daughter The Stars and Stripes along with "Tucson AZ" blazed across the stern marked us as friends. The second to stop was a retired Minnesota highway patrolman who was doing duty for the UN in Bosnia. He was part of an international team providing instruction to the Bosnian police as to how a police organization is operated. These are new times to the people of the Balkan states and there are some basic things to learn in a democracy that were not necessary in the earlier times. The town is built on a point of land that juts out into the bay. The streets are laid out in a peculiar manner. The Bora is a strong winter wind that blows from the N-NE and the summer winds blow from the west. So they laid out the streets to run E to W so as the cooling summer breeze from the water would blow down the narrow, 6-8 feet, wide streets. There are no N-S streets so the Bora goes over the town not down the streets.
        We sailed to Dubrovnik Croatia the next day and found the town full of United States sailors off of the George Washington. They were here for a few days of shore leave. The old town is beautiful and completely encircled by a fortress wall that ranges from 10 feet to 18 feet thick. There is a walking path around the perimeter that is more than a mile long. The small bay that is so prominent in the tourist pictures that one has seen is absolutely unusable by anything other than a very small powerboat. It is open to the southeast, which is the direction of the prevailing winds. The old town streets are large 18" by 24" or so marble stones. They have been walked on for so many years that they are polished as smooth as if they were waxed with Johnson Wax. It is a beautiful town. The Dubrovnik Marina is actually two miles up the river beyond Gruz in fresh water This is a very inexpensive place to keep a boat. There is a small power boat there, "Dry Heat" from Scottsdale.
        The next part of the trip will be 250or 50 miles. It is at least one overnight long and we want pretty good weather before we start. The weather looks good for 24 hours so we head South toward Italy. Our plan is to sail south and approach Italy in the vicinity of Brindisi but go no closer than about 20 miles to the Italy coast. We will parallel the coast until we have a straight shot at Corfu Greece that clears Albania by about 20 miles. We have been forewarned to avoid both Montenegro and Albania. We have a Raytheon Radar unit, which really helps us in these strange waters where we need to know shipping lanes and small boat fishing areas.
        About sundown of the second day we find ourselves in Greek waters. In the last 30 hours we have sailed in waters of five countries; Croatia, Montenegro, Albania, Italy and Greece. In about 12 more hours we are in Corti at the Gouvia Marina. This is a very sheltered marina where we will leave the boat out of the water for the winter There are people from the UK and Germany as neighbors in the marina. We get referred to a fellow from the UK who is watching after the boat for the winter Corfu is the island that makes up the most NW of all land in Greece. It is at latitude of approximately 40 degrees north, which is further north than San Francisco. However there are citrus trees, bougainvillea, cactus and palm trees. The weather is nice and the water temp is about 74 degrees. For the whole trip the water has been in the 70's, really quite warm considering the latitude.
        We, Kathy, Leroy and I, caught a plane to Athens ,London and Tucson. It has been a very enjoyable trip and we look to sailing Traumerei in the Mediterranean next spring.

Wednesday, May 17- At midnight we were approximately 5O miles from San Carlos, sailing under a doublereefed main at 6+ knots. That is pretty dose to hull speed in an Aquarius 23. Chuck was fine but I was a little apprehensive (translation: terrified). Starting to feel lonely, I mentioned an article I had read on some web site about bumping swing keels. The author, upon hoisting his boat and checking, found that the support bolt was rusted almost through. Now we could both be apprehensive.
After a night that seemed interminable, a very gray morning made its appearance. Looking at the seas, which had become quite impressive, I longed for a return to darkness. The seas were running from WNW so they were catching us just abeam of our starboard stern quarter. The waves were running in a series of three to
six in close succession and, while the individual waves were only six feet or so, the troughs would get deeper in each series until the fourth or fifth would make you think you were in a deep canyon.
The difficulty of course is sliding off the trailing edge of the wave, which has passed, and then meeting the succeeding one without broaching. Did I mention that they were only about fifteen to twenty feet apart? Fun stuff!
We were on one hour watches by now since our autohelm was defunct and one hour fighting the tiller was all a couple of tired old men could handle. We finally reached an anchorage at El Pulpito about 9:30 in the morning. Time to take a deep breath, make a pot of coffee and offer a silent prayer to whoever protects sailors that we had survived. We rested for a couple of hours but the anchorage was pretty roily so we decided to motor down to San Jaunico.
A thought I might share with you. if you take the time to enter waypoints in your UPS, keep it somewhere convenient for the helmsman. It is most disconcerting to go into the cabin to read the GPS and discover that you are 0.97 miles from the point, then watch that change to 0.98 and 0.99. We were making really good time. Much better than when we reversed course and fought the waves and wind to get back up to San Juanico. Of course with the prevailing winds and seas we had to anchor on the north side and our GPS setting was for the south anchorage. 1.5 miles away.
San Junnico is as beautiful as reported. A calm anchorage in the north cove with several other cruisers and about 100 sea ducks for company. We celebrated a glorious night of rest and recuperation. A martini, beef stew and sleep seemed to fulfill all basic needs.

Thursday. May 18- We started rather late and since the wind had shifted around to the South we motorsailed down to Isla Coronado. This is only 17 miles but we were still feeling somewhat battered so decided to overnight there.
Friday.Mav19- We motored down to loreto where we parked the boat in the small commercial quay and taxied downtown for gas, ice and beer. Just the essentials. We then motored down to Puerto Escondido (the wind was still on our nose) which was our final destination. 18.4 miles.  There is very little I can say to add to the plaudits of everyone who has written about Escondido. if you plan only one cruise in the Sea of Cortez, go to Escondido.
The loreto Fest, sponsored by the Hidden Port Yacht Club celebrated its fourth happening. The party was worth the trip. if you enjoy fun, food, games, beer and camaraderie with a couple of hundred cruising sailors, don't miss this party.

Saturday May 20-On Saturday morning, I made a rough count of 125 boats in the inner harbor and approximately 15 additional in the waiting room. Every type of cruising vessel you can imagine plus three little boats from the Tucson Sailing Club. A number of people wondered if we had trailered those little boats down. This wasn't asked snidely; for while many of the cruisers are blue water people, a large number are west coast cruisers who would never dream of going off shore enough to return to the US. Many of them really believe that anything less than forty feet is a day-sailor.
The Loreto fest was organized by a bunch of cruisers who live in Puerto Escondido as a party to dean up the harbor. That is still done on Saturday morning with a truckload of trash collected this year. An interesting residual effect has been the generation of considerable cash from the sale of memberships in the HPYC (10.00 per annum), the sale of t-shirts, burgees and beer at the fest. The club provides free dinners on Saturday and Sunday evenings with a free pancake breakfast Sunday morning.
The event is well organized, well managed and lots of fun. I highly recommend it for any Sea of Cortez cruiser.

Sunday, May 21- Everyone else in our group went into loreto while I vegged on the boat They were back in time for the spaghetti feast in the evening.

Monday, May 22- We caught the morning tide and set sail for San Juanico. (About 33 miles) The winds were southerlies but of variable intensity so we sailed and motorsailed so we might arrive fairly early and do some sightseeing around the cove. There were several large boats already there but since Chuck and I had already anchored close in we had no qualms about going close to the shore. Jerry was even closer and Scott and loretta followed our advice and anchored in twelve feet of water in a perfectly safe anchorage. Safe until early morning when the wind and tides had swung us all about and they wound up perched on their keel. We invited them over for coffee and all schemed various operations to get them off the stand. Nothing we tried was successful but finally the tide came in enough to float them clear and we cleared for Santispac around 10:30am.

Tuesday. May 23 - Since we had a very late start, we decided to overnight in Bahia de los Puercos. (About 17 nmiles) This is a very small anchorage but really quite lovely. A small fishing camp has grown up around the cove but we were hurrying and didn't take time to explore.

Wednesday. May 14- Great sailing all the way to Concepeion with a reach when we rounded the point to head for the entrance of the bay. We mostly motored down to Coyote Bay and were wary of the shoals going into Santispac. This is a rather neat anchorage with great beaches and they still have plenty of tourists. Apparently Baja California has rejected the mainland's policy of discouraging tourism.
We were introduced to Ray's palapa bar and restaurant. if you have been there, you need no explanation, if not, Go!

Thursday. May 25- We break up our little fleet. Jerry and Ken decided to spend another day in Concepcion and then make the Saturday night pig roast in Muleje.  Scott and loretta with Chuck and myself wanted to get back to San Carlos in time for the races. We left around 10:30 Thursday morning with very nice winds to the mouth of Concepcion then headed for San Carlos with a hem wind all the way. This was absolutely perfect sailing. Steady winds with just enough chop to make sailing fun and clear skies so there was always a star to steer by. The wind finally died down about 2:3Oam so we motored in and arrived in San Carlos about 6:30am Friday morning.

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The Sonoran Sea Aquarium

Bringing the sea to the desert...

The Gulf of California, also known as the Sea of Cortez, is nestled between the Baja Peninsula and the west coast of mainland Mexico. The Colorado River Delta, at its northernmost headlands, provides the Sea with essential nutrients, while the waters of the Pacific Ocean rush around the tip of Baja, bringing its flux of migratory mammals,
This "desert sea", covering some 60,000 square miles, is home to a wide variety of species, many unique to this richly diverse aquatic environment. It provides a refuge to over 10,000 species of marine invertebrates as well as several hundreds of species of fish. The Sonoran Desert, with its own distinctive ecological specificity, meets the Sea at its shoreline where together they create beautiful estuaries and marshlands which act as sanctuaries for resident and migratory birds.
The concept of a group of Tucson residents with years of experience exploring the Gulf of California and the environs, the Sonoran Sea Aquarium is a nonprofit corporation whose function is to build and operate a regional aquarium of international renown focusing on the Gulf of California, and the lower Colorado River. The Aquarium's purpose is to create a self-sufficient research, education, and entertainment center which will promote a broader understanding of the marine environment, aquatic life, and geology of this unique region.
The Aquarium also proposes to be a new forum for cooperation and understanding between the U.S. and Mexico, promoting tourism into Mexico and encouraging multinational research on the Gulf of California while supplying jobs to the Tucson community. The economic impact of the Aquarium on Tucson and its business community is forecasted at 70 to 90 million dollars per year.
The Foundation wants to reinforce its community-wide awareness campaign well into the 21st century. The Education program has reached thousands of children since its inception. With its volunteer docents, the Education Program brings the uniqueness of the Sea of Cortez to children and adults alike by providing a series of educational projects and presentations to schools and other community entities.
If you would like more information about the Sonoran Sea Aquarium Project, or would like to participate in the Education and Docent Programs, or would like to make a donation to the Sonoran Sea Aquarium.
Please contact:
Sonoran Sea Aquarium, 3755 N. Business Center Drive, Tucson AZ 85705; phone 520-293-1306;
web page - www.tucsonaquarium.com; email sea@tucsonaquarium.com.

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Millennium Delirium

While browsing through some dust-covered archival material in the recesses of the Roman Section of the British Museum, a researcher recently came across a tattered parchment.
After some effort he translated it and found that it was a letter from a man called Plutonius with the title of "magister fastorium," or keeper of the calendar, to one Cassius. It was dated, strangely enough, 1 B.C. January 7- or 2000 years ago (remember there was no year zero). The text of the message follows: