Saturday 11 May 2019

We left our anchorage at Cala LLonga to move closer to Ibiza town, our younger son is arriving tomorrow, and we wanted to be somewhere easier for him to access. We have been trying to contact the four marinas in the town for a week or so, and apart from one who said that they were full and would put us on the wait list, we had heard nothing. So while en route, I started to phone them and managed to reserve a berth with little difficulty. We changed our route plan and headed into the main harbour of Ibiza.  We made first for the fuel dock and managed to do the check in process while there.  There were plenty of available berths and I don’t understand what the admin staff had been doing. Not as efficient as I would have liked.

Despite the fact that we are not yet at high season, this is the most expensive marina we have ever been in. And we believe that the price roughly doubles on the first of June and then again on the first of July. At least when we got to our place in the smaller boat pool (you should see the big boats!), there were marinaros to help us in and there seem to be a lot of staff in general, and plentiful security staff specifically. I guess that the location and the sort and size of the boats we see, that this is what they expect and it makes it possible for them to charge what they like. We are where the beautiful people go.

Later we needed to go to the supermarket, so got our bikes out for their first use of the year. On our way, we diverted into the old part of the town to explore and soon found ourselves pushing the bikes up to the castle that overlooks the bay. The views from the top were stunning. The tiny streets were filled with stalls of all types, selling food, tourist trinkets, toiletries etc. Most of the stall holders were dressed in traditional costumes. It wasn't clear whether this was a special occasion, of whether it is always like this. On our descent, we passed the former home of Christopher Columbus, who apparently came from Ibiza.  We also came across a troupe of dancers, performing a dance with similarities to a Morris Dance (see video below).  As I know one of the possible derivations on the surname Morris is from Moorish, I wonder it these dances originally come from the Moors in North Africa.

Distance covered today	7	nautical miles
Trip distance covered	374	nautical miles
Distance covered 2019	374	nautical miles
Steve (and Tricia)