Friday 11 July 2014 - Rome

Not much to say about Thursday.  Mainly we just stayed on the boat waiting for workmen.  We had occasional trips to the local café to use their free wifi.  Our devices all seem to have run out of credit.  There is no place here to top them up and it doesn’t seem we will have enough time left when we get to Rome to make it worth while topping up.

So the only news is that we have a passarelle all properly installed and it is a delight to use.  We are kicking ourselves for not having installed one earlier.  It was a bit concerning watching them drill a huge hole in the deck.  But the fitting is fine and not very intrusive at all.

We don’t have as much time as we hoped to be in Rome, what with waiting out this bad weather.  So we have decided to book an hotel for two nights so we can see as much as possible.  We did this on line and I am looking forward to a real bathroom!

We had dinner on board and went to bed early as the electrician is coming at 8:00am to fit the new navigation light.

Today we got up early and had a light breakfast.  The electrician was only a little late and the job was done.  So we finally go off to go to Rome.  The sea is still very lumpy especially as we just leave the marina.  We have put up the sails, but the wind is very light and we have over 25 miles to go, so we motor sail for about the first hour. However, after that the wind picks up to a nice force 4 from behind, but not directly behind.  We find that with that wind we can sail perfectly nicely making 5 knots over the ground.  So we get a very pleasant sail.

We have decided not to go directly to the marina we have booked for the summer, which is next to the airport.  We are told that the main Rome marina (just around the corner) is much more comfortable.  We shall go in and spend the night and see how we feel about it.  As we approach the wind gets up (as ever) and I call up the marina on the radio.  They confirm we can have a berth and give us a berth number.  We tell them we are not quite ready because we are taking the last of the mainsail down.  It was too rocky out at sea for Richard to go forward and take the last part down.  This means that as we reach our berth there are no marina staff to help us.  But other people on the pontoon come and help and we find that one is an Englishman who is here on his Southerly!  Having safely berthed with his help we arrange to have drinks on their boat.  They are Peter and Wendy and their Southerly 105 is aptly named Tinkerbell!

We first go and check in and find out about the town and the way to get to Rome.  Having found that is all fine, we decide we will stay here.  We will leave after 3:00pm on Tuesday and go the 4 miles to our booked marina.  They are not expecting us until Tuesday in any event. 

We have a very nice early evening drink with Peter and Wendy and learn a lot about the area from them with lots of hints about where to go on the next leg of our journey in September.

So this will probably be my last posting for this part of the trip.  The next few days will be taken up with sightseeing and then packing to fly back on Wednesday afternoon.