May 28, 2003
After a horribly rainy night, the morning sky seemed to signal more
passing showers. I decided to take Zoe to the park, then to see the
exhibits at the Balearic Island exhibit hall, a rather odd combination
of Robert Capa and marvel comics. The Marvel comics exhibit consisted of
illustrated but monochromatic proof pages. Samples from all the Stan Lee
classics were there: Fantastic Four, Daredevil, Spiderman, X-men,
Ironman and even a four that I hadnÂ?t seen. The illustrations are really
quite funÂ?itÂ?s a shame kids donÂ?t read them anymore.
May 29, 2003
After several windy overcast and rainy days the weather cleared and we
set sail for Cabrera. Cabrera is an island about 4 hours sail from
Palma. The island is a nature preserve. There are no services, or
restaurants, only a small cantina. One must apply for a permit in order
to stay the night. It's a popular destination. we asked to stay 3 nights
and were only granted one night, our friends were wait-listed.
We enjoyed a lovely downwind sail and arrived mid-afternoon. We decided
to take Zoe up to the castle. Zoe still seems to enjoy her backpack, but
wanted to walk down the steep hill. After several minutes we realized we
never make it down if she walked (or more accurately stopped to collect
stones every couple of steps) so we scooped her up and carried her
protesting down. Afterwards we decided to stop in the Cantina for a
drinkÂ?and this time we actually remembered to bring some money. It was
after 5 and a foursome played poker in the unlit room. The drinks were
surprisingly inexpensive 1 euro each for a cafe con leche (a cappuccino
in US coffeehouse parlance) and a can of soda. We were enjoying our
drinks on the shaded veranda when the barman came out bearing candy for
Zoe. He scared her with his stubble and generally disheveled appearance
but she really wanted that candy bar. She inched slowly towards him
while reaching for the wrapped bar. As soon as it was in her possession
she skittled quickly back to the safety of her dad. (It is a bit of a
problem here, vendors and waiters love to give her candy and cookies).
Sunday, May 25, 2003
We had one of those surreal Robert Altman “frogs raining from the sky” experiences the other night. We’d met some friends for dinner and returned to Nothing Ventured after 11pm. I noticed immediately that the lights on the pontoon were out. Then as we walked to our boat we noticed a strange bubbling sound emanating from a powerboat. Tom stopped to investigate and realized that the sound was in fact air rushing out of the concrete pontoon. Simultaneously, I saw Irv (the retired pilot) coming towards us excitedly babbling that the marina had just practically been drained of water and the boats had been laying on their keels. He couldn’t leave his boat because the passeral had dropped too low. As we stood there, we noticed the water flooding back into the marina at the pace one would fill a bathtub. Except the marina holds millions of liters of water! As we stood there, it quickly became apparent that the water would soon crest the pontoon. In the 3 minutes that we were lollygagging, the passeral for Nothing Ventured rose from Tom’s foot level to his eye level. Since it was now too high for us to use, we ran back to the car just as the water topped the pontoon. By the time we reached the car it was mid-calf. Later we learned that we’d had our first encounter with a tsunami caused by the earthquake in Algeria some 400 miles away! We were reminded of nature’s incredible power as the water continued to fall and rise for several hours. The morning brought aftershocks and smaller tsunamis.
Friday, May 23, 2003
Our journey to Palma was excruciatingly long, yet surprisingly painless. We were rested enough after the first leg to travel into Wilsden Green to meet our friends John and Jane (and little Georgie) for some wonderful takeaway curry. Zoë was fascinated by the train and the London Black cab (think NY checker), although the combination of fatigue, rush hour traffic and driving on the other (wrong!) side of the road caused my heart to leap into my throat on several occasions!
The short travel time to Palma was doubled due to a French air traffic control strike (The French striking??!! What a shock!) but thankfully it pushed the flight back to Zoë’s naptime and she slept the whole way. She is becoming very social and prefers wandering the aisles and waving hello to sitting in our laps.
After a couple days spent floating around the 95 degree pool at the hotel, Nothing Ventured went back into the water (she’s an impressive sight on the crane) and we reintroduced Zoë to her second home. The boat seems to have instilled in her a manic desire to climb—probably because all the good stuff is out of reach. On the first day she successfully scaled the companionway stairs and hasn’t looked back since. Zoe took four nights to fully adjust to the time change. At midnight, she would be wide awake and ready for play. It was a relief to get her onto the boat and out of our bed (the crib never seems to last the night in a hotel—she knows we are too close).
In the first 4 days we saw lots of familiar faces—it seemed as if we had never left: the same people work in the office, provide security at marina gate, clean the bathrooms, help dock the boats, run the cafe. Many of the live-aboards and captains are also still around: Smiley, Dave the canvas guy, the German with the yellow lab, the old couple with the 2 Airedales and the American pilot whose been living in Berlin for 15 years. At the Santa Catalina market we ran into Pierre (who used to run the café), and one night while walking along the Passeo de Maritimo we ran into Martha, our Spanish teacher. Tom and I had Stephan cut our hair. He does outstanding work and is very reasonably priced.
The vendors in the market remember us—or more accurately remember Zoë. They marvel at how much she has grown. The produce at the Santa Catalina market is as wonderful as we remember. The strawberries are small, deep red and bursting with flavor. The Spanish melons are in season as are cherries. The strength of the euro makes some things quite expensive, but food in Spain is cheap compared to home. I admit it feels good to be here, and already I am sad that we are bringing Nothing Ventured back.
The war has brought US tourism in the Balearics (an apparently London) to a standstill. Tourism officials are worried about the strong euro and relatively weak economies of the countries that are the source of its tourism (Germany and England, in particular). In general, however the people of the Balearics seem more focused on their upcoming regional elections than world events.