Homeward bound

El Rubicon is on the final leg of her Tidal sailing adventure, having set sail for Ayamonte and Isla Canela on the 25th March we now find ourselves enroute from Mazarron to the Mar Menor and our home base in Tomas Maestre marina. The adventure has been fantastic, we have sailed in some beautiful areas and met some lovely people. The weather has been testing at times and somewhat cooler than the warm winter climate that we have become accostumed to. Would we do it again - absolutely, in fact we plan to return into Tidal waters next March. So if your looking professional sail training, RYA qualifications, quality sea miles during our sailing mile-building phase and a mini adventure - give Debbie a call to find out more.

Mar Menor channel silting up?

The channel allowing access to/from the Mar Menor into the Med appears to be silting up, there have always been a couple of shallow areas although recently we have been recording depths of 2.2m on both the corner at the end of the buoyed fairway and if exiting the Mar Menor or Tomas Maestre the second port fairway buoy by the old sluice gate. Official figures suggest that the channel should be around 4m all the way through, however this is clearly not the case and if further silting is experienced over the winter period it will become questionable as to what yachts will be have access. El Rubicon draws just under 2m and with the recent silting I have been a little nervous watching the depth gauge plunge wondering if it will level out before that horrible rubbing sound as you come to a complete halt... As any sailor should know, the Med is non tidal and running aground is simply not a case of waiting for the next tide to float you free, whats worse the bridge only opens every 2 hours so if you have complications that cause a delay then you are likely to miss the bridge opening as well. Lets hope they dredge the channel for 2011, if not it will be a case of continuing to nudge forward and keeping your fingers crossed.