We woke just before 6am as it was getting light and slipped away from Porto Corallo, waving goodbye to the east coast of Sardinia and heading out across the Tyrrhenian Sea to Sicily. In our favour was a forecast of light winds and calm seas, against was the fact that this stretch of coastline had been taken over for the whole of May for Naval manoeuvres. The day before, on our approach to Porto Corallo, we had been directed by a naval helicopter to detour out to sea ‘for our own safety’. Fortunately, for this passage we were well out to sea when they radioed and asked for our position and did not give us any further directions!
We had an amazing day, being visited by numerous dolphins and porpoises who swam at the bow for ages performing the most amazing synchronised stunt swimming. It is so joyful to watch them – what a privilege. We also spotted what initially looked like small pieces of driftwood floating by until one suddenly dived. These were sea turtles sunbathing on the surface of the calm sea. We saw hundreds of them – how fabulous! We ended the day with a small sundowner beer and a bowl of chilli before starting the night watches.
Sun set at about 8pm so we had a long night of two hour watches. Fortunately the sky was clear and there was a bright half moon lighting our way. By the early hours Jupiter, Venus and Mars were shining brightly on our port side. We had some fleeting dolphin visits and some shooting stars and otherwise kept ourselves awake with pod casts and audio books. The sun rose at 6am, the wind picked up and we had a fabulous sail into Trapani harbour on the western tip of Sicily and we were moored in the Marina of Mr Arturo Stabile, an elderly man dressed in a dark pinstripe suit who looked every inch a Sicilian!