Mahon and off to Tunisia May 17 - 26,  2001 Since we were able to finally arrange for our stove to be repaired and shipped to us in Mahon over on Menorca, we were free to set sail, at last! At 0530 we slipped our mooring and proceeded out Bahai de Pollensa in the dark, into a heavy northerly wind that caused us to put in a reef before even hoisting sail. It looked as if it would be a lively crossing of the Menorca Strait until we exited the headland at 0600. The wind lasted for another five minutes before becoming light and variable. The rest of the crossing was motor sailing with the winds coming from all directions so that we were close hauled for a while, then on a broad reach, then a run, and back close hauled again, all on the same heading in light winds. We could have sailed for a few hours without the engine, at a frustrating 2 or 3 knots, but the whole idea of leaving so early was to get to Mahon early enough to spend some time with our friends on Soleil Sans Fin and Dany II, as they might be leaving next day.  Mahon, the major port of Menorca, is a historical naval port fought over and occupied at various times by the British and French, and much earlier by the Romans and Moors . Coming along the eastern end of the south coast we saw many cave formations and small calas. We went through the wide passage between Isla del Aire and the southeast tip of Menorca in thirty feet of clear blue-green water. The few miles up the east coast to the entrance to Mahon were spotted with more calas, and vacation homes and bungalows. As in Mallorca, there were construction cranes dotting the skyline, indicating more resort developments. However, Menorca is not as heavily developed as Mallorca. Upon entering Mahon harbour, it was evident why it made such a valuable naval port, with a relatively narrow entrance on which a myriad of batteries were dug into the rock, able to deter any unwanted hostile ships. The inlet itself is a long narrow body of water 5.5 kilometres long with a couple of islands and several calas providing a large protected area for anchoring and port facilities. It is the largest and safest harbour in the Med. I have heard claims that it is the second or third largest harbour in the world; however I doubt this (I cannot recall how many harbours we have been told that about). It is a multi-purpose harbour for car ferries to Palma and Barcelona, a fishing port, a naval station and pier, ro-ro facilities with a large container port, cruise ship facilities, and extensive docking and mooring areas for yachts. We hadn't seen so many cruise liners since we were in Bermuda two years ago. All the mooring buoys, anchorages, and floating docks are controlled by the port authority, the Ribera del Puerto, but the charges are quite acceptable. For Veleda at 10 metres, we paid 1592 Pesetas per night (approximately $13.00 Cdn), including electricity and water. There is only one free anchorage area in the whole estuary, and that is the bay east of Illa del Lazaret off the entrance channel. We contacted Soleil Sans Fin and went to the floating docks where they were at Isla Clementine.  This was an interesting, enjoyable little self-contained "Waterworld", a floating island complete with benches, electricity, water, sun shower, lights, and a central swimming area. It was a square with each 25 metre side able to accommodate five boats, moored bows on, with lazy lines for holding the stern off (typical Mediterranean mooring). There was an electrical box and a light standard on each corner. In the centre was an opening about 10 metres square into the water, with a swimming ladder making access easy. There were several water taps, one of which had two or three linked hoses flaked out on the deck to absorb the warmth of the sun, hooked up to a shower head mounted on a post. The heated water would produce a brief warm shower. Up to 20 boats could moor there, and after a short time one got to know most of the boaters. Some had spent the winter at that island, and others, like us, were just there for a few days. We knew Soleil Sans Fin and Dany II would be there, but we were pleasantly surprised to find Two-Step and Mindemoya there as well. Two-Step was built by Paul and Sheryl Shard and they have sailed her from Port Credit, just outside of Toronto, for a couple of transatlantic crossings, and extensive cruising in the Caribbean. They have made several excellent videos of their cruising experiences, shown on TV Ontario, and are contributors to several sailing magazines in Canada. In fact the night we arrived they were showing their latest video, on sailing around Spain and the Balearics, on the floating island. In the small world department, one of the people in their video was Ken Erlich of Galahad whom we had met just last week in Pollensa. In the video, he was regaling a group of cruisers with, being a Cornishman, jokes about Englishmen. After their two videos, we continued the movie night with a film spoofing space stories.  We had last seen Paul and Sheryl at a Seven Sea Cruising Association rendezvous in Melbourne, Florida in November of 1998. Their videos as well as Veleda's logs are listed on the www.searoom.com website (that's right here, folks! TC). It was good to meet up with them again. They had left Two-Step at Isla Clementine for the winter, and returned to Canada for a couple of months. They will be off later this month to create more videos about the Med.  The other unexpected boat, Mindemoya, we last saw in Barcelona. Doug was the gentleman who came over to dive under Veleda to locate our bow light which had dropped into the water at our mooring in Port Olympic harbour. We shared a rental car with Sara and Doug to travel around Menorca for a few days. Sara is a yoga instructor who conducted yoga classes each morning on the dock. Each morning, bending and stretching in Iyengar yoga poses, about ten of us were on deck attempting to contort ourselves into the svelte postures. Sara is a good and gentle teacher, especially for stiff old codgers like me and a couple others in that group. She saved us from undue stress one morning by having us lying down in the "corpse pose", eyes closed, focusing on our breathing and relaxing our bodies, not letting us know about, and be distracted by, an attractive blonde English lady showering in the nude across the dock. We had Paul and Sheryl over for supper one night, and discussed our trip through France, as they may consider such. Another evening I made a meal of meatballs and spaghetti for ten of us, hosted by Bill and Jean on Soleil Sans Fin. Next evening we attended a "pot luck" barbecue for all the boaters at the island dock. The camaraderie amongst cruisers is very supportive and most enjoyable. We are constantly sharing ideas and helping each other out. Many of them are still on the cruisers' net on 8104 at 0600 GMT (or UCT Universal Coordinated Time as it is now called). I'll try to remember to talk about this net in my next log. For us, a couple of special mentions about Mahon that we liked are Pedro's Boat Centre and Club Nautico de Villacarlo at the end of the point going into Cala Fonts. We used Pedro's as a faxing address for sending and receiving insurance information, as we needed to have our new insurance coverage before departing for Tunisia. We also used them as our delivery address for our repaired stove from Plastimo in France. They have good repair facilities and an excellent chandlery. They were most friendly and helpful. Thanks Pedro! At the Club Nautico, recommended to us by Paul and Sheryl, we had a delicious three course Menu del Dia including wine, at a lovely balcony restaurant on the point overlooking Mahon Harbour and Cala Fonts for 975 pesetas (about $7.00 Cdn) each. We highly recommend Pedro's and the restaurant at Club Nautico de Villacarlo. A last little item about Mahon is its name. English spell it Mahon. The "h" and the "n" are silent. Menorcans spell it Mao. It is reported that Richelieu, the French general who conquered Mahon from the British in 1756 enjoyed the local garlic-based alioli sauce, but his mistress objected to the garlic. The modified version (sans garlic) known as "Mahonesa" was served at his victory banquet in Paris, whence it has become known as the ubiquitous "mayonnaise". A bit more about the archeology and history of Menorca in my next log before we actually set sail for Tunisia. Yes, the stove did come in to Pedro's, and only a day later than promised, and we finally departed the Balearics after an unexpected and expensive damage repair and maintenance period. We initially thought a month for the Balearics, but spent almost 4 months there. It was good to get off for Tunisia, as I'll describe next log.