Sat 11 Aug and Sun 12 Aug

Saturday was a pretty quiet day, we got through some admin and sat out the Mistral winds whilst watching the super yachts in Cala de Volpi.

On Sunday morning we did a workout on the beach then got Bini ready to sail to Olbia. We’d read in the pilot book that you can moor up on the town quay for free for a few days, so it’d be a perfect place to do the engine service.

We had a lovely sail around the north east coast. A beam reach until we got into the bay then a downwind sail (with a few gybes) until we reached the channel entrance into Olbia where we dropped the sails and motored 20 minutes down the channel. There were a few boats on the quay and we moored up into a nice big space. Whilst Tom was tying up the lines he noticed this sign on the bollards.

Now there are a few ways which this could be interpreted…

Only the 6th of August you need to be out of here by 07:00.
From the 6th of August, every day after that you need to be out of here by 07:00.

Just to be on the safe side (you know us 😉 we took a walk to the harbour office to see what the deal was but being Sunday it was closed. We decided to be brave, leave the boat there and venture to Decathlon on the bus to buy two paddleboards. We’ve been contemplating lessons for a while but thought we may as well buy two and teach ourselves. How hard can it be? 😉 As we were walking to the bus stop we looked on Marine Traffic to see where the boat was that the sign had referenced. Crap, it was heading right for Olbia! Might they have meant 7pm? It was now 17:45. With visions of an angry coastguard and a hefty fine, we scuttled back and moved the boat to another spot. Once she was safely tied up, off we went again.

On arriving at Decathlon, predictably they’d sold out of all but one paddleboard. Luckily it was the right size for me, but we had to order Tom’s. As with getting anything delivered, not having a fixed address is a pain. For good reason Decathlon were not prepared to deliver it to “where the boats are at the end of that car park” (imagine us showing it to them on Google Maps) so we had to provide proper address. In haste we noticed the Captainaria on the map so opted for that. We’d go tomorrow and politely ask whether they’d mind.

On the way back we treated ourselves to dinner in Olbia. The old town is beautiful, small cobbled streets alive with people, restaurants and bars. It was nice to be back in civilisation after a few days being on the boat.