Our original plan was to carry on cruising along the south coast of Sicily until we would reach the southwesterly corner of the island.
However, we could still remember clearly the Sicilian harbours we have visited so far, our meeting with Mr. Godfather himself and the details written in our Pilot together with stories from local fishermen and sailors about Gela and Scoglitti that both harbours were boring and dangerous due to shallow grounds, we decided to give up this original plan. Due to all these reasons, a Skipper’s Meeting was held on 4th October.
Minutes as follows:
Why risk damaging the boat in a bad harbour now that we have come so far without any accidents or problems?
What can these 2 towns offer us that we have not already seen in the other towns along the way?
Why not take advantage of the high pressure and fantastic weather that we are enjoying right now?
Result:
We are ending our cruise through Denmark, the North Sea, the Belgian, Dutch and French canals and a large part of the Mediterranean. We shall simply set our course for 118° - directly towards Valletta, Capital City of Malta!
We therefore settled down to finish writing our logbook, update our homepage,
settle all our money matters, rig up the boat for the last long stretch over
open sea – otherwise we would never get these things done once we arrived in
Malta!
On 5th October at 23.00 we were ready to leave, and sailed quietly
out of the harbour in the dark night, there were hardly any stars out and
visibility was not very good. We set our speed at 6.3 knots and the auto helm at
118
The sea was totally flat with only a weak easterly swell as we sailed through the black sea, with the moon bravely lighting our way through the cloudy skies.
We soon became aware that we were not alone on the sea, when we suddenly started hearing over the radio "This is US Navy Warship No. 4" and "US Aircraft Carrier" calling out to all ships to make themselves known. Welcome back to civilization we said to each other! Well, if the war was beginning, then we must have been in the safest place surrounded totally by these warships. That was Per’s opinion, Vicki had a totally different opinion about it!!
We settled down to our night shifts, sleeping a couple of hours at a time and holding night watch alone, as we slowly but surely covered mile after mile bringing us closer and closer to the ending of our wonderful dream cruise through the waterways of Europe.
Saturday 6th October 11.00 a.m., we sailed close to the coast of Malta, Vicki called Mike and was told that he was already waiting on his terrace with his eyes glued to the binoculars trying to find us!!
11.15 a.m. We made visual contact via binoculars and verbal contact over the mobile – it was a very emotional moment and there were tears in everyone’s eyes! After 75 miles and 12 hours sailing we arrived in Msida Marina, we hugged each other and shouted together "WE MADE IT!!" 2.293 Nautical Miles – 139 days – 220 locks – and thousands of impressions and experiences!!
After Customs and Immigration Clearance, we sat down exhausted in the cockpit with a drink … until we were invaded by Mike and Patrick and Stef (Vicki’s brother and his wife) and celebrated our arrival in our usual style – champagne opened of course the Sunray way, with a sable!!