We left Greenwich marina after two days and were looking forward to reaching Denia.
I had suggested this place to Diane for her and Harry and until Harry took not well, they loved it. Albeit, I spent five days there, I didn’t get to see anything other than the hospital so was looking forward to seeing it as a “tourist”.
The wind was on the nose all the way with a moderate to rough sea and a big swell, so it was get there as quick as we could, I even had on my harness at one point. Who says there’s no wind in the Med? We have encountered some quite exhilarating sailing since arriving.
On arrival at Denia it was chucking it down, that together with the mountainous scenery I once again, thought I was back in Scotland.
In El Portet marina we were directed to a berth. Par for the course, for us, there
was a problem with the lazy lines so we were told we would need to move but only once the rain went off. Three hours later, the Marineros got this nice Spanish couple to move their boat, put us in their vacated spot and moved them two berths up……”Why couldn’t we just have gone the two berths up we asked the couple?” The lady just shrugged, smiled and said “Welcome to Spain”.
Like Altea, Denia didn’t disappoint us. Nice frontage and beach with a lovely old town to it as well. There was a festival on while we were there so every street you walked up had bands playing and people dancing. The festival was to do with Christians defeating the Moors for which they put on a mock battle up at the Town Hall. The noise was unbelievable!
Diane’s Flat
While we were watching the Battle we bumped into Chris and Lorraine a couple we met in Lagos. They were leaving their boat there for the winter and were heading home in a few days’ time. It was nice to have a couple of drinks and catch up with what each other had been doing since Lagos.
Diane and Harry met a lovely couple, Lynn and Gerry who live out there now. They were good friends to Diane while she was there and helped her out a lot when Harry had to go to hospital, even picked me up from the bus station and came to see me off when I went there. So, as promised, we looked them up and went out for a lovely meal and some great company. What nice, nice people, and hopefully we will meet up with them again.
Best Moors I’ve ever seen
On returning to the boat we found a bag hanging over the bow. I had a look around to see if anyone had left it there by mistake – but it was for us. The Spanish people on the boat which was moved, because of us, had left us a lovely walnut cake with a note welcoming us to Spain. How hospitable and welcoming is that? Denia was lovely and we will hopefully go back there some time. We have really enjoyed this last part of Costa Blanca and should be heading over to the Balearics now. However, as we are so much later than we intended to be and slap bang in the Spanish holiday month we are heading up to Valencia in Costa del Azahar to wait out August before hitting Ibiza or Majorca.
