A Final Med Season
Our decision to cross the Atlantic was fueled by the realization that if we wanted to sail Wild Spirit to her home port in Sydney, we’d better get on with it.
But good-bye’s don’t come easily.
I mean, who wants to leave the Med? The spectacular coastline, the history, the ambiance, the culture, the food. Oh my god, the food! The wine. Who decides to leave such glorious richness?
Knowing the summer of 2019 would be our last season cruising the Med, we decided to spend a month roadtripping through Spain and Portugal. We planned to take in all the sights we hadn’t seen in that region and drink every last drop of wine 5,000 inland kilometers would allow.
By the time we splashed Wild Spirit in Canet-en-Roussillon, France in June, we had devised a solid plan for the remainder of our last Med sailing season. Our sailing plan included re-visiting our favorite anchorages along the French Riviera before exploring Corsica and Sardinia. From Sardinia, we planned to head across and revisit the Balearic Islands, then sail down the coast of mainland Spain, stop in Gibraltar and cross the strait to Morocco before returning to Gibraltar. Some of it was familiar territory covered on previous laps around the Med. Other places would be new. It would all be marvelous.
In September of 2019, after completing an adventurous land-based tour of Morocco with friends, we sailed back to Gibraltar where we would pack away the boat for the season.
By then, Gibraltar felt like an old home town. It also felt like coming full circle. Gibraltar was where we purchased Monastrell in April 2012. Because the sale took longer than expected, we got to know The Rock quite well. Being back in Queens Quay Marina felt a bit like a homecoming. A perfect way to end to our blissful Mediterranean story.
Still, I didn’t want to say good-bye.
We’d been getting to know Europe’s Mediterranean waters port-by-port over the last eight years. Every town, every village, every stretch of coastline, every bay had seeped into my bones. We hadn’t just traveled to the various regions that comprise the Mediterranean, our summers had been spent living in these places. Wild Spirit had been our home while we floated from country to country.
A friend once asked, What do you do over there for so long? as if there were only so many sites to see and places to visit in Europe. As if one might get bored. I could scarcely fathom the question. At the time, the only answer I could muster was, we live.
We live is my answer still.
Our eight seasons in the Med have left me feeling as if I know every millimeter of this Mediterranean map. I read it as though it is my favorite book, a treasured volume whose dog-eared pages are as well-worn as a child’s beloved teddy bear.
As we packed away Wild Spirit and prepared to fly to Tuscany for a friend’s wedding in September, my heart felt heavy. Saying good-bye to the Med felt like turning my back on an old friend. It wasn’t without its share of grief.
But endings are also thresholds of new beginnings. We had already enrolled in the ARC+ rally, which would begin in November, a few short months from now. The beauty of joining the ARC+ was that it gave us a timeframe for crossing the Atlantic—an official schedule.
In a few short months, we’d be back in Gibraltar to say a final farewell to Europe—a proper ending that would also open a new chapter on a new adventure in the Caribbean.