Cala de Algayerens - Fornells Bay

After two nights spent in Ciudadela, we leave Cala Degollador and set course for Fornells, soon followed by our mooring neighbors on Gran Slam. It’s blowing hard, as forecasted, the sea is choppy with a good force 6 SE. We took a reef in the main sail and change the genoa for the yankee but it’s still too much in the gusts. After passed the Binicous Cape, west of Ciudadela, the sea becomes flat and so we are speeding at 6.5knots. The coast passes by quickly, we wish it would be always that easy…
Gran Slam catches up and has fun taking pictures of us, we are so heeled with our full gib when they have two reefs in the main sail and a handkerchief at the front. We see them heading into a cala mid-way from Fornells, we check the Imray guide book : it’s the Cala de Algayerens, looks interesting. We make up our mind and go for it, we enter with the sails on and close to the wind, of course. Indeed it would have been a shame to miss it: no buildings, two nice little beaches enclosed in reddish cliffs (the well named Punta Rotja) and behind the dunes a river and a lagoon (in reality a big pond with birds, reeds and dragonflies). We placed some hopes in a spring marked on our map but it has either dried out or it’s not what we found. So we keep on saving water.
In the evening, gathering on Gran Slam for a drink with Andy and his wife (hosting) and their hilarious Scottish friend Martin; Ollie and Allan (US/Kiwi) travelling on Summer Wind (a gorgeous 13,5m boat we are kind of dreaming of since we saw her in Espalmador and Cala Llonga; they are friends of Vida Vagabond crew we met last year in Camarinas, are you following?) and Trevor and Lesley a lovely and funny couple we’ll see again in the next cala. We exchange experiences; jokes; embarrassing, alcoholic and funny stories about life at sea.
The next day we take off for Fornells, this time with a reef in the main sail and in the yankee but it’s bad luck, after a fair start, the wind drops and we are stuck 5M before arrival. Motor a little bit then the wind suddenly comes back and we finish by tacking into the bay. The funny thing is that since we are in Menorca, the weather hasn’t be that nice and sailing is always : gusty then flat calm then on the nose…Here we are in Fornells, a large bay, quite sheltered in the north east of the island, still unspoiled by touristic development, hilly and wooded. The mooring near the”town” is free, cool. We trade books with Lesley and Trevor. A dinner is organized onboard Kishorn, Makis, Chilli (sin carne) and raviolis salad, we didn’t starve for sure. Ollie and Allan have been working on luxurious boats and share with us some stories about RPP (rich people problems), how hard to be a millionaire !
The next day almost everybody leaves for Mahon, capital city and largest port of the island. A N-NW gale is coming but it’s not enough for us to give up a free mooring with wifi! Bad weather should last 12hours, we triple the rope to the buoy to sleep confident. When will we have a good weather window to cross to Sardinia ?