Written by Jon:

Leaving Soller wasn’t easy, with great friends around us, it was hard to say goodbye. But once we’d got our new anchor chain sorted out it was time to move on, northwards. We set off early and headed up the coast under sail. First stop was the majestic entrance to Torrent de Colarbra. Mia and I remember sitting on the stoney beach here when I lived in Mallorca, gazing out at the yachts bobbing between the cliffs and talking about how one day it would be us out there. So one day came and, leaving Mia on-board, Teo and I rowed ashore to explore the beach and walk around the cliffs.

Teo loved exploring this pre-historic valley, like something by Jules Vern, with high sided cliffs, murky lagoons and oversized grasses. There is a tunnel cut through the cliffs between the two coves and we ran through it excitedly making scary monster noises. While we were shore the wind picked-up and Mia had to furl away the mainsail which we’d left up on anchor to save us a little time – thank you dad for the walkie-talkies which once again proved very useful for shouting ‘helpful’ advice from the shore.

Back onboard and the wind had dropped so the motor went on and we headed up the coast. After a couple of hours we grew a little bored of the motor and decided to change plans for the night and head into Cala St. Vincenc. It’s a bit of a tourist resort but the sea was the most amazing colour and at least initially it was well-sheltered from the wind and swell. Unfortunately, during the night the swell shifted around (not on the forecast) and we ended up rocking and rolling the night away with gusty wind from the west and a large swell rolling in from the north. It wasn’t dangerous as we didn’t have much wind and the sandy bottom of the cala has good holding for the anchor, but not much sleep was had by Jon.

The next morning we left early-ish and sailed peacefully, albeit slowly, around the northern most tip of the island – Cap Formentor. The whole north-west coast of Mallorca is stunning, huge vertical cliffs rising straight out of the dark blue sea and Cap Formentor was a fittingly impressive way to say goodbye to this particular bit of coast.

The next night we headed to Cala Murta, (a recommendation from the guy who picked-up our out-of-date flares) a beautiful and largely unspoilt little cala with a stoney beach, high cliffs and only one house and handful of mountain goats ashore. We left abruptly, leaving behind a pair of Mia’s favourite shoes.

A recurring theme, and potential topic for another blog post, is our anchoring angst. Suffice to say that after several more sleepless nights and an unscheduled night sail to a different anchorage, we decided to pop into the port in Pollenca and rent a car for the day to drive into Palma and buy a new anchor to go with our new chain.

So a few days passed around Pollenca, with lots of anchoring practice, a few nice walks, playing on the beach, a trip to Palma and even bumping into some friends we made in Soller. We left quietly just after the sun came up headed towards Menorca.