Tunisia 2

Even though we have seen little evidence of the revolution, yesterday we visited Tunis and saw a significant military and police presence around the city centre. And we have seen numbers of young people, probably uni students, who seem to be celebrating the regime change. Perhaps any continuing unrest is their doing; no one else seems the slightest bit interested.
We travelled by louage, a minibus much used by the locals; less than two euros each for the hour long trip. Tunis is a fascinating sprawling city, exotic, chaotic, dirty and great fun. The rubbish strewn streets are off-putting; as bad as we saw in Egypt. The medina was like most bazaars and souks we have seen with shops selling anything and everything and with pushy touts trying to get you in. We think they are suffering the effects of the revolution in a lack of tourists but it is still early times yet.
Tunisia seems a tolerant, liberal society; women dress in all fashions, there are bars where the blokes get stuck into the beer, the predominance of Islam seems far less obvious than was the case in Turkey. We have yet to hear a call to prayer.
The people are all very friendly and despite French being the local lingo we haven`t had any trouble being understood in English. Generally speaking, things are very cheap; meals, booze, groceries, cab fares and even wifi internet are ridiculously cheap. Though still paying EU40/night for the marina berth.
Today we hired a car and drove down to Monastir to buy a new 2.8 m Caribe brand RIB from the factory there. Great boat and the price hard to beat. Check out www.caribeboat.com .
All in all we would recommend Tunisia as a place to visit. Once our new dinghy has been delivered we`ll set sail for a two night crossing to Cagliari in Sardinia.


Largely unoccupied hotels near the marina

Louage station Tunis

Central market Tunis

Guess who?

Cafe at the entance to the Medina

Medina scene

Minaret at the Great Mosque in the Medina

Spring cleaning at the Mosque

A princess in the Medina

Mosaic on Roman baptismal font - Bardo museum Tunis

colur somewhat enhanced by picasa - probably more like the original

More mosaics

That princess again

Lunchtime downtown Tunis

Security presence

Sit-uation normal?

Garbage strike?

Red meat butcher near the dinghy factory

Caribe dinghy factory

Lunch at the marina at Monastir

Crossing to Tunisia

Greetings from Port Jasmine Hammamet, Tunisia. Finally,we were able to achieve enough work done to enable us to set off from Malta. The parts for the furler finally arrived and the new lazy bag, after several returns to the loft for rework, was acceptable[?]. So, we set sail, tacking into a fresh 20 kt headwind as a short shakedown sail to the island of Comino between Gozo and Malta. It sorted out a few gremlins and we were able to spend a quiet though short night in a calm anchorage before an 0400 start for the crossing to Tunisia. A lack of wind saw us motor all day before a fresh breeze came in, just as the grib files had predicted, and we then had a cracker of an overnight sail in 18-20 kts of quartering wind all the way to Port Yasmine, arriving too early for the locals to be ready to receive us. Enroute we shared the sea with turtles, dolphins, swordfish and sheerwaters and negotiated our way through a large fishing fleet and around several unexpected offshore platforms [our charts, both digital and paper apparently out of date]. We were received by the local authorities without too much hassle and now find ourselves in a strange place. The marina precinct is an architect`s dream of acres of buildings for shops and accommodation, ninety percent of which is empty and obviuosly has never been occupied, surrounded by wide malls and collonaded walkways. Judging by what we see here and in the local surrounds you would not know that there had been any recent "revolution". The town area is comprised of miles and miles of hotels, all empty at the moment. Who knows if there will be normal season here? If not, then many of the locals will find things tough as they rely totally on tourism. Anyway, these are first impressions.


Departing Marsamxett Harbour, Malta

Comino anchorage

Lovely day motoring

First Mate ready for a COLD night watch

Approaching Port Yasmine

Downtown Port Yasmine

Our berth in the marina at Port Yasmine

Exploring

We cycled about 4 km to nearby Barraksal for fresh supplies

And returned to the marina

Return to Malta

Jack Tar`s crew are now back aboard in Valletta, Malta, at Manoel Is. yacht marina. We flew via Munich and had the opportunity for a quick trip to the city centre between flights. It is 1st May and we are still here having encountered a few equipment issues which have delayed our departure. Most crucial is a defect in the top swivel of the genoa furler which requires parts from France. Things do not progress swiftly here and we are somewhat frustrated by the time it takes to get work done [or eventually not done]. Weather has been pretty cold and often wet, and the rain deposits thick layers of red north African mud all over the yacht. Commonly now known as Gadaffi`s revenge. However we are otherwise ready to go with a new mainsail and many other bits and pieces. All things being equal we should be off soon on an overnight sail across to Hammamet in Tunisia where the marina assures us all is as normal.

Munich

Munich

Guess who

Cas

View from our hotel in Sliema with Manoel Is.Yacht Yard in the background

Jack Tar ready to go with a newly repaired transom gantry

The journey to the water begins

Final touch up

Enroute