Another glorious day. It was supposed to be rainy and windy today, but it seems that the frontal system coming from the East Med has been delayed. So it was nearly wind still and sunny with temperatures in the low 60’s.

After leaving the Straits of Gibraltar behind us, we entered the Mediterranean Sea. The fist part is called the Sea of Alboran, which is just a local name. We will come across more local names for specific area’s that all form part of the Med.

As we are sailing straight courses, the land is sometimes closer and sometimes further away from us. Every time that we have to turn the corner we are close to land again. So we passed Cabo Palos and Cabo Nao to name just two of them. Cabo Nao is at the edge of the Strait of Ibiza but you need very clear weather to see both the mainland and the island at the same time. Ibiza is part of the Balearic Islands, which consist of Ibiza, Mallorca and Menorca.

There was quite a bit of wildlife. We saw whales and dolphins playing around the ship. With our ships speed of 17 knots, the dolphins can just ride the bow wave that comes off the bulbous bow. The whales are a different story, they just swim by going about their business. We have a company protocol in how to deal with them. As soon as we see a spout, we try to figure out which way the whale is going, and then change course the opposite way. If we cannot get out of the way, or the whale is just floating, we slow down and try to maintain a good distance. All the navigators and the quartermasters (these are the sailors on the look-out) get trained in this. Sometimes the whale is curious and comes to the ship to have a look. Then we slow the ship down completely until the animal moves on again. The whales in the Mediterranean are not as big as those we see in Alaska and sometimes they are hard to spot, but do what we can do to give these majestic animals the right of way.