Noise, fortress and Karen platinum
During my last visit to the port authorities, I had asked Karen what time we could come to check out in the morning. She had told me 10am, which we suspected wasn't because the office was closed before that but because she didn't feel like working before that. We decide to aim to be there around 9am to avoid walking in the heat and to give us enough time to do a few errands on the way back.
When we arrive the place is already busy, this time with a civilised queue of people waiting for their turn. Karen is storming in and out, barking at people. When she sees the 4 of us entering the room she barks:
"Only one person, the others wait outside"
Mike tries to protest. It is after all already really hot, but he realises in a second that they are indeed better outside, but for a different reason.
I am just about to take my place in the queue when she barks:
"I remember you, come here" she says pointing at the table. Without any other reason than remembering me, she makes me cut the line yet no one dares protesting.
"We need to check out"
"Where are you going?"
"Montenegro"
"Where?", she seems surprised, almost unaware of this possibility.
"Montenegro"
"Montenegro", she repeats with disgust.
"OK, I need crew list, boat documents, boat registration, boat exit form"
I hand her the documents, she storms out and comes back a minute later with a few photocopies.
"Take this to customs and come back once it is stamped"
"Sorry, but where are they?"
"You know, you've been there last time"
".. Hum, no"
She already moved on to her next victim letting me figure out where it might be. My guess, where I took the ferry the previous day.
We walk to the terminal. At this time of the day it is pretty quiet, no ferry is leaving or arriving anytime soon and therefore the immigration office appears to be closed. We try to find someone to help us but without any luck. We decide to go with plan B and walk through the back door, the way I checked in coming back from Albania. We walk by a security guard who doesn't seem to be impressed about 4 gringos walking right into a restricted area. Yachties checking out of Greece in Corfu seems to be a bit of an oddity but after a quick explanation he points us in the right direction. There we find a "kid" in jeans and T-shirt who takes our passports and check us out of the country. He doesn't look like any immigration officer I have ever come across and certainly is friendlier than most but he gets the job done in a couple minutes. Now the customs need to check out Kujira. Sadly it isn't a kid in jeans but what appears to be a Karen.
"What do you want?"
"I need to check out my boat"
"Transit log, I need your transit log"
"Sure sure, I don't know which documents you require, just tell me"
The European union has strange rules and regulations about VAT, the country it is flagged under and time spent inside or outside of EU waters. As we are now officially leaving European waters, I am concerned she might ask me for a document I may not have. Maybe something related to the purchase of the boat. I am already having all these nightmare scenarios playing in my head; Kujira stuck in Greece, me chasing Sammy the crook, the broker we dealt with, for some documents the French administration won't be able to provide during the summer break. And then something strange happens. Karen smiled and started briefly chit-chatting. By doing so she immediately and indefinitely lost her title of Karen as the AKS, the Angry Karen Society, does not support or encourage such behaviour.
I get another magical stamp and having nearly filled up my check out of Greece bingo card we can go back to the port authority building. This time Mike, Jana and Kim don't even try to get inside with me.
I walk in.
The hallway is empty.
I go towards Karen's office and stand by the door. She is sitting at her desk looking at her smartphone. Without turning her head, I can see her eyes turning towards me. I have been spotted.
She sighs.
I wait quietly not wanting to unleash hell upon myself.
She takes a little mirror out of her purse, takes another look at me without turning her head and sighs again.
I wait.
Now back on her phone she obviously has very important business to attend to.
I wait.
She sighs.
It is nearly noon and I wonder whether she is just trying to avoid doing any further work before lunch break.
She sighs but finally looks in my direction.
"I have the document" I try to say cheerfully.
She gets up and take the papers.
"Sit down" she says while pointing at a bare wall with nothing but the shrine of the fallen coastguard.
Assuming she isn't expecting me to sit on the shrine I decide to wait standing next to it. After a couple minutes she comes back with our crew list. Having received the final stamp I nearly shout “Bingo!” but restrain myself, take the document and leave. We are now officially checked out of the country and have 24h to exit the territory.
On the way back we stop at a supermarket, the fruits and vegetables market and a car shop to buy more oil and coolant for Mr. Perkins, who I have recently diagnosed to have an internal bleeding. I also buy a self triggering fire extinguisher for the engine compartment and finally some bread. I believe we are now ready for our 48 hours passage to Montenegro.
As we leave the marina, we are welcomed by a gentle breeze. The sky is blue, the sun is shining, it is bloody hot and the forecasts are for an easy sail into the sunset. Kim is at the wheel and we are all casually chatting. As we reach what we have named the straight of Corfu we get flattened without any warning. The wind has jumped in a second from a gentle breeze to 25 knots. With 3 of us on deck and no swell to worry about, Kujira is quickly brought back under control and the sunset cruise turns into a sunset race but we make good progress. With the night fall the wind dies and we have to put Mr. Perkins to work for a few hours.
Being 3.5 skippers makes a hell of a difference for the night shifts. When I go on watch at 2.30am I feel rested. The wind is coming back and we can start sailing again. And we sail uninterrupted and with no need for tacking or reducing sail for the next 16 hours. It is probably a record for us as the Med is usually changing mood every couple of hours like a mad woman. The second night requires again a little bit of dinosaur juice and Kujira hums along happily under the stars. At 1.30pm, we reach Bar, our port of entry into Montenegro. It took us 47h to do 194Nm which is quite acceptable for the old whale.
We try to contact Bar port authorities but never get a reply so we dock the boat on what appears to be the immigration quay. It is now time for me to go and face the local authorities and check us in.
I walk towards what appears to be the main building in search of someone, a sign or any clues that I am on the right track. I walk past a security booth and don’t notice the woman inside. She doesn’t notice me either as she is too busy with her smartphone. I walk a little bit further but realise I am about to leave the facility and I am therefore illegally entering Montenegro. I turn around and this time notice the woman in the booth on her smart phone. As I get closer she suddenly notices me and starts shouting something in Montenegrin. I have no idea what she is saying but there is no need for shouting, I can just come closer. As I do so, she suddenly puts a hand out towards me and the other one on her gun.
I freeze.
I have no idea why she is suddenly behaving as if she was protecting Fort Knox but she is still shouting in Montenegrin and her hand is still on her gun.
“Boat, that’s my boat!” I say pointing at Kujira in the background.
She relaxes a bit.
“Immigrrrazion? Polize?” I try in what could only be described as a very lame guess of Montenegrin. However she seems to understand and points toward a door. Happy to get away from this psychopath, I rush in the direction she pointed. There, I bump into a police officer or a boarder guard. His English is just as bad as my Montenegrin but he knows what he has to do. I give him the boat registration, the crew list and our passports and he feeds all this into his machine. Step one is completed and now I have to go to the port authority to have Kujira checked-in and the crew list stamped. They are located in a building on the other side of the road, 5 minutes walk away. It is hot, unbearably hot and even in a T-shirt, shorts and flip-flops I feel heavily overdressed.
The port authority building is a beautiful example of mediocre mid 70s communist architecture. A square concrete block. A couple of guys are standing outside by the door. Just to make sure I am at the right place I ask them:
“Port authorities?”
“Da da”
But the second one is shaking his head while pointing at a sign on the door, no flipflop, t-shirts or shorts allowed inside. Darn, I have the full combo. I try to look disappointed but he keeps on pointing at the sign so I turn around and walk back, past the gun psychopath and back to the boat. There, the others at first do not believe me but when they see me coming out of the room with a shirt and a pair of trousers they start cracking up. To complete the penguin attire I put on shoes and head back to the port authority building. I am now heavily sweating, my feet are crying inside the shoes and the pants are sticking to my legs. The two guys are no longer outside and I enter the building without any further issue. The inside looks like an apartment foyer rather than an administrative building. There is what used to be a reception desk but this one has obviously been closed a long time ago, there are 3 doors with no signs, inscriptions or any clues as to what they could have behind and a staircase. Moreover, there are a dozen men in their 20s waiting inside. One is in flipflops, a couple in shorts and nearly half of them in T-shirts. I am completely overdressed and feel totally stupid. I also realise that the 2 guys from earlier are not working here at all but are also waiting, they simply took the Mickey out of me… As everyone seems to be waiting for their turn, the best I can do is wait too. I try to make eye contact with someone in the hope that he would offer some help but that is futile.
So I wait.
One door finally opens up, someone walks out and someone walks in. I guess I just have to wait for my turn then. There is something weird about the situation. A vibe that feels familiar but that I can not yet identify.
So I wait.
Another one goes, another one replaces him.
What is that vibe? Why are there only men? Why are they all young? It’s funny, that guy seems really nervous. Actually a few of them appear to be nervous. And that one who keeps on looking inside his book for a few seconds then closing it. Looks like he is mumbling to himself… He is not mumbling, he is trying to memorise … and then I remember what this familiar vibe is: an exam! They are all waiting for their turn and I just gate-crashed an exam, waiting for my turn like an idiot. Trying to enrol in the Montenegrin coast guard is obviously not going to be very helpful so I may just as well try my luck with one of the other doors. I knock and walk in. An old man sits behind a desk, there is a VHF next to him and he appears to be busy doing nothing.
“Sorry, English?”
“Yes, a little”
“Great, we just arrived by boat. I need to check-in”
“I am finishing in 45 minutes, I don’t have the time. Come back when I will be replaced”
“..?!”
He turns back to his computer and goes back to doing nothing. I guess I’ll come back in 45 minutes then. I also presume that he was the port officer who never answered the VHF when we arrived. He must have been really busy doing nothing all afternoon.
Not wanting to walk back and forth in this heat, I decide to wait outside the building. I sit on the stairs and sweat in silence, cursing the moron who stopped me from going in without pants and a shirt. At 3pm, on the dot, I go back to the office. There is still no-one but the old guy who seems to be watching paint dry on the wall.
I wait a few more minutes for his replacement to arrive. And she finally arrives. I can tell right away that I will not be dealing with the average Karen, but with a Karen platinum. She looks snappy, she feels snappy and she has the least natural platinum blonde hair I have ever seen.
“Excuse me, I am here to check-in our boat”
“Wait!”
I obey and observe in silence. She starts by cleaning the desk with a wet wipe, then the keyboard and the monitor. Then she goes into cleaning the chair, getting herself a drink and finally she sits down. I am still in the office, waiting and watching. She turns towards me, sighs and goes back to her screen. A few minutes pass, she again acknowledges my presence with a sigh and keeps on doing her business. It is now 3.15pm and I am slowly getting annoyed. Finally she is ready to work.
“What do you want?”
“Check-in our boat”
Then follows the usual bureaucratic nonsense. There are stamps, photocopies, suspicious loosk at the passports; she also requires my skippers license and ironically my VHF license. During our entire week in Montenegro, we will never be able to contact anyone by VHF and we will never hear anyone using VHF, yet it is mandatory for visiting skippers to hold a VHF license. After an eternity, paying for a cruising permit and an entry fee which does not match at all what I have read in the Almanac, she finally sends me back to the customs officer to hand them the crew list covered in stamps. We are officially free to move around Montenegro for the next 7 days.
One of the main reasons for stopping in Montenegro, besides being on the way to Croatia, is because Jana has a really good friend who now lives there. She wants to meet her, maybe even go for a drive around the country side and see her house. She suggests to meet at Sutomore, across the bay from Bar, to catch up over dinner and makes it sound like a lovely seaside town. Once we cross the bay, what we find is far from idyllic. The beach is absolutely packed, loud music is pumping from everywhere and there isn’t really anywhere to anchor except right in front of the beach.
We go to shore on the patched-up dingy. Or is it to hell?
There are people everywhere, it is noisy, it is smelly. It looks and feels dirty or a bit run down. Every other shop seems to be fast food of some kind. And every other shop a bar with music blasting. We finally find Sarah and before sitting down for dinner, she warns us that the local cuisine is pretty disappointing. She is right, it is meat heavy, basic, and greasy. Mike orders one of their specialties and is served some kind of rolled cordon bleu, wrapped in batter, deep fried and covered by half a kilo of tartar sauce. Saying it is heavy is a light word…
After such a meal, a walk is necessary. There is only one option, the promenade that goes along the beach. It is still extremely hot, now you nearly walk shoulder to shoulder with people, it is noisy and our senses are completely overloaded after our 2 days of self isolation on the boat. Candy floss, amusement rides for kids, and cheap crap sold as souvenirs. Even the ice cream is disappointing.
Jana decides to spend the night on land with Sara, assuming they can find an AirBnB, while Mike, Kim and myself go back to the boat for a very noisy night. By now, all the bars have decided to turn into night clubs. It is a competition to see who will be the loudest and from our anchorage we can probably hear half a dozen different tracks at once. Needless to say, it wasn’t really what we had hoped for after a 2 nights crossing.
We pick up Jana in the morning who seemed to have had a rough night too and her dream of a nice long shower was shattered when she discovered that the AirBnB didn’t have soap or shampoo. We decide to move along the coast to a quieter anchorage, away from the decadent civilisation. We find just the right place but with our luck, only one other boat decides to stay over night and in keeping with Montenegrin culture, have music blasting. Some time after sunset I get fed up and start blasting Ramstein. They quickly get the message and not wanting to deal with satanic New Zealanders they turn down their music. Nothing like peaceful soft diplomacy to resolve conflicts.
With only one week allowed in the country, we have to get going regardless of the wind conditions so we motor most of the day towards the bay of Kotor. Once we enter the bay the wind picks up and we get all excited. Unfortunately the wind dies nearly as soon as we go around the first headland. The bay of Kotor is often compared to a fjord. While I think the comparison is not justified, it is nonetheless very pretty. It feels like a succession of mountain lakes and it is refreshing to be so close to mountains. The downside is that the area has the reputation for “nuclear winds” at night when the cold air from the mountain tops rushes down into the valleys. We stop at a marina a few nautical miles away from Kotor town for the night. What they call a marina is actually just a pier facing out and we get bashed by waves every time a boat, ferry or cruise ship passes by. As a bonus, music is blasting all night long. Tomorrow we shall move to Kotor marina.
Emma’s bus is running late so Kim decides to go wait for her at the bus station. Mike and Jana go look for AC, a coffee and an ice-cream while I decide to go for a walk around town. It is busy but not overwhelming like Sutomore. I even manage to find a little secluded garden with some shade and no one but a friendly cat who decides to sit next to me while I read my book.
People say that boat life is a constant yin and yang, a balance between really good and really bad, between ups and downs with nothing really in between. The day had been pretty good so far so of course it was now time for the yang to come smack me in the face.
As I approach the boat I notice something strange with our fancy Amel passerelle (gangway plank). Someone, who I assume is Emma is lifting it off the ground and it looks odd. That is because one wheel is bent upwards, the frame is bent too and the attachment ring for the port rope is missing. Kim comes out of the boat.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t have the time to do anything”
“..?”
“I had just come back with Emma and we were inside when the boat got rocked by waves. I rushed out quickly to lift the passerelle, but it was too late. I heard a horrible crushing noise.”
“What? How?”
“The passerelle got jammed under the bollard and when Kujira started bouncing up and down with the waves the passerelle didn’t survive to the 14 tonnes of the whale.”
“Sacré bleu!” I shout or something like that.
I feel nearly as bad as the day Rockna got knocked between the eyes on that Italian fuel dock. I remove the passerelle and assess the damages. Some fibreglass work will be required but luckily it doesn’t look like any critical damage has occurred to the structure of the boat. The passerelle however looks like Rocky at the end of the first movie: having put up one hell of a fight but having lost nonetheless. As I try to bend the wheel back in its axes, the aluminium tube snaps. Nothing else I can do about that one for now.
I remove the T articulation that lets us pull the passerelle up and down and swivel. It is nearly at a 45 degree angle. I start bashing on it with a mallet knowing fairly well that I have no chance against a stainless steel tube but at least release some of my frustration. Meanwhile, Emma who had gone out for a bit comes back. I have never met her before and I am obviously not in the best state of mind for small talk.
“So, what are you doing? You think you can do something? What if you did this? Why would you do this? Can you explain to me how this work? Can I do anything? You know how to fix it?”
Fortunately I am bashing on my piece of metal which prevents me from exploding. While she means well, it is not the time or place to be asking me all these questions.
A local on a little tourist speed boat offers to help. He knows a car mechanics who might have a bench vice I could use to squash it back in shape. I jump on his boat and we go around the corner. In some sketchy back alley there is indeed a car mechanics who he seems to know well. They talk for a minutes and the guy points towards the back of his shop. He has an old bench vice, poorly attached to a tired looking wooden desk but we are free to use it and give it a try. The boat guy gives me a hand and slowly, bit by bit we manage to bend the tube back a little. Every time we tighten the vice, it looks like the desk is about to give up and the whole thing will go flying in our face. It is a tough fight and after 20 minutes I have to accept that we probably did the best we could with what we have. I thank both of them and walk back to the boat. With the help of Mike we manage to put it back on the passerelle. It doesn’t look pretty but at least the passerelle is now usable again. I will probably need a proper blacksmith to fix it properly.
One of the highlights of Kotor is the castle perched on top of the city. We are all really keen to do the climb but for the last couple weeks it has been a gazillion degrees throughout the day so we decide to go with a 5.30am start. It is a wise choice as the climb is steep and it is already warm. The view however gets better with every single step. Soon we can see the entire valley, the old town and the surrounding mountains. We take some photos, with the early morning light before rushing back down like vampires afraid to be turned to ashes by the first ray of sunlight. A quick breakfast and it is time for me to put on my protective plastic suit and jump inside the cave to replace the diesel lift pump.
It should be an easy one: unscrew the diesel inlet and outlet, remove 2 nuts and job half way done .. So of course it had to turn into an 8h sweat marathon. While removing the inlet, outlet and the nuts was fairly easy if you put aside the fact that you need to have graduated from cirque du Soleil in order to be able to achieve any work in the cave, removing the pump turned out to be an absolute pain in the behind. Like everything else on this engine, after a couple hours of struggling, you realise that nothing can be removed without having to dismantle half of the engine beforehand. In this case, the oil heat exchanger has to be removed but for this to happen I first need to remove the oil drain pump and drain the coolant from the cooling system. The drain plug is of course one centimetre away from a wall making it nearly impossible to drain into a container. Once all these shenanigans are done, I can feel the victory. I put the new gasket in place, push the new pump in place and start tightening the diesel outlet, or at least I try.
And I try.
And I try.
Nothing seems to work. It is as if it wasn’t the right size. After an hour of trying, I remove the pump and try to attach the outlet first. It works excepted that now I can’t fit the pump anymore. Another hour or so of trying to figure out a solution with Mike but nothing seems to work. Meanwhile I am liquefying inside my plastic suit but failure is not an option. As long as the engine is not put back together we will not be able to leave Kotor, which is unfortunate considering we are meant to leave the next day and in a few days from now my family are arriving in Dubrovnik. As I am slowly running out of time, I finally realise that the new pump doesn’t have the same dimensions despite being sold as a replacement pump for this exact engine. As a result, the rigid diesel outlet pipe is being pushed against the engine and doesn’t have the space to be screwed in. Great, I have only one option left, put everything back together the way it was 7 hours ago and try to find another pump. I am exhausted, thirsty and hungry. My body aches, my knees are screaming and I come to the realisation that the engine compartment from the Amel Maramu must have been designed by sadistic midgets. Mike who stood by me all day isn’t doing much better but we rush putting the engine back together to make it on time for dinner. Jana picked the place. At first glance it looks lovely but at second glance not really. They are playing annoying loud music, we are facing a bunch of run down storage buildings and the food is completely bland. Just like the night before, we are also missing half of the ingredients announced on the menu. As if the day hadn’t been tough enough already, Emma is asking questions non-stop:
“So what have you done? How is an engine working? What will you do? Why? What? How?”
She means well but once again, it isn’t the right time. I am too tired to say anything and simply completely blank her out. Mike however has a bit more energy left and I can see him on the brink of exploding. Tomorrow shall be a better day and it is.
For our final day in Montenegro, we need to go all the way back to the entrance of the bay of Kotor, check out and find an anchorage for the night before leaving the country first thing the following morning. The winds are strong enough for sailing except that they are coming straight at us. As a result, we have to tack, tack and tack again to make it through the jaws of death. The jaws of death is the narrowest part of the bay, no more than 200 meters wide at its narrowest point and criss-crossed by ferries, tourist boats and speed boats. Mike is at the helm, Kim on the ropes and me on the winches. It is hard work as we need to tack nearly as soon as the genoa is sheeted in but with every tack we move a little bit further. We also need to take into consideration all the other boats and calculate when to tack. It makes for great sailing and successfully making it onto the other side without crashing or having to turn on the engine feels exhilarating.
Checking out of the country is a lot easier than checking in. No Karen today and all the officer wants to see are our passports and the crew list. In 5 minutes it is done without any drama so of course, it is time for some yin yang.
“How much time have we got before needing to leave the country?” In Greece we were given 24 hours and the Captainerie in Kotor had told us it was the same here.
“U ave to leave now”
“But?”
“Go now”
“Can’t we anchor for the night and leave in the morning?”
“No, check-ut done, need leave now”
“But it is 5pm, I thought we could just drop the anchor and stay on the boat?”
“U can try, but no legal, ve ave kameras”
“.. Whaaaat?
Apparently big brother is watching and I am not too keen to find out whether it is true or not. Back on board Kujira I announce the news to the crew. Emma is keen to try our luck arguing that 300 euros divided by 5 isn’t too bad. Mike doesn’t believe we would get fined but doesn’t mind going for one last night passage as the port of entry into Croatia is 6 hours away. Jana is happy to go with the flow and Kim is happy to do as the captain says. So there we are, sailing one last time into the sunset wondering what the hell we will do once we arrive at midnight…
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