Mediterranean noon to noon average run.

[BurnitBlue]

From earlier days, outside the Mediterranean it is generally accepted that 100 nm a day is a good average to plan a multi-day passage on a cruising boat.

What would be a reasonable average noon to noon for a trans Mediterranean passage. I have asked skippers here in Greece and I get the answer 50 nm if offshore, but zero to 30 inshore.

What is your experience please? Inside and outside the Mediterranean. The original guess was based on heavy long keeled yachts. The present flat bottomed fin keel designs with light weight must modify this guess somewhat. Thanks.

 

[sailaboutvic]

If its any help we from the very early days worked on 5 kt ,
the reality is on a 24 hour sail we avg around 5.5 a lot of the time .
Boat 14 tons fin keel Moody .
Not so much here in the Netherlands, 10 miles can take you 3 to 4 hours waiting for bridges and locks ?
Hey its all good fun

 

[BurnitBlue]

If its any help we from the very early days worked on 5 kt ,
the reality is on a 24 hour sail we avg around 5.5 a lot of the time .
Boat 14 tons fin keel Moody .
Not so much here in the Netherlands, 10 miles can take you 3 to 4 hours waiting for bridges and locks ?
Hey its all good fun

Thanks Vic. It is the noon to noon average that is useful. You reckon 130 nm in your Moody. The problem with using speed as a planning tool is that human nature recalls the good days (hours). I should have mentioned sails only, no engine. Because of unreliable engines of earlier cruisers this was accepted as the base of 100 nm noon to noon. I accept that long Mediterranian passages are mostly unnecessary so I am looking for considered guesses based on experience. Thanks for you input, but what is your guess for planning.

Unfortunitely for me stuck in Greece I have never needed to sail offshore for more than a few hours. But I am trying to plan a reasonable passage time to Gibraltar. After Gibraltar I will be in familiar 100 nm sailing days, day in day out.

 

[sailaboutvic]

We plain on 5 kts Avg we never been far wrong well I shouldn't say never ,
we once did a trip to North Africa from Spain and plain to arrival at daylight to get into a harbour , 4 am heaving too waiting for some light that arrived at 6 am haha.
BB you know as well as I do , the Med can give you more wind then you want or no bloody wind .
A lot of these times when your doing 24 hour runs its unusual to sail all the way .
We be doing 7 kts one min the next 3 kts the next 5 kts then wind dies and engine on .
If your asking how far can you sail undersail only in 24 hours ,
In a really good blow as said above .
Little wind on a heavy boat plain on a couple of miles an hour .
We once sailed 10 miles and it took us 4 and a half hour .
Friends in a 40 foot concrete boat took 20 hours to sail from Porto Paulo to Ragusa once, just under 30 miles .

 

[sailaboutvic]

Can I ask why you asking and what's your plain maybe then I can give you a more satisfying answer.

 

[RupertW]

Thanks Vic. It is the noon to noon average that is useful. You reckon 130 nm in your Moody. The problem with using speed as a planning tool is that human nature recalls the good days (hours). I should have mentioned sails only, no engine. Because of unreliable engines of earlier cruisers this was accepted as the base of 100 nm noon to noon. I accept that long Mediterranian passages are mostly unnecessary so I am looking for considered guesses based on experience. Thanks for you input, but what is your guess for planning.

Unfortunitely for me stuck in Greece I have never needed to sail offshore for more than a few hours. But I am trying to plan a reasonable passage time to Gibraltar. After Gibraltar I will be in familiar 100 nm sailing days, day in day out.

I think a lot depends on whether you can wait for the right winds. I’ve found offshore forecasts pretty good in the Med and if I had the time to wait a few days or maybe a couple of weeks then lots of passages would have been quite fast under sail. But I think you also have to be happy with strong wind sailing for some distance too. If you are fine in the 15-45 knot range and have time to wait then you shouldn’t have a problem. If you are only comfortable long distance at the 10-20 knot range then you may wait forever for the right window.

Close to shore you can go well on dead calm days in many parts of the Med, I have found, provided you start after lunch when the wind starts and keep sailing until dusk as the thermal winds carry you along on a nice reach.

I know it’s not your plan but having a decent reliable engine makes a lot of difference in just doing what you want when you want.

 

[BurnitBlue]

Can I ask why you asking and what's your plain maybe then I can give you a more satisfying answer.

My plan was to escape from the Mediterranean starting mid-summer. Unfortunitely, I injured one of my my toes in early June which became badly infected so I had to amputate it with a pair of cutters. With consultation from a nearbye Doctor skipper I managed to clean it up. The swelling went down enough to allow me to wear my crocks.

I am now running out of time so I am trying to guess whether or not I can still make Gibraltar with a delayed start around mid September.

 

[sailaboutvic]

BB as Rupert said you have to be willing to burn some fuel , as for can you make Greece to Gib mid Sept, roughly 1400 miles , I say so .
I know you be doing it solo but even with stop overs and some weather delay
If you cal 100nm over 24 hours that's only 14 x 24 hour stretch or 28 day sail
The end of the day you only know your own limits .
It's only the last few years we stopped sailing mid Oct and that's not because of the weather .
Good luck my old friend ,
Just be safe .

 

[BurnitBlue]

I think a lot depends on whether you can wait for the right winds. I’ve found offshore forecasts pretty good in the Med and if I had the time to wait a few days or maybe a couple of weeks then lots of passages would have been quite fast under sail. But I think you also have to be happy with strong wind sailing for some distance too. If you are find in the 15-45 knot range and have time to wait then you shouldn’t have a problem. If you are only comfortable long distance at the 10-20 knot range then you may wait forever for the right window.

Close to shore you can go well on dead calm days in many parts of the Med, I have found, provided you start after lunch when the wind starts and keep sailing until dusk as the thermal winds carry you along on a nice reach.

I know it’s not your plan but having a decent reliable engine makes a lot of difference in just doing what you want when you want.

Thanks Rupert, all good stuff. I prefere offshore without the harbour hopping. A direct offshore route can cover a lot of distance.. I have a new engine but no way to carry enough fuel to motor 2,000 miles.

Sailing long distance can be a lottery where the challenge is part of the fun. Harbour hopping is OK if the plan is to see the sights but can be a thief of time.

 

[grumpygit]

I tend to agree with Vic, and imho you can't plan anything in Greek waters especially in the summer months, the wind is that fickle and so can the seas. There is nearly nothing more uncomfortable than losing the wind on a rough sea with a short fetch.
In the last 15 years sailing mostly the Aegean I can count on one hand any memory of getting anyway near a noon to noon transit. Before Greece the rest of my sailing has been Adriatic, Spanish, Italian and French waters and I hold the same basic opinion throughout.
If you are working to a timetable, I don't hold out for you to make Gib by September without doing a lot of motoring so may be use 30-50% of your preferred boat speed under engine as your overhaul average over the water. Any speed/distance gained under sail is a bonus.

 

[RupertW]

Thanks Rupert, all good stuff. I prefere offshore without the harbour hopping. A direct offshore route can cover a lot of distance.. I have a new engine but no way to carry enough fuel to motor 2,000 miles.

Sailing long distance can be a lottery where the challenge is part of the fun. Harbour hopping is OK if the plan is to see the sights but can be a thief of time.

I agree with all of that. Before my first med delivery 20 something years ago I was enthusiastically preparing by copying harbour charts along the route then found that the skipper (correctly) was expecting to do South of France to Ionian with one stop only if necessary for fuel.

Typically as a couple we do one long trip each season with some multiple overnights as we change bases/country and it’s somewhere between a delivery and a cruise, and we have burnt a lot of fuel on occasion. Our range is about 500 miles with including spare cans in cockpit lockers.

 

[BurnitBlue]

I remember a conversation I had with a well known multi- circumnavigator about this topic. We observed that although it is almost 3000 nm between Canaries and Caribbean most Skippers did it in 21 days or so. We agreed that if there was a coastline with harbours most skippers would not get there before the hurricane season hit.

 

[BurnitBlue]

i am picking up the message that attempting a non stop engineless sail through the Mediterranean Greece to Gibraltar Is not a sensible project. I suspected that this would be the case. My maximum non stop passage in the Mediterranean was about 72 hours and it took me 4 days to recover from sunburn and exhaustion.

I will still aim for mid September and see what happens when the time comes. It will still be fun. Actually my greatest fear is being back in freezing Sweden with a healed foot while punching myself in the face and cursing my choice to delay yet again.

The odds are that I will attempt a non-stop where possible and pull in for fuel and weather if I must. I will base my passage times on 50 nm noon to noon. Thanks for the advice.

 

[sailaboutvic]

Arr your going back to Sweden, might catch a look at your toe next year ,
It's our plain , Denmark Sweden.
BB Greece to sicily can be an over nighter or a two nightee depending where you take off from , the north coast of sicily there plenty of places you can anchor to make you sail west day sails, its a 30 hour sail nw sicily to Sardinia, we done it in 30 hours and 36 hours in the pass under sail.
To the islands is a bit of a long one the quicks we don't it is 53 hours .
Your more then half way there by then .
Just some thing to think about we have friend who left the Azores 12 days ago in a heavy steel yacht there still 300 miles out last night waiting for wind .

 

[BurnitBlue]

Arr your going back to Sweden, might catch a look at your toe next year ,
It's our plain , Denmark Sweden.
BB Greece to sicily can be an over nighter or a two nightee depending where you take off from , the north coast of sicily there plenty of places you can anchor to make you sail west day sails, its a 30 hour sail nw sicily to Sardinia, we done it in 30 hours and 36 hours in the pass under sail.
To the islands is a bit of a long one the quicks we don't it is 53 hours .
Your more then half way there by then .
Just some thing to think about we have friend who left the Azores 12 days ago in a heavy steel yacht there still 300 miles out last night waiting for wind .

Wow. I thought I should check out another long passage maker Martin on the Bavaria 34 M-Jambo. During Covid he sailed non-stop from Antigua to Germany via the top of Scotland. Then non-stop from Germany to Portugal, then back to the Caribbean. He then started out again this year on another long passage back to Germany from Martinique. He was dismasted in Atlantic.

His vblog was released three days ago.

I bring this up because I always admired his contempt for bad weather. It also reminded me of when I raced aboard a 42 foot Nicholson. During the race the owner skipper risked all. After the race we would crawl and creep back to port. He said that a boat could float round the world for a hundred years. It was stress that caused things to break. I could see his point but boy did his crew suffer. Dangling our feet over the side just for something to do.

 

[BurnitBlue]

The toe stays in Greece buried in an ants nest. I often wonder if they catch some mutant thing from it and emerge like Godzilla to munch my boat in two bites. I did think for a moment whether to send it in a matchbox to an ex wife with a note how much the rest of me is ransomed for. Just to find out how much she really cared about me.

 

[Tranona]

Wow. I thought I should check out another long passage maker Martin on the Bavaria 34 M-Jambo. During Covid he sailed non-stop from Antigua to Germany via the top of Scotland. Then non-stop from Germany to Portugal, then back to the Caribbean. He then started out again this year on another long passage back to Germany from Martinique. He was dismasted in Atlantic.

His vblog was released three days ago.

I bring this up because I always admired his contempt for bad weather. It also reminded me of when I raced aboard a 42 foot Nicholson. During the race the owner skipper risked all. After the race we would crawl and creep back to port. He said that a boat could float round the world for a hundred years. It was stress that caused things to break. I could see his point but boy did his crew suffer. Dangling our feet over the side just for something to do.

Glad you have found Michael. Just shows (if it ever needed showing!) that you don't need am old heavy long keeler for successful long distance solo sailing. Mind you he is helped by having spent large amounts of money on modern electronics and communications plus knowing how to use it to the best advantage.

Back to your original question. I did Corfu ,Straits of Messini, Cagliari, Majorca St Carles 3 up in May/June 2010 in my Bavaria 37. Original plan was to continue through the Straits and up to UK but various problems not least blowing 2 autopilots and a looming fixed date in UK meant abandoning and trucking the boat back to UK. We planned on (and achieved ) 120 miles a day, but motored over 80% of the time. As already suggested with a fixed time window you cannot rely on achieving that sort of non to noon run without motor. We burned about 45l a day with a Volvo 30np which ran faultlessly despite over 3000 hours on the clock.

You just have to accept that to meet your time constraints you will have to go in delivery mode and maintain 100+ miles a day. Fortunately the middle of the med is pretty empty so not too scary single handed with the right gear to warn you of potential danger - plus a totally reliable autopilot.

Good luck.

 

[BurnitBlue]

Glad you have found Michael. Just shows (if it ever needed showing!) that you don't need am old heavy long keeler for successful long distance solo sailing. Mind you he is helped by having spent large amounts of money on modern electronics and communications plus knowing how to use it to the best advantage.

Back to your original question. I did Corfu ,Straits of Messini, Cagliari, Majorca St Carles 3 up in May/June 2010 in my Bavaria 37. Original plan was to continue through the Straits and up to UK but various problems not least blowing 2 autopilots and a looming fixed date in UK meant abandoning and trucking the boat back to UK. We planned on (and achieved ) 120 miles a day, but motored over 80% of the time. As already suggested with a fixed time window you cannot rely on achieving that sort of non to noon run without motor. We burned about 45l a day with a Volvo 30np which ran faultlessly despite over 3000 hours on the clock.

You just have to accept that to meet your time constraints you will have to go in delivery mode and maintain 100+ miles a day. Fortunately the middle of the med is pretty empty so not too scary single handed with the right gear to warn you of potential danger - plus a totally reliable autopilot.

Good luck.

Thanks for your practical example. It caused me to read this whole thread start to finish again. There are a lot of practical examples that has a consensus from everyone that burning fuel is necessary to achieve good daily runs. That is my problem. This is an open forum so I was reluctant to admit that I am already well into my 90/180 thing. Calling into marinas for fuel means that I would be "clocked". Yes, I would probably get away with it but it is another risk to add to weather, health, and breakages.

Claiming my legal position using international waters would need checking in and out of the EU for fuel. Roadsteading will not fill the tanks. September/October is not a good time of year for a non-stop run but I did hope that some answers would support my attempt. Even from my own experience I know that a good engine and lots of fuel are necessary. This fact alone is my main reason to get out of the Mediterranean.

So, common sense points me to a clean unused start of my 90 day "allowance" to avoid the risk of running into a bad tempered immigration official. I am a resident of an EU member state, however I will be single-handed with a British Passport with no protection from family. Oh well. Back to the real world. Thanks all. Interesting subject though.

 

[sailaboutvic]

BB I really wouldn't worry about popping in to a marina to get fuel .
You can always do what we been doing for years and dinghy in with cans

 

[Yngmar]

You don't need to check into a marina to get fuel. Most of the fuel quays are independently operated and you just moor there, fill up, pay the fuel quay operator, undock and be on your merry way. Almost all of them will let you fill up water while filling fuel too, especially if you're taking more than a few litres. The marina office doesn't get involved in this. Nobody will bother you about papers there.

The tricky bit is when the weather inevitably turns unpredictable on you and you need to shelter somewhere