Cudillero – Part 2

We wrote about the following subjects elsewhere on our website (on the Ahoy introductory page) but we’d like to repeat it here because of some comments we received recently…

The language translations are sometimes strange – We write the text for our website in English. The multiple language selection feature that is available by default on WordPress, our hosting platform, is an auto-translation function by Google. This translation is not perfect; it sometimes uses peculiar words and even expresses things in a very different way than what we actually meant. So, if you’re reading in a language other than English, and you read something strange, switch back to the English version to read what we actually meant to write! We’ve even had to rephrase things in the English text so that it is translated (more or less) correctly into other languages.

The Captain’s Log is very elaborate – Some readers have found it to be extremely detailed, elaborate, and sometimes hard to digest. This is why we have structured our posts with the “Highlights” (the overview) section at the top of every post. That’s a quick and easy-to-read summary of the story that most people would want to read, without too many details. “The Captain’s Log” (the complete story) has all the details. This is also why, if reading both sections, you may find some redundancy. If you’re interested, you can scroll down and read some or all of the complete story. If you’re not interested in more, stop reading after the Highlights section. We’re also adding a list of topics at the beginning of “The Captain’s Log” with links to the location in the text. You’ll see those with a little starfish () designation. That should also make it easier to jump to just the area of interest. You also may see a little badger paw print () in the event the Badger has something to add.

Why all the Detail? – The primary reason for elaborating on things is for our own reference. A boat is a very complicated collection of technical systems – a hundred times more complex than a house – and you need to be able to handle all of these systems on your own. There’s no one to call when you are out at sea and something breaks. For instance, Wim has calculated once that there is over 50 kilometers of electrical wire in this 12m hull. And, over 200 meters of piping and hoses!!! Things break down or need maintenance all the time. Non-stop. The human mind is not like a computer memory: some memories fade to background as new experiences are added. So, if we repaired some system 2 years ago, today we might have forgotten the details as so many other things have happened in these 2 years. That’s why we write down details and make lot’s of pictures (Wim has a collection of almost 20.000 pictures since he started to design Dione IV). Anyway, if there is a problem, we find it very handy to be able to look back and see: When was that? How did it look? How did we take that apart? Where did we get spare parts? Etcetera, etcetera. Or, in case of changing constructions: What were our considerations? Why did we build it like that? What materials did we use? What’s under there? Etcetera. In addition, as we travel to so many different places, we sometimes need to refresh our memories on where we were and when, who we met, what fantastic things we found/enjoyed/explored!

Highlights – the overview

We spend our first Christmas together in Cudillero. We have such a lovely day! We unpack our ‘Christmas present’ to ourselves: a new screen! We install it in our nest/bed so that we can watch movies and programs snuggled in bed 🙂 We cook a special Christmas dinner: a “Timballo”, an Italian recipe from Naples. We even made our own ricotta cheese, since this isn’t something we’ve found in Spain so far. After dessert (the delicious fresh cheesecake from Mariana’s bakery in Avilés), we watch a movie on our new screen. It has an excellent picture and with sound from our little Tannoy portable loudspeaker, it is a real joy! What a lovely Christmas day we had!

Then, on to some projects… Sher took out the sewing machine and there’s a new pillow! Why more pillows?… First, it is stuffed with a guest sleeping pillow, so we can display it and not have to take up space storing it in valuable (and limited) storage cupboards. And Second, when we sit in the cockpit, having these wonderful pillows makes it more comfy and they look beautiful! Then, it’s on to the next sewing project! Sher is making fender “dresses” (covers) to replace the now worn and torn ones. Meanwhile, Wim has enough projects to keep him busy, too! He installs our new positioning antenna and makes a hinged bracket to mount our viewing screen! And, we enjoy some beautiful weather!

And then it’s New Year’s Eve! In the afternoon, Jesús, the harbormaster of Gijón, calls us and asks what we are doing to celebrate. Maybe we can have a “cheer” with him and his sister, Lola. That sounds like great plan! We agree to go a café in Cudillero. The bar is packed! Everybody talking very loud and a group of men singing loudly (to scare off evil spirits?) What a special experience! The tradition here is to have a drink with friends and then go home to join family for a dinner. Then, at midnight, they eat 12 grapes for good luck in the new year. So it was still early (11pm) when we get back home. Sher is tired and goes to sleep, claiming that “cruiser’s midnight” (9pm) is the midnight she is celebrating, while Wim stays awake for one more hour to the actual midnight – New Year. But Wim finds it a bit too quiet, with his life-long tradition of lighting fireworks (and firing expired emergency flares at the isle of Terschelling in the Netherlands) and blowing loud horns at 12 o’clock. Oh well… he sets off a package of tiny flares on the dock, drinks his twelve grapes worth, and heads to bed to start the new year off with a snuggle.

On January 6th, Three Kings Day, It is a Spanish tradition to take the Christmas decorations down. So, we take the Christmas lights out of our branch and Wim puts the branch back in nature. He plants it in wet soil and we hope it will grow again! It got a bit dry but it didn’t loose its needles. While bringing the branch back ashore, a beautiful rainbow appears over sea. This means good luck for our little branch! Speaking of luck: another Spanish tradition is to open doors and windows on 3-kings-day to let the luck in. Well, since it’s another lovely day, we have the companionway open all day! So, lot’s of luck has been flowing in 🙂 We take our light strings down from the masts and the railing. We feel a little sad about that, it was so nice…

Now that the holidays are behind us, it’s time to continue on with projects. First, we need to replace the pressure valve on the hot-water boiler, which also provides heating to the boat. We clean the heating element, order a new one and the anode, and Wim replaces and reassembles everything when the parts come in (read more). Next, he builds a hinged mounting system for the viewing screen. And then we make a trip back to Aviles to get some wood for the shelf in the aft storage area (lazarette), and go to Mariana’s bakery (of course).

This week, the wind comes from the east/north-east and that blows cold air from Eastern Europe towards us. Thus, the temperatures drop to about 5ºC at night and to 14ºC in the afternoon. But it’s lovely clear and sunny weather. In the early morning we switch on the electric heating to have a comfy temperature when we wake up and around 11 o’clock the sun heats up the deck salon so much that we can switch the heating off.

The Captain’s Log (T+189,190,…208) – the complete story

Jump to specific topics below:
Hot Water Boiler Pressure Valve
About Our Heating Systems
From the Badger’s Bunk

December 25 – Merry Merry!

We cook a special Christmas dinner: a “Timballo”, an Italian recipe from Naples. We got great chicken legs at the market in Avilés and while they are cooking Sher feeds some old bread to the seagulls for their Christmas dinner 🙂

The dish needs Ricotta cheese but in Spain, we haven’t found any Ricotta. So, we look up a recipe to make it ourselves. It works really well!!! Success!

Well, after all challenges with the herbs and the ricotta, the Timballo is really delicious and we enjoy it with a glass of Rioja wine!

After desert (a delicious fresh cheesecake from a great bakery in Avilés), we watch a movie on our new screen. It has an excellent picture and with sound from our Tannoy portable loudspeaker, it is a real joy! What a lovely Christmas day we had!

December 27 – A new pillow! (really? more pillows?)

December 28 – Next sewing project

And there’s the first new boat fender cover!

December 30 – Gijon

Today, we take a bus ride to Gijón. There’s a big Decathlon store there and Wim needs a new wet suit. The propeller has some sea weed on it and it needs to be cleaned before we leave Cudillero. In 14 degrees C seawater, you need to dress properly!

We leave early (just before sunrise) because it’s over 3 hours travel time!

Then, we take the bus to the post office to pick up a parcel with Christmas lights that was delayed. After that, we take a bus to Avilés and another one to Cudillero. Long ride and we have to wait an hour in Gijón and an hour in Avilés for the next bus.

So, we arrive in the dark at a bus stop with an hour walk from the marina. It’s pretty chilly, 5 degrees C and we do not really like the long walk but there was no other bus.

A guy gets off the bus at the same stop and he asks where we are going. He’s going to Cudillero too, and he says, “you shouldn’t go walking. There are wild boar (javelinas) that can be dangerous.” Oops, we didn’t know that… He says, “I have called a taxi. You two can ride with me.” Wow! that’s great! It’s only a 15-minute drive and we offer to share the taxi costs, but he doesn’t want any money. The taxi drops him off in the village and continues to the marina to bring us home. So nice! We’re really overwhelmed by such kindness!

December 31 – New Year’s Eve!

In the afternoon, Jesús, the harbormaster of Gijón, calls us and asks what we are doing for new year’s eve. Maybe we can have a “cheer” with him and his sister. That sounds like great plan! We agree to go a café in Cudillero and they will come pick us up at 2030h with their car.

The bar is packed! Everybody talking very loud and a group of men singing loudly. Fisherman’s and farmer songs. We have a nice chat and a drink with Jesús and Lola. They are so nice. Lola is an English teacher and Jesús speaks English pretty well, so we communicate easily. What a special experience!

At 2130h, suddenly all lights are switched off! They are only allowed to stay open until 2130! But, nobody leaves and nobody seems to care about the darkness with only just some emergency lights left on. Everybody keeps on cheering and drinking and the barmen pour more drinks as if nothing changed! Hahaha! Well, after an hour or so we decide to move back home. Sher is tired and goes to sleep, claiming that “cruiser’s midnight” (9pm) is the midnight she is celebrating, while Wim stays awake for one more hour to the actual midnight – New Year.

At 12 o’clock nothing happens here. The port and the village stay completely silent and dark. Not even church bells. No fireworks, no horns or music or cheering. The Spanish eat 12 grapes at midnight, one for every month of good luck. That’s all. Wim finds that a bit too quiet, with his life-long tradition of lighting fireworks (and firing expired emergency flares at the isle of Terschelling in the Netherlands) and blowing loud horns at 12 o’clock. That is really the opposite of the situation here, at this time… So, we have bought some little flares in the Chinese shop and have the 12 grapes in liquid form 😉

January 1 – 2025, the New Year begins!

Since it’s such gorgeous weather and the next days will possibly be a little rainy, it’s a good moment to install the new Satellite Positioning antenna. The old hole has 6 layers of primer paint so, we can mount the receiver with some sealant.

January 3 – Beautiful warm days!

January 5 – More projects

January 6 – bye bye little Christmas branch, and thank you!

January 7 – A new project? Hot water boiler pressure valve

In the morning, we notice our freshwater pump keeps priming and we hear another noise that we don’t recognize. Hmmm. That could mean there’s a leak somewhere… We check the bilges and we find out there’s fresh water in the deep bilge in front of the engine and the bilge pump in there is running. That was the noise we heard. We find out that the water is coming from the hot water boiler.

The rubber seal has become too wide and can’t be used any more. So, Wim makes a new seal from a sheet of rubber that we have with us:

In the meantime, Sher cleans the heating element. It has a lot of limescale on it and the magnesium anode is almost completely gone. We will have to order a new anode and check this every year because it was only a year ago that Wim replaced the heating element + anode.

On Amazon, we find new anodes, a spare heating element and 2 new pressure valves and we have it dispatched to the little post office in town.

We decide not to fill nor use the boiler now as we need to dismantle the heating element to replace the anode. Besides that, the pressure valve is unreliable. So, Wim makes a bypass and we will use our small (low-capacity) hot-water boilers in the kitchen and bathroom, while we wait for the parts to arrive.

January 8 – a few windy days

We have a couple of windy days. But we’re very well sheltered here, from the South-Westerly winds: 40-50 knots in A Coruña. Here, we have hardly any wind, only sometimes some strong gusts swirling around the high hill beside of us. Funny how we seem to be in a quit spot all the time. Here are pictures of the wind maps from 3 following days. The red is storm (40 knots) and the green is less than 10 knots. We are the red pin:

January 9 – and rough seas

Even though we didn’t suffer from too much wind, the sea has become pretty wild. But because the swell has turned more to the West, not much swell enters the port. On the wall (remember, 15m high) it’s pretty wild sometimes:

One of the things that have arrived from Amazon is a latch for our viewing screen (we enjoy it every evening!). The lady at the post office knows us already and hands over our packages without the need to show her the reception notice and passport 🙂

January 10 – Avilés

January 11 – delicious bread for breakfast

Wim fixes the boiler with the parts we received. First, the new magnesium anode on the heating element and put the heating element in place.

January 13 – warm and comfy with heating on board!

This week, the wind comes from the east/north-east and that blows cold air from Eastern Europe towards us. Thus, the temperatures drop to about 5ºC at night and to 14ºC in the afternoon. But it’s lovely clear and sunny weather. In the early morning we switch on the electric heating to have a comfy temperature when we wake up and around 11 o’clock the sun heats up the deck salon so much that we can switch the heating off.

About our heating:

• In our central heating system (radiators and convectors in all rooms, filled with coolant, pumped by a very silent circulation pump) we have a 1200W heating element that heats the coolant in the system. Also, the circuit of the central heating flows through a spiral in the hot-water boiler and that adds additional heat from the hot-water boiler (heated to 65ºC by shore power). When on shore power, we draw an average of 2000W like that and that’s sufficient to keep Dione IV warm (at 20ºC). She’s well insulated: 8cm of insulation all around.
• When not on shore power, this 2000W would drain our battery bank in about 7 hours so we need diesel solutions for that:
  • A 5kW Eberspächer diesel water heater can heat the central heating system. It also heats the hot-water boiler via the spiral in the hot-water boiler. The Eberspächer however, is not a system that should be used permanently for an extended period of time. It needs maintenance an a regularly bases. We use it mainly during sailing and for heating the boat up quickly. For the long, long hours of heating we have:
  • A Dickinson Antarctic stove in the salon generates a nice and dry convection heat and has a spiral that heats the central heating system. The advantage of the Dickinson is that it’s a gravity-fed (from the diesel day tank), natural draft combustion system. That uses zero electricity and the natural draft (chimney) keeps the air inside Dione IV very dry. So, no condensation problems. The Dickinson is not suited to use during sailing: the natural draft gets disturbed by the swirling winds around the chimney. So, when need heating during sailing, we switch on the Eberspächer. That has a forced combustion system and runs under any circumstance.
  • When the engine is running, the engine’s coolant runs through a second spiral in the hot-water boiler (keeping the boiler hot, at 70-80ºC) and through a 40kW water heat exchanger than exchanges the engine’s heat to the central heating system. So, the heat from the engine is not wasted into the seawater through the exhaust but heats Dione IV’s interior.

We decide to stay here for a while. We’re in a little area that has better weather conditions than even a short distance West. We’re protected from strong winds coming in off the Atlantic, and can wait for a good weather window to continue on. That gives us the opportunity to order things that have delivery times. Such as a dive compressor from France. And since we have the little post office here with the very kind lady that is willing to receive any package for us, it is convenient to order things for projects we’d like to do. And for for big packages such as the dive compressor we can ask our friend Jesús from Gijón. And, we love Cudillero. It’s very well sheltered and often we have far better weather than at the west coast (A Coruña for instance). And, the marina is inexpensive. Enough reasons to spend wintertime here before we sail into the Ria’s in spring!

From the Badger’s Bunk

Yep, it’s been a while since you’ve heard from the resident Badger on board. Holidays got the better of me, what with all the chocolate and good cheer, Christmas tree (branch), lights, and decorations. And what’s with this “Mousemas” stuff? Mice? Forget that nonsense and let’s celebrate Badgers… Merry Badgermas to all! Thank goodness Sher didn’t get the idea to sew up some santa hats for the Bears and me until after Christmas was all over, phew! But we’ll need to watch out next year…

We had some visitors on board. They have two little kids. And you know that kids LOVE tiny badgers like me. So I got some play time in! Pretending to have a grumpy and impertinent disposition doesn’t fool children at all, (thank goodness)!

Okay, back to my VHF and SSB watch post… even though we’ve been here for almost 2 months, you still need to keep an eye (and a paw ) out!