Portić - Borovinje, 4th July, 2025

Borovinje is a large cove that is only partially protected from the Bora wind. One sailor on Navily mentioned a strong funnelling effect under the Bora wind, which results in strong gusts of wind. We experienced these gusts all night long!

And this exactly what we got overnight... But before that, it had been a paradise!

As we arrived in the early afternoon, the water was crystal clear and there was no wind.

We could clearly see the anchor dug into the seabed, as well as a bunch of fish swimming around.

Initially, we experienced a very light south-westerly wind, which gradually strengthened in the afternoon as the sea breeze emerged. However, the wind direction shifted abruptly to the north-east in the early evening, accompanied by a significant Bora wind. As you can see from the Windy picture below, we should have been well protected from the Bora at this location. But we were not! The wind gusts were very strong and the cove offered no protection. In fact, it funnelled the Bora towards us above the hills and down into the cove.

28 knots winds on anchorage with funnelling effect

The bora strengthened late at night, with the land breeze adding to it and making conditions quite uncomfortable. However, we added another 10 metres of chain and a 5 metre spring line to the anchor, and it held perfectly as the boat did not move an inch despite gusts of winds up to 30 knots.

We decided to cancel our planned trip to Cres when we checked the weather forecast, which indicated a new episode of bora was expected the following evening, with rain all day long. We set sail under storm jib only, surfing back to Pula at over 7 knots in 5 hours with a back wind! The bora faded away as the sea breeze built up around midday, only to return later in the evening after we had safely reached the Polesana marina.

It was a fascinating experience to witness the interaction between the various weather systems in a place like the Kvarner when a low-pressure system was heading southeast from the Gulf of Genoa, and the bora was coming from the Velebit mountain range and falling into very warm waters influenced by the sea/land breeze.