A night ride to Rab, 20-21 June

Needing to be back in Pula at the end of this week and given an announced storm for the end of the week, we decided to go for a one shot night sailing from Sibenik to Rab, a 90 nm ride. The choice was based on the forecast of a medium Bora episode with winds around 14 m/s (28 knots) during the night that would allow us to sail 7 to 8 knots so as to reduce the time to cover the 90 miles to go.

Passing Sibenik at night

It worked as expected, under 2 reefs and trinquette (staysail), but the episode lasted much longer than anticipated...Here is the route that we followed.

The forecast was as follows on Windy (left) and on the Bora forecast Croatian site (right):

Where the two forecast disagree is in the area of Zadar, where Windy indicates much lower winds while the Croatian forecast anticipates same levels of winds, and they were right. After all it looked like the land breeze I am used to is combining with the cold Bora to create these very strongNortheast winds in the second part of the night. By sunrise, it starts to fade away.

Below is what is described as the typical "waves" of clouds generated by Bora/land breeze in the morning. The clouds originate on the summit of the Velebit chain and extends over the sea

In the same are by end of the morning, the breeze has disappeared, and remains only the cumulus humilis announcing the start of the sea breeze which will go stronger in the afternoon. Fascinating learning experience.

Rab is a very nice island known for its cultural heritage dating from the Romans, its medieval architecture, and its sandy beaches, which is rather rare in Croatia.. 

Typical sand beach in Rab, only accessible by sea!