Mission Ocean work on Marine Protected Areas in Mallorca
by Mission Ocean 29 Nov 2017 18:27 UTC
Motoring in the calm © Mission Ocean
"How's your Spanish?" asked the plucky Australian voice down the phone. "Can you meet with our head of research?" The voice belonged to Brad, president of Asociacion Ondine, a hugely active marine environment non-profit organisation on the island of Mallorca.
Ondine (as well as being the name ofBrad's Palma-based diving company, and a 2009 film starring Colin Farrell) is a group that runs educational programmes, research expeditions and awareness-raising campaigns, all centered around protecting the marine environment in the Balearic Islands.
Our adventure with Ondine started when Henrique first met Brad at the Monaco Yacht Showin September 2016, on Doyle Sails Palma's stand. The Doyle team in Palma are passionate long-term supporters of Ondine's work, and many of the staff give up their spare time and resources to help as much as they can. With a long, curly ponytail down his back, a cheeky smile, and bright eyes full of infectious enthusiasm for marine conservation, you can't help but like Brad and – most importantly – listen to what he has to say. As soon as we knew that we would be in the Balearics this Autumn, we called him up.
The day after our arrival in Palma, after a hairy entry into port with 18 knots of breeze, we welcomed Brad and Miguel (an experienced diver and marine biologist, with a wicked sense of humour) on board Contigo to pour over maps, teach us some new Spanish words, and make plans...
A week later, and Contigo was making her way along the north western coast of the island, bound for the northern-most tip. Conditions were unfavorable – flatcalm and windless the first day, and a two meter swell on the nose for most of the second – but spirits were high, and we were happy to be out on the water for the first time with our two new volunteer crew members, Charlie and Oli. Both professional skippers, these two English sailors have just finished hectic mediterranean seasons on charter boats, and will be with us until we reach the Caribbean early next year. On rounding the Cabo Formentor, a light breeze in our backs meant that we finally got a chance to test our symmetrical spinnaker into Pollença bay. Whilst we are reserving judgement on the 1990s colourscheme, the sail worked beautifully, and we spent a happy hour fiddling around with the possible configurations and snapping some glorious photos. We were so pleased with the setup that we decided to get a second, identical spinnaker made up by the good people at Doyle Sails Palma, of which we will be taking delivery in the Canary islands.
The following morning dawned beautifully calm, and we sent Oli off in the tender to collect Miguel and his team of divers. One of the long-term projects that Ondine have been working on is to identify potential zones that could be classed as Marine Protected Areas by the government of the Balearic Islands. They have already succeeded in getting stunning areas such as Dragonera protected with strict restrictions during the summer months, and our mission was to gather data on the flora and fauna between Formentor and Soller, to form part of a detailed report that will be submitted to the authorities.
Three tender runs later, and Miguel, Carolina and Mari were safely on board, together with ten dive bottles, a host of research equipment, and a delicious-smelling homemade potato tortilla for lunch. The team dived first around an hour south west of Formentor point, with Henrique joining them for their second dive in the afternoon. Careful planning by Miguel had seen stragetic points identified for each operation, starting at around 50m depth and creeping gradually in towards the shore, taking observations, videos and photos asthey went. Oli and Charlie took it in turns to man the tender and keep a lookout, whilst I held the fort on board Contigo, baked Charlie's birthday cake and nursed a horrible cold (worst luck...)
After a big birthday dinner and a calm night at anchor, we inched our way along the coast to Miguel's chosen dive spot for that morning, under the massive, imposing cliffs that dominate this side of the island. We passed by several clusters of small fishing boats, and were dismayed to sail through whole zones of floating macro-plastics as we headed south (beach balls, polystyrene boxes, kids' balloons...) These sightings only helped to reinforce the importance of what we were doing, and Miguel, Carolina and Mari quickly kitted up and sped off with Oli to begin their third dive. Their huge smiles as they returned gave away the beauty of what they had seen underwater – a stunning boulder garden teeming with life. A final dive after lunch confirmed their suspicions; we had found a sensational, diverse site that offered perfect conditions in which fish could live and reproduce, and an ideal candidate for a Marine Protected Area.
Our final goal before heading back to Palma was to test a prototype cradle that Miguel had made. A simple structure with a quadrant base for scale, a camera and a lamp, the aim is of this tool is to take film and photo footage at depths of up to 100m, without the costs, risks and invasive disruption associated with sending divers down. We undertook three seperate tests at 50m, a delicate operation to keep Contigo as stationary as possible and avoid the cradle dragging behind her. Miguel declared the tests a resounding success, and the resulting images were even better than we had imagined. At sunset, we dropped the happy, exhausted divers on a pretty little quay at the end of a long, slim bay and motored gently down towards Soller to pick up a buoy for the night.
This is just one example of some of the fabulous projects that we have seen, and become involved in during our time in Mallorca. We have been blown away by the warm welcome that we have received here, from both the Mallorcan and the international communities. But we have also been surprised at just how dirty the marine environment is here. With a waste water treatment system that is nearly a hundred years old, and which cannot cope with an exponentially growing population that also swells massively in the summer months, the biggest problem faced by groups such as Ondine is the sanitary waste that overflows from this system after every rainfall. We were no strangers to beach cleans when we lived in France, but we have never seen shorelines so full of cotton bud sticks, toothbrushes and other (much more disgusting) sanitary items that should never even go down toilets, never mind end up in the ocean.
Thank goodness for people like Brad, and his team of volunteers and specialists, who are raising awareness, motivating the general public to do something about the issues, and working hard to get parts of the island classed as Marine Protected Areas. At Mission Ocean, we were over the moon to be able to offer Ondine our assistance, and to learn from them, during our three weeks in Mallorca.
As a leaving present, Ondine trained us to use their Dos Manos (Two Hands) schools programme, originally from Australia and aimed at teaching marine pollution in an interactive, accessible way to junior and high school students. We will be able to use this programme and teaching tools throughout our world tour, in all of the schools that we visit. We can't wait to get started!
Mission Ocean is proud to be supported by: Boero, Doyle Sails Palma, Rotary District 1730, Navigair, Octomarine, Battery World Service, Victron Energy, Monaco Marine, Aquatabs, Spade Anchors, Plastimo, Furuno France, Pejout Marine Services, Lyvio, Storm Bird, Aethic, Astrolabe Expeditions, AsociacionOndine, and Sail-Worldcruising.com