Years ago, during Holy Week, a multitude of white sails fills the Mediterranean heading for Ibiza. The Ruta de la Sal, the offshore regatta with the most sailors in the Mediterranean, has been moving thousands of sailboats for over thirty years, participating in a competition born to commemorate a forgotten historical event. In 1846, when the Carlists managed to blockade Barcelona during the First Carlist War, a Barcelona businessman offered money to all sailors who volunteered to go to Ibiza to fetch salt and bring it to Barcelona, as it was running out. It is said that a schooner named Halcón Maltés, captained by the Greek Andrea Potrus, was the fastest to break the blockade.

"After so many months sailing such a tiny boat, my mind is still sailing. My head's still not on the ground, if you know what I mean," explains Pilar Pasanau (Barcelona, ​​1968), speaking by phone from Antigua and Barbuda in the Caribbean. At 58, the Barcelona native recently finished fourth in the Mini Globe Race, a solo round-the-world race in boats under six meters long. Her boat, the 5.80-meter Peter Punk, covered a total of 24,000 nautical miles, more than 44,000 kilometers, in 191 days. "I'm in a very sweet, very pleasant emotional, mental, and physical equilibrium. I would love to be like this for the rest of my life, that is, with total control of myself," explains the first woman in the final standings of a race created in 2020 by Australian adventurer Don McIntyre, who envisioned diving from a boat. For now, she remains in Antigua as she needs to find the money to ship the boat back home. In love with the sea, Pilar didn't hesitate to go into debt to make her dream a reality. "It was now or never. We'll pay them back," she says with a smile.

For centuries, these waters were feared by any navigator. Sailing around Cape Horn, the southernmost point of the American continent, or along the coast of Patagonia has never been easy. Now, two Catalan sailors, Dídac Costa and Guillermo Cañardo, are preparing to sail along the Chilean coast to southern Patagonia on a voyage unprecedented in the world of sailing. They will cover more than 1,500 nautical miles (2,780 kilometers) in a traditional sailing dinghy: the Catalan sailing dinghy. This small vessel will face a challenge unlike any seen before.

13 hours and 8 minutes of uninterrupted sailing just to circumnavigate the Isle of Wight, in the south of the United Kingdom. And doing so on a Catalan dinghy, a small boat that had never circumnavigated this island the size of Menorca, but with very tricky Atlantic currents. More than 13 hours alone on this sailing dinghy, barely 5.6 meters long and without a rudder, steered only by the body, the mast, and the sail. An adventure few sailors can undertake, but one that Dani Anglada Pich (Barcelona, ​​1986) has managed to complete. If doing so is already complicated, in his case it is even more impressive, since Dani is blind.

The America's Cup sailing competition continues to explore ways to be an attractive competition. After the failure of the last edition, held in Barcelona, where spectator numbers fell far short of those announced by the organizers, a new proposal has been presented for the 2027 edition, to be held in Naples.

Barcelona will host the prestigious America's Cup in 2024. The 37th edition of the oldest tournament in this sport, born in the 19th century, will come to Catalan waters in 2024 thanks to the agreement with Team New Zealand. The New Zealanders, reigning champions in the competition, have decided to put their trust in Barcelona Global's candidacy, which was promoted by a holding company created to obtain private financing for the event, in collaboration with the Barcelona City Council, the Barcelona Provincial Council, the Generalitat de Catalunya and the Port of Barcelona.