...but no facilities
David and I went ashore in search of cigarettes that he could trade with his workmates. Kiosks abound, usually with an old lady demonstrating the product available, but only in packs of 20, not 200's. We eventually found a wholesaler, pointed out by an attractive and intelligent looking young lady that I had approached, but were refused service. They sent us off to a newsagent, who had some packs, but clearly for their own stocks, and who would not take a Visa. So our trip was aborted and we returned to Fuga so that David could complete his packing.
At 1100 we went up to the taxi rank, and experienced some confusion as the taxi would only take people where he wanted to go: fortunately the airport was ok, to the annoyance of a woman ahead of us, and some older folk who no doubt wanted to go just around the corner. We loaded fuel from the Shell mini-tanker at 4 cents less than the lowest forecourt rate for diesel (126 cents a litre). We had taken on water from the taps on the quay in the morning, so now only needed some fresh fruit and other supplies. First we went to find an internet cafe, as I was anxious to get my antivirus updated having found it had somehow become disinstalled. We eventually found one (Home internet cafe, L. Ziva 31, just off the St. Markos square) where you could connect the laptop via wifi at very reasonable rates.
We returned to the boat, had some late lunch, and prepared to leave. For some reason I had forgotten to recover the Rocna hanging over the bow, where the ladder/passerelle had been mounted, and this managed to collect the chain of our neighbouring motor cruiser as the wind carried us across its berth. Having embarassed ourselves and attracted the attention of several people, I shortened up the anchor warp to the chain, but could not get the Fortress out of the sticky mud. We have no roller or securing point on the transom, so there was no way to use the boat to wriggle the thing out of the ground. Eventually, using the davit to secure the chain we had recovered (it flexed horribly) we did at last obtain our freedom. As the anchor came to the surface we realised it was bringing a substantial deposit from the bottom, so we crept out of the harbour ignominiously with it trailing from the davit in the water.
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| The so-called marina at Zakinthos is home to some moored pleasure boats ...but no facilities |
As soon as we got outside we anchored clear of the entrance to sort ourselves out and lick our wounds. After that we motored down to Porto Roma, where we had already anchored twice, for a quiet evening. It was our 9th wedding anniversary! As Mo went down below to get a drink, she heard water sloshing around in the bilges under her feet. Once more I got the summons! This time there was a significant amount - there is something quite frightening about water inside a boat. The bilge pumps however would not touch it, so it had to be extracted using the dinghy pump into a bucket: 6 of them, Mo counted. There was no sign of water coming off the generator, and the water appeared to be clean and fresh. We cleared it up, and it did not come back.
John and Carol Boulter on Aquatint had mentioned the new harbour at Kiparissia as a staging point on the way south, so we decided it made sense to use it rather than have to do a very much longer trip down to either Methoni or Pilos in one hit, probably meaning an overnight. We set off from the anchorage, and for the most part enjoyed a pleasant sail. The wind was initially from the NW F3 or 4, and only at the end did it swing around into a light and variable southerly which was no use to man nor beast. We kept the main up and motored the last few miles. We noticed cruise ships at Katakolon visiting the site of Olympia, but for the most part visibility was hazy and we saw very little. At Kiparissia there was plenty of room, and we berthed alongside ahead of another British boat, Tawa Kachina. There were only five yachts altogether, including a German yacht with wife and young daughter. We prevailed upon Rod and Margaret from Tawa to come on board for a drink on their way out to eat, but unfortunately could not persuade the German couple. Rod and Margaret are in their ninth year of cruising from the UK, and were a mine of useful information, so we kept them as long as we could until they became hungry and the tonic had run out.
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| The entrance to Kiparissia at the NE corner is straightforward | Fuga alongside |
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| A view over the harbour and fishing boat berths | From the root of the former breakwater at the NW corner |
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| The fishing harbour has also been upgraded |
Mo woke up full of action: she wanted to sew back the Dehler badge that had come unstitched off the 'main drop' (stack pack) sail cover. I was instructed to remove it, so that it could be sewn and put back before the sun awning went up. The sewing machine was extracted from the rear cabin and this was duly accomplished. Our 'Wind Scoop' wind chute had torn apart during the near gale in Argostoli, and we had been talking about making an omnidirectional scoop. I had sort of modelled it in paper, stuck together with selotape. The only possible suitable material was a 'Dehler' flag that we had inherited with the boat, 1.5m by 3m, and I thought this would do the trick. Mo started making the base for attachment in the hatchway, while I puzzled over the cut of the main part. Eventually, having cut one half of the material, I realised that I needed four triangular sections for the top, and the only way I could get two of these was to shorten the design. We eventually put together one of the main sections, sufficient to offer up in the light breeze to try. It seemed a bit ineffective. We concluded it needed to be larger, and made of spinnaker cloth, as the weave of the nylon flag was too open and too heavy. So with rather heavy hearts, the project had to be aborted. We modified the damaged windchute, cutting off the shredded cloth at the top and sewing it over the wooden batten, then sewing on heavy tape to attach a supporting line. All this took time: our German friends (who had reported a Lidl 2km outside the town) and Tawa had gone. We still planned to look around the town, but in the heat of the afternoon felt disinclined. We stayed on board, and read until dp time.
We still needed to see the town! We got up, and after breakfast headed off along the harbour wall, past the now massive quays of the little fishing harbour. Mo was initially for turning around when we reached the taverna, as she was under the impression that I was anxious to get going. I fancied a look at the castle, and so we set off on a climb through the town and up the hill. As it was Sunday, only one or two food shops were open, but there were countless cafes with men sitting reading papers, smoking, and doing what men do on such a morning. We passed the end of an old disused railway yard on our way up the hill. Eventually we got through the main part of the town, almost on a level with the castle, and close enough to take some sort of photograph of it! Then we turned back. I climbed on an iron fence with pike shaped decorative tops to try to take a photo of part of the harbour below, only to impale myself on the way down losing my shirt front in the process! I felt a bit self conscious as we retreated down the hill, this time to the western side of the harbour, and then back to the boat. The new harbour, funded largely by the EU, is certainly a major attribute to the town, and a useful staging post along this coast. On reaching the boat we filled up with water. Only having done so did we check the bilges, and there it was again! This time we pumped and dried, and tried topping up the water again only to find water pouring out from the area of the tanks. The filler connections are not easily accessible, so having identified the source, we were content to leave the problem for another day.
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| The Folly at Agrilos |
We got away about midday, taking the inshore route to see the Disneyesque castle on the foreshore and the taverna in a mill at Agrilos. I adjusted the log * as we had been constantly showing 'current' against us. Having adjusted at the beginning of the season, when the paddlewheel may have been stiff with antifoul, it has now presumably loosened up a bit, and we have I think been marginally over recording our speeds and distances logged. We sailed inside Nisos Proti, feeling superior as Rod had promised gusty winds, when the wind came upand we enjoyed a fast sail downwind with a NW that increased to F5/6. We made a rapid entrance to the anchorage at Methoni, but had trouble in setting the anchor in the gusty wind in a controlled fashion. On the second attempt, when it appeared to be dragging across rock, I let out all our chain in the 4m depth, took some transits, and had a swim and a drink.
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| The Turkish tower and part of old castle at Methoni |
Mo woke up feeling under the weather again with a cold and congestion. We took it very easy all day. I avoided investigating the water leak, and instead spent a long time on the internet, having paid for two days connection via the phone. (Wind, 5€ for Non Stop 2). I responded to e-mails, and was concerned to find more woes being aired on the CA website. In the end, the written word in electronic form, may not be the best way to communicate emotive issues, as we so often found in our former business lives. So much is missing, such as the ability to pick up on misunderstandings. When finally we got to dps, Mo had recovered sufficiently to ensure that we both slept vinously but very well: I fell asleep in the cockpit and she was obliged to erect the windchute, that we had had to take down earlier because of the strong winds, herself.
Mo was feeling better in the morning. I spent an inordinate amount of time 'nerding' to catch up on the web log and e-mails, as we had invested in two day's internet access via the mobile phone. We did eventually get ashore in the early afternoon. We walked around part of the castle, which is very extensive, but mostly ruined after which we needed a drink and stopped at a hotel, two cokes for an unbelievable 1€. The Dia % supermarket had a good range of fresh fruit and veg, as well as other useful items to fill some of our outages, so we came away loaded with bags. Once we were back on Fuga, Mo stowed away while I recovered the dinghy and outboard and made ready on deck.
We set off at 1900 hours with a light north westerly to take us gently down the channel between the offlying islands and the Peloponissos shore while we ate our supper. Unfortunately, the breeze did not last, and we had to motor for a while, before it switched to the SSE and freshened enough to enable us to make reasonable progress. We anchored in the very beautiful Ormos Sarakiniko, on the south coast of the island, which provided excellent shelter when the wind later freshened from the NNE. We crashed out in recovery mode. Later, I decided, probably inappropriately, to fix the SSB aerial. David had brought some cable that I had ordered from Maplin, and being screened it may not be appropriate as the tuner is supposed to match the impedance presented by the long wire (backstay) antenna. I dismantled the bottom of the backstay, so that I could do the job from the bosuns chair at the mast, rather than try to haul myself out to the backstay as I have done in the past. Fuga was pitching to the swell brought in by the onshore breeze, and even so the job was quite difficult.
I spent some time trying to get the SSB to talk to the computer: the sound card seemed to keep losing its set up, and I would get spurts of music from the music library, and spurts of output on the fax software. Eventually I got it receiving passable faxes from the German Meteorological service, but totally failed to make sense of the RTTY side of things. Too many unknowns, and variables, such as what are the transmission schedules, baud rates, frequency shift, etc. Giving up on that, we then started to look for the water leak. This meant unpacking three saloon 'settee' lockers full of canvas covers, spares, and all sorts. There was quite a bit of oily salty water, which Mo attributed to the generator exhaust manifold which I thought we had fixed. There was also some new(ish) very salty (partly crystallised) water under the propeller shaft: this might be leakage from the stern gland. This we had to dry up first. I located the outflow from the first freshwater tank into the second, my prime suspect. The outlet was under the built in saloon seating. I considered fitting an inspection hatch, but decided to make do for the time being with a 'pilot' hole, as I did not have the jigsaw out, or any suitable short blades. No point in puncturing the tank! The jubilee clip was still functional but quite loose: I tightened it up a couple of turns at least, and we will see what transpires next time we fill. It could still be a split in the tank, or the breather tube fitting. Extracting the tank or getting access to it, if we have to, promises to be a nightmare.
Thus entertained, we put everything back, and prepared for sea. The urgency on the SSB front had been to obtain a weather forecast. I had tried to listen to the Med Net on 8122Mhz: I could just about make out an American voice (presumably the Net controller) reading days and times but that was about it. Paradoxically, I could read people all over the Med quite clearly, and when he arranged a schedule with some boats in Turkey on 4000MHz I could read them all fine. So with some reluctance I set up the computer, and paid for another 2 days of internet traffic through Wind. The link was virtually useless, but I managed to download a grib file eventually. This confirmed light westerly winds for much of the night, so we decided we should go for it. (In Milos, Wind have a 3G service, and performance is fantastic!)
The forecast proved amazingly accurate. Akra Maleas was lumpy with a NE swell left over from the day before, but the only thing to worry about was the heavy commercial traffic (east and west) that was turning about a mile from the point. Once cleared through this coastal traffic, we motored along, and the swell gradually diminished. Occasionally the W to WNW wind showed some enthusiasm and attained F3, so that we could sail for a while, then it died away again. Later on her second watch, Mo caught the shift to the N, and was able to sail at a respectable 4 knots or so for the latter part of the journey.The entrance into Ormos Milou on Milos is quite dramatic. Some of the hills are scarred with open cast mining of various valuable minerals that can be found here, and tourist boats go close in to see the multi-coloured rocks. The town Adhamas is very different to those we have seen so far: white and blue buildings, and on the hill above the main settlement, the Chora. The bay itself is enormous, (having been a British naval base in WW1), and we anchored off the town to rest up for the day.
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| The harbour at O. Milos | Some large yachts and commercial traffic visit |
We set the alarm so that we could make an early start, as it was going to be a long day. It was flat calm as we left the anchorage, and there was only the slightest breeze. We aimed to pass between the islands of Kimolos and Poliagos, partly because it might be marginally shorter, but mainly because it promised to be more interesting. The rocks along the shores of Milos, and later on the shore of Poliagos were fascinating. We met an oncoming high speed ferry in the narrow passage between Milos and Kimolos, and soon after encountered a large cargo ship that appeared at first to head in our direction. For some reason he turned around and headed off south about the island towards his ultimate destination of Spain. Once clear of these islands there was very little to engage our attention for the next 30 nm or so, as we cleared Nisos Sikinos (very steep to with a village on the top) and arrived at Ios.
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| The harbour front at Ios |
We went into the main harbour to take a look, but we had already decided to anchor in one of the bays immediately south. We had a look at the whole of Ormos Milopotamou, but concluded we would be best off in Ormos Kolitzani. We expected two or three days of strong northerly winds (Meltemi). The bay seemed pretty quiet, and the nudists described in the pilot were distinctly thin on the ground.
The wind picked up during the day, as we had anticipated, but never seemed particularly strong. The Navtex was also giving out forecasts of 7/8, but there seemed to be very little commotion offshore. A square rigged tripper boat came in and picked up a buoy briefly to allow his punters to swim, but soon cleared off towards the south. We checked out the water situation in the bilges - none to speak of - and Mo did some re-organisation of her dry goods storage. Otherwise, we read and swam to while away the day. As a precaution we laid the kedge as a second anchor so that we were held a little more steadily. I managed to get the SSB/computer to spit out some RTTY messages, and left the set running overnight, but found that I was missing the eastern Mediterranean from the reports it had gathered.