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| Spinalonga Lagoon, the island is in the far distance | Agios Nikalaos, looking down from the road to Elounda one evening |
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| The bridge over the southern entrance to the lagoon | Early morning in our anchorage |
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Mo was washing: we had been using clothes up like no tomorrow with our trips out. There were a few essential jobs to get done on the internet while we had our connection (we do 2 days at a time), and of course there were plenty of distractions in consequence from e-mails and news from the world at large. I put away some of the spares that Sandy had brought. BBQ Pork chops tonight!
We had decided that today we would have the cooker out! Sandy had brought out rubber gas hoses, and replacement of same has long been on the jobs list. We have never had the cooker out since we have had the boat, nearly 7 years. It took its toll! In trying to lift it up out of its gimbal fittings, I managed to get my thumb in between the work surface and the cooker. Extremely painful, and the nail immediately began to go black. Mo set to work with cleaners and rubbing compound, while I went in search of a gas compression joint: the hose we had would not fit! No luck in the village, so decided on a bodge job cutting the end off the old tube, and pushing ours in with a jubilee clip. Managed to rub down and get two coats of varnish on (it was actually not too dirty), and get it back in place in time for supper. Big fat (fairly tasteless) BBQ sausages from Lidl!
The mission for the day was to sort out the SSB aerial. I had not been happy with the arrangement ever since I had fitted the new feeder cable to the backstay, the old system having been demolished during the re-rig at Nidri in 2008. I made some perspex spacers, then took off the backstay at the base, and went up in the bosuns chair to disconnect the feeder. Then we fitted the spacers, and soldered on the feeder cable to the split copper pipe, kindly provided by Sandy/Dave. The copper pipe neatly crimped over the backstay, and was secured with two jubilee clips. Unfortunately a couple of the spacers broke: thicker perspex required. Pork chop from Lidl!
Up sharpish for the Mediterranean net. Gone with the Wind, an Australian boat anchored nearby came in strong, and relayed for a boat in Ashkelon, but she did not seem to hear Fuga! Nor did anyone else. Came to the conclusion that our problems were not just the antenna, but something more fundamental. Noticed that the signal strength indicator (having read the manual) was not flickering. Decided to check the fuse: a three hour marathon to extract the unit from under the chart table seat, find out the fuse was ok, and put it all back again. It might just be the microphone, but unlikely. In between had spent an hour in the water trying to scrub weed off the bootline and hull. The antifoul has all but gone with primer showing through, so it looks as if it is going to be a regular job all summer. More fish from Turkey.
In the morning we sat down and looked at the recent pictures we had taken with a view to putting them on the web site, and I updated some of the web site pages, incorporating them into it. Then after lunch I started an internet session (2 days for 6 euros) running, updating the web site. I then spent many hours reviewing and improving the pages on communications that I have been writing for the Cruising Association web site, having been g'eed up by Frank Singleton's suggestions for it.
We went for a walk around to the bottom of the lagoon, where a bridge crosses over the shallow channel out to the sea. There are three old windmills here, in various states of disrepair. A sign directs you to an early Christian basilica, so we walked along the shoreline and around the churchyard. The church itself was locked up. We lingered at the bar there, and decided we would try to come back for something to eat at some stage, but virtuously returned via the supermarket to Fuga with a loaf of bread. It was breezy, and the forecast was for the wind to get up to around F6 outside: this could mean anything from not much to heavy gusts in the anchorage. I worked far too late on the computer.
Mo busied herself with washing. Icom came back very promptly with some suggestions in reply to my queries on the SSB. It was slightly embarassing that I had not properly read the manual, as I had understood that when 'TUNE' went off the aerial was tuned. This is not the case, and it seems we may have an issue with the tuner or its wiring. I spent some of the afternoon in the lazarette trying to check the voltages on the control cable, without much success. To take it further meant dismantling the shelves and chart table seat again, so Mo wisely persuaded me to leave it until the morning, and we went for a walk along the shoreline instead.
We had breakfast, and set about dismantling the chart table area to gain access to the SSB, which is built in behind the chart table seat and under the side shelf. Although there was nothing obviously wrong with the control cable wiring, I decided to replace the socket on the transceiver end with a connector block, and this had some immediate results in that the tuner started to try to do something. It was not however the end of the story, as it was still not tuning properly. I suspected a voltage drop issue, and doubled up the supply cable using spare conductors. Then when we put the generator on for a cup of tea, it achieved a 'tune'! Tucked away in the tuner book under precautions, it suggests that you should not operate without the engine running! Everything had to go back again, so the project took a while, and further advice from Icom is needed. Maybe we need to beef up the control cable? Encouraged by something a CA member had posted about Wind, I tried to use the 'free' internet. After a couple of minutes on line, the phone cut off! Our prepaid balance was now 8 euros overdrawn!
Got up early for the Med Net at 0830 local time. Running the generator the SSB tuned, and we checked in loud and clear to the net controller in 'western Greece', and also spoke to Steel Sapphire on the radio. There is still the issue that you cannot get a reliable tune, even with the engine or generator running. The cable spec. is 14AWG, which I have now discovered has conductors 1.6mm in diameter: ours is a screened cable used for computer peripherals with much lighter conductors. We went ashore to the bakers and to try the hairdresser again. We found out that she only opens in the evenings, from a Brit guy who runs a second hand book store in the shop below. He confirmed what we had already surmised, that there is an absense of grockles (holidaymakers) here this year. People are down because of the ash cloud, and put off by the economic crisis and riots in Athens. As a result he said that most people were 50% down on takings, and he himself was 70% down on last year.
We had a need to empty our holding tank, so motored out past Spinalonga in order to do the business. We anchored in a deep (long) cove on Nisos Kilokithia (the island that forms the 'lagoon'), open to the east, but very pleasant. We had lunch and swam before motoring back in to find that a French catamaran had taken advantage of our absence to pinch our 'spot', so had to anchor a little further up. In the clearer water of the cove, it became more obvious to me that we had a serious outbreak of coral worm on both sides of our keel that might need attention.
We did a water run to the tap on shore, and then set about re-assembling the wind generator (Willy). It had seemed a shame to be wasting wind. With Willy hoisted and making his rather paltry contribution, we put our cockpit cover back on and settled down to enjoy our virtuosity. As if in response the wind shifted north and increased in strength. I had an internet session running, so spent some more time on the CA website. Heard from Harriette, still in Karpathos, and from Steel Sapphire in Kasos, both keeping out of the westerly winds that became quite fresh. Other than that we read and amused ourselves, and I was permitted to take advantage of the internet while we had it.
Became incensed that Lloyds Bank had at last replied to a query via Diane, but not read the question. After a long call to their call centre, they came back, and insisted that you could do what I couldn't do. I was fiddling trying to get the fax facility to work to give them what for, when Mo suggested I look again at the web site. Sure enough, if you went about it a different way altogether, it was possible to get at our money after all! By now, the wind had forced us to take our cockpit cover down, and we retreated inside.