Category: Route

Posts related to the route traveled

Skiathos

Skiathos

Skiathos is a nice little island with an old town set on some hills with style full old houses.

We anchored opposite the beach, a short dinghy ride away from the port on the other site of town.

Our anchorage near Skiathos town

The small streets near the fishermen’s port are littered with shops, bars and restaurants. The nearby airport brings many tourists to the island which translates into a healthy tourist industry.

Skiathos cats know their place
The old port
Old port as seen from a restaurant terrace

We strolled along the port for a bit and found nearly every boats is available for charter, island trips, day sails, etc etc. As of yet not evaluated is the local chandler..,

Deaulos Orion

Today we ended up at a nice calm bay after a day of motoring and sailing. Early in the morning around 02:00 we passed the old bridge in Chalkida across the Euripus Strait. This is a narrow channel of water separating the Greek island of Euboea in the Aegean Sea from Boeotia in mainland Greece. The bridge only opens for a short while between the tides when current is minimal. Water flow peaks at about 12 km/hour(!) In order to cross a visit to the port police is mandatory. Here they explain the procedure ( standby on channel 12 from a certain time, they’ll call each ship twice: once to prepare for departure (anchor up etc), and once to start passing the straight ) and they also check the cruising tax paperwork and payment. After the visit to the port police we visited the bridge authority (or whatshamacallit) to pay for the crossing. While in the process of doing this late in the afternoon we had the opportunity to the the tidal current at full force going south. Passing the open bridge was quite an event as it turned out that Chalkida has some active nightlife and yachts passing by the old bridge is part of the festivities.

We found a bay

Athens

We stayed overnight at Zea Marina in order to satisfy our everlasting lust of marine chandlers. That and Sushi.
Zea Marina Athens

There are a number of them on the boulevard around Zea marina, but the highest density is found close to the commercial port across the hill. While on the move in somewhat remote areas finding some specific parts can be a challenge. But Athens has a reputation to keep as it is the center of one of earths ancient civilizations. Thus we found our circlips and capacitor with relative easy. The capacitor was the primary challenge and it took 2 chandlers with blank stares until number three pulled out the business card for the rockstar shop that had our desired model in stock. We tried some more chandlers in the marina area in vein until we resorted to walk to the one of the business card:

Capacitor
Capacitor

From there on finding the circlips was easy.

CirclipCirclip

Route plan
Patroklos island

On top of the hill: Temple of Poseidon, Sounion

We passed the Temple of Poseidon while on route from the west to the east coast of the Attica region .

Argostolli

After a few days in Ithaka we head to Kefalonia. Here we hope to see some turtles while staying at anchor while wind picks up.

Sadly the predictions for wind and rain turn out mostly accurate. The promised turtles remain unseen. We suspect they are in hibernation.

We use the time to rewire one of the electric winches It bypassed the future battery monitoring system in its original installation. For this we had flown in some bad *ss cables. Lots of time was spend under the floor and under the chart table. Eventually the new cable was installed and fixed in place with tie wraps. And the winch still works.

Meganissi and Ithaka

After many moons at Lefkas Marina Ocean Wolf is finally on the move again.

We say goodbye to Lefkada for a while and motor south towards the island of Meganissi. Ocean Wolf is somewhat uncertain after having been at the dock for so long. Simple things require some help. Turning in a circle takes care of autocalibrating the compass. Rotating the speed log also requires a little help. The bowthruster wasn’t thrusting much due to loads of barnacles that had grown on the impellers.

Some dives later things behave a little better and we continue to a nice and quiet bay in the island of Meganissi. Here we anchor for the night and wake up to the sounds of construction workers who are busy building a house on the hillside next to the bay.

Next we head to Ithaka and pass by Scorpius. This privately owned island was previously owned by Onassis. While passing it we see large signs to welcome nearby boats. On closer inspection the text invites boats to please stay away. Booh!

Towards the end of the afternoon we reach Ithaka and anchor near Vathi port.

The village looks beautiful from the water. The houses all look freshly painted and well maintained. Nice to see that there are no high rise building to spoil the authentic Greek/venetia village look.