ocean-pilgrim

We left the Gulf of Patras for the tiny island of Kastos, a long string bean of an island tucked in alongside the larger island of Kalamos. Happy days as we were off to the main town, to a stunning aquarium of an anchorage and a trip in to the bar at the Windmill that overlooks the rugged bays and further across to the mainland. It was gorgeous and I couldn’t resist the water and swimming amongst the super friendly fish. Then an unforecast south easterly swell arrived.  Before we knew it whilst all the boats in the now full harbour were sitting pretty we were bucking about like we were on horseback. This heralded the arrival of grumpy Cath as I knew this swell often doesn’t abate and I could see my trip ashore disappearing by the second.  Yep, up anchors and off we go to another anchorage further north and slightly more protected. It was certainly an improvement and we spent a comfortable night aboard amongst a few others with the same idea.

We had a beautiful sail on the sparkling blue seas into the island of Meganisi. I’m not sure about other people but I always feel I need to get reacquainted with sailing life and feel comfortable with our anchoring techniques and choices of places to hang out before doing the more stressful bits.  What I really mean by stressful bits is the stern to the quay med mooring.  With only 2 of us and a centre cockpit boat Rick can’t throw off a line as he’s attached to the wheel carefully manoeuvring us in and using the bow thruster  to keep us on course which leaves me dropping the anchor then fending off boats on either side so we don’t hit them then running to the stern and throwing lines ashore that hopefully will get caught by a person.  If not I have to jump ashore and tie us up.  So much can go wrong, and we have pretty much seen or done it all and it still makes my heart hammer at first, despite our competence as we prepare to do this.  I guess it’s only natural not to want to do it at first.  So in Meganisi instead of heading into the main town, called Vathi we went into a bay close by to anchor. There were quite a lot of people in there already but we dropped anchor safely in a charming spot close to the little quay with boats med moored to it but far enough out not to get in a situation where we may get tangled with those boats anchors.  More and more boats arrived. Sheesh, its only just the beginning of the shoulder season for the charter boats and they just kept on arriving and I am thinking it must be absolute madness in summer. But the strong breeze dropped and everyone including the shouty Frenchman settled down and we deeply appreciated a calm night with no rocking! We spent 2 lovely nights here and walked a lot of the coastal paths and into the town of Vathi and took in how pretty it is.

Forecast rain and strong winds and a necessary trip to the chandlery for parts had us heading to Nidri, a big safe and shallow bay on the island of Lefkada where I suspect half the boats in the Ionian head to in windy weather. Sure enough everyone was there as it was blowing 20 knots outside the bay but annoyingly also inside it. We did our provisioning and online shopping at the chandlery, packed everything away and I was a bit tired and didn’t feel much like cooking so we headed back into town with our washing which we put through  a great coin operated machine whilst we had dinner. A waterfront meal, fab food and lovely wine, a charming head waiter who regaled us with stories of a new marina right in front of the Taverna that remains steadfastly closed due to bureaucratic bungling despite a TV story of it’s opening which had us in stitches. We really appreciated his ability to see the comic side of the debacle.

The next day brought a lot of rain and a super lovely lady at the chandlery that sent all our items with a friend who was driving to Nidri.  Rick just made an arrangement to meet her near the dinghy dock which saved him an hour round trip on the bus or in a taxi in the wet weather. Phew.

The following day we headed off very early to get through the Lefkas channel and through the opening bridge first thing in the morning.  The bridge is only open 3 times a day except on a Sunday when its open about 8 times to disgorge all the charter boats as they head off on day one of their charter adventure north towards Corfu. We know people start late on holidays so we decided to go through on its first opening on the Sunday.  It was a great experience as can be seen by the photos.  We popped out around the end of a breakwall into the open sea and a decent swell and plenty of wind. Sails up and we romped our way up to Preveza one of the biggest yachting hubs in Greece and an idea stop off point.

It’s easy to get into thinking that the best thing about sailing in Greece is the Islands.  I don’t dispute that as I really love each of them and their individual flavour and history but this last year has really deepened my appreciation for the mainland. Contrary to my belief that the Ionion is always full of boats we spent 2 lovely nights alone in a tiny wooded anchorage with nothing to disturb us but birdsong.  Perhaps it was empty due to its lack of mobile coverage or we just caught it in a quiet moment. 

From there it was off to the small coastal town of Parga.  It has an amazing castle and tiny islands sporting a few ruins and a tiny whitewashed church.  A sparkling blue sea and a charming village top off this lovely spot.  Here we farewelled our friends Meagan and John who had sold their boat and were heading home to Australia.  We’ll miss them this season. We headed back to Intention after a lovely final lunch with them to find a guy had anchored pretty much on top of us right as a thunderstorm was threatening. Arguing with people who either can’t understand swinging room or have egos that won’t allow then to admit they’re wrong is a waste of breath so we decided to head off to the island of Paxos/Paxi and get away from a potential problem.

We had decided to head to a much loved aquarium anchorage called Lakka right at the north of the island but we decided to check out a few other protected spots en route.  Sure enough we came into the tiny town of Longos where were no other boats and it was calm and still light enough to set anchor in sand. We decided to stay. It’s such a charming town.  Everyone was out having drinks as the sun went down.  We provided some interest but fortunately not entertainment.  It was exactly the type of place you might imagine when thinking about sitting out at a bar as the sun sets over a tiny headland in a pretty bay filled with little motor and fishing boats on a cypress filled Greek island as summer arrives. This is right where my love affair with Paxi began.

But I nearly lost it the very next day as we headed into Lakka.  We anchored in a place that someone had just vacated in this big aqua sandy bay and had a swim and watched as everyone else joined us.  49 other boats in fact.  It was forecast to be a pretty still night and most boats settled in alongside each other with less problems than you might expect but then the sloppy, rolly swell peeled its way into the bay keeping us awake for most of the night.  After an early morning SUP around the bay we headed off to Gaios, the main town on the island.  It is protected by an island and you have to navigate along a narrow passage to the town quay.  Its super pretty.  As I was staring open mouthed we passed a boat just leaving and he yells “Go in there where we just were.  The orange boat right there next to our spot has people from Tasmania on it!” Good lord! So we did exactly that and met our new neighbours who were, indeed, from Launceston a mere 2.5 hours from our home in Cremorne. Small world right? The quay was free in May so we decided to stay and spent 6 nights there.  We walked and swam and met the cutest kittens and made friends, had drinks and tolerated the worlds absolute worst harmonica busker who breathed aimlessly into his instrument as any tourists approached along the quay.  Deadly!  As soon as he started up in time with the daily tripper boat arrivals I put our little speaker on and blasted actual music so the harmonica ear worm wouldn’t get going inside our brains.  Our neighbours did the same.  We drowned him out and he moved and harassed other people further away.  But even this couldn’t spoil our time there.

It was truly a lovely stay but time marches on as it is wont to do and Rick had booked us into a Marina in Corfu Town for early the following week so we needed to head north.  We zigzagged our way north between anchorages on the mainland and Southern Corfu enjoying the variety which you can see from the photos. 

Next time I will go on from here as Corfu Town was absolutely beautiful and also marks the end of this year’s journey northwards.  Next time is southbound as we head back through the Ionian towards the Corinth Canal.