A Turning Point

We departed Amorgos once the winds had settled down a bit in company with all the other boats who had been stuck there with us, and set off in different directions. Except for the cross captain next door who had dropped an inordinate amount of anchor chain [ against local advice] and now had it well stuck under the ferry’s chain. And of course being Sunday, wasn’t going anywhere ...Zut alors!

We were headed due W towards Ios, an island we had a long association with since we visited as a new couple some 43 years ago.

Aaaah

It was a good sail on a broad reach most of the way, with the wind falling off in the mid portion as we passed S of the great hulk of an island that is Naxos.

It was a bright day but the N wind is still much fresher in temperature than normal and though the shorts came out, we still had fleeces and woolly hats.

Amorgos to iOS, Wind N 8_ 16 kts

We moored at Ios uneventfully but there was not a lot of room and the season has barely started. They must really struggle in the holiday months to find enough space for the number of boats.

Having climbed up to the Chora, we had promised ourselves a meal at our favourite Thai restaurant in the Med, the Thai Smile.

It is a bit a bit of a steep hike up to the Chora. There is a bus but it is M’s philosophy that we should walk when we can, and in fact it is amazing how spending long days in small spaces brings forward and strange desire to take exercise and stretch the legs. Anyway she was puffing by the time we sumitted. In our first youthful journey here, donkeys took our luggage and women on the harbour vied to offer us backpackers rooms... Well we got to the Thai Smile restaurant, if that counts as summiting.

The following day was going to have less of a sailing breeze so we were likely to have to motor for a bit.

I have been keeping an eye on my dripless stern gland, as it were, and from time to time it still seemed to be warm. Not hot like it had been previously, but sometimes it is stone cold and sometimes a bit warm. I found that if I burped it. That resulted in it cooling down, but I was still a bit anxious that the inflow of cooling water might be intermittently compromised.

Ancient Tamarisk tree, Amorgos.

The next part of the trip was a 45nm hike to the island of Milos, so knowing we would need to motor some of it I was a bit anxious about this. I considered going into the water with my scraper again to try to get at the water inflow. However this would require going right under the boat which is not a good plan if there are waves, and the water in the harbour at Ios was not conducive to swimming. There was a brown goo on the surface, the origin of which was uncertain.

So I burped and greased the gland again and resolved just to monitor it.

Ios to Milos

We had an unremarkable trip with a combination of sailing and motoring to Milos. Milos is the most SW of the Cyclades islands. It is the last stopping off point before going round the Peloponese peninsula, and also the most southerly that charter boats from the Athens area get before turning round to go N again. So it can be busy.

Milos is also a large volcanic caldera, a bit like Santorini further to the E. The main difference is that it is considered extinct having last erupted 150,000 years ago whereas Santorini blew up around 1500 BC and is still active with more minor eruptions in the 1950s.

Colourful rocks, and dragons.

So this makes the geology on Milos very interesting, with all kinds of strange colourful rock formations and random rock stacks emerging from the deep. You can imagine this as the source of legends to the ancients. There be dragons!

The main industry in Milos is mining. There are large swathes of the island have been cut away and shipped out. It is on of the main international sources of kaolin, which is the basic ingredient of porcelain. The capital of the island is the the town of Adamantis. So this must surely be the basis of a “Round Britain Quiz” question. What is the relationship between a Greek Island and the new romantic music genre, via the porcelain industry. Answers on the back of a postcard please.

Cockerel and Donkey

We were moored on the outside S facing side of the floating pontoon of the harbour. The inner side was reserved for local boats. As I was running about sorting stuff out on deck following our tying up, I was a bit surprised to see M ashore on the pontoon deep in sociable conversation with two young men.

They looked like Brits. You can tell. School shirt, shorts, socks and sandals. One fresh faced and confident, the other long droopy hair and less so. Think the TV series The Young Ones.

It turned out they were on what looked like a 1980s thirty footer of uncertain provenance, possibly a Moody, and had sailed from the UK in large off shore passages, Obviously inspired by Swallows and Amazons, Enid Blyton and E.M. Forster. Quite the young adventurers.

Anyway they were very helpful in directing us to the Port Police and full of information on everything from Shengen to where to eat.

It was warned in the pilot book that the harbour could be untenable in Southerly winds, as there is a long fetch across the lagoon that is the volcanic crater and waves can build up. However the forecast was for strong winds from the NW over the next few days, but nothing from the S.

Milos houses, boat garages below.

We went to bed in still and calm, only to be woken early the next morning by significant wave action on the boat. A sneaky wind from the S had come in and was blowing 15 knots across the lagoon. We were in something of a compromised position.

The boat next to us was getting a bit of a doing as its fenders bounced off the pontoon with each surge. I lengthened our stern lines and pulled us further from the pontoon with the anchor, and while we were safe it was a bit uncomfortable.

Over the next hour most of the boats on the S facing side of the pontoon left. Our young Englishmen had somehow managed a berth on the safe side of the pontoon. Suddenly the young heroes were off, and on a night passage to Amorgos. Good for them…..respect!

Also good for us as it was an opportunity for us to sneak round into the berth they had vacated. It was a bit of a tricky manoeuvre and took a couple of goes due to all the small boat moorings that had to be avoided and the brisk breeze, but eventually we were in a much more comfortable berth.

However there were a few scowls from the locals so we adopted the nonchalance of Empire employed by the previous occupants and ignored them entirely.

Adamantis.

We have had a few problems with weather forecasting. We have used two main sources, Windy and Predict Wind. I wont go into the complexities of the various models used but suffice to say you can pretty much get any flavour of weather your heart desires. However the main theme has been that

the wind strengths in the Cyclades have been under-called somewhat. And also that forecasts even for 48 hours ahead can change. I think part of this is the sea state, which is a lot higher here for a given wind speed, compared to the Dodecanese and closer to the mainland of Turkey. I think this is because the Meltemi tends to blow uninterrupted for several days in the same direction over open seas and gives the opportunity for a fully developed sea state to pick up over a longer distance.

Our next intended passage was around Cape Melia at the S end of the Peloppenese. This has a fearsome reputation with big gusts coming off the high land and dire warnings that these can cause equipment to break and knock downs to occur.

So I was taking this next bit seriously. There was to be strong winds for the next 2-3 days and then it would settle down for 24 hours that should allow us to go directly from Milos around Cape Malia and anchor up at an island anchorage some 10 mile round the Cape. This was a trip of about 65nm.

However the problem was that the following day the strong winds were to return and blow around the cape and along the Southern Peloppenense for another 3 days or so. Looking at the pilot book there are really very few places to hide from this, other than the anchorage we would be in. So we would be stuck for a bit.

Putting this all together meant that we would have been waiting for about a week to get around this obstacle without a clear end point to it.

A major re-think had to occur. We had already paid a deposit on the marina we intended to go to in Preveza in the Ionian. But this should not compromise safety. The Corinth canal is currently shut for engineering works following land slides, but is due to open on June 1^st. Which would be fine – if it opens. We could find no definitive information about the certainty of this.

We could head up to Corinth in that expectation. We still had a marina contract back in Marmaris, but if we were not there by the 20^th June, it would expire and they are not offering new contracts. If the weather was not playing ball we could be in a bit of bother.

So the decision was made reluctantly to head East again! One thing we learned early in our sailing history, is that things go wrong when you make rigid plans to suit other people or deadlines, ignoring the weather and sea in the decision making. We are here to enjoy the sailing rather than any specific destination, or achieve any specific goal, and so the priorities have to change accordingly. Don’t fight against the elements!

The modern Oedisseus? Or was that Prometheus (Mary Shelley)

So we abandoned plans of following in Odysseus’ path and reaching Ithica and Cephalonia, well it did take him ten years, and he lost all his crew!

We sat out the predicted high winds for the next two days, which in the end only really came for about 24 hours. But they did come and they were strong. We were glad of our adopted local boat status on the sunny side of the street. One yacht on the ‘ other side’ had a bust spreader from walloping into its neighbour. This damage can seriously compromise the mast and so they were stuck until it could be repaired. At night the buffeting, even when well secured, left us feeling a bit seasick !

There was then to be 24 hours of Easterly breeze predicted. So we left Milos and headed N to the island of Serifos, some 30nm.

It is a creditable design feature of the Cyclades islands that they are mostly all a day’s sail away from each other. It is not clear whether this is evidence of a higher intelligence at work (Zeus), or just the consequence of randomness following seismic and volcanic activity. Discuss.

Cyclades and Dodecanese

Serifos had a few health warnings from Rod Heikel with severe gusts coming into the harbour with the Meltemi. However M discovered that a new marina had been built there since our pilot book came out. This was partially true. There was a new Marina, but it got thoroughly slated in the Navionics reviews. There were no mooring lines laid and anchoring was perilous because of the presence of mooring chains lying on the harbour floor! There was also no electricity or water on offer.

So we went in with some trepidation, and ended up going alongside the concrete in a reasonable position such that the winds would blow us off the wall rather than on. Despite the lack of amenity, and lack of any assistance around to advise about berthing, the hombre in charge pounced as soon as we tied up and relieved us of a bit of wallet.

It turned out that Livadia, the village on Serifos was quite a pleasant little place, if unremarkable apart from the 7 Euro cost for a small bottle of beer in the locals bar!!!