Gulf of Gokova with Steve & Jane Wilson 21-24/8 and Amy 25-29/8

Photos – Steve & Jane and Amy are going to post some photos onto the blog relating to this commentary.
We’ve now been in the Gulf of Gokova for about a month and that has suited us well as there’s plenty to experience here and we really did want to spend more time in one general area, get to know it pretty well and “sniff the roses”.
This Gulf is roughly 40 miles from West to East and varies from 20 miles to 5 miles from North to South. It is bordered by the Greek Island of Kos to the West, Bodrum on the Turkish mainland to the Northwest and with interesting and quite isolated anchorages, particularly on the Southeast coast.
Steve & Jane Wilson from Christchurch arrived on the evening of 20/8 having flown in from Canada where Steve had been competing in a gruelling mountain biking event which crosses the Rocky Mountains. We half expected Steve to be carried aboard but he was remarkably well, albeit looking forward to a more relaxing time with no training or competing.
On Tuesday we left the marina and anchored under the walls of the imposing Castle of St Peter for a first swim in a water temp of 26d, the warmest sea temperature that Steve & Jane had swum in. We then had a journey of several hours to English Harbour, mentioned in the last blog entry. We moored stern to shore in the perfectly sheltered bay and during our first of many swims Steve said he could see a cannon ball on the seabed. To belay our sketicismSteve prodded this with his foot and found it was made not of iron but of unfriendly sponge and Steve had a slight tingling sensation in his foot for the next few days. The next day we moved on to the Snake & Castle Islands where Cleopatras Beach is located. There were only a couple of boats anchored overnight in this enchanting anchorage and we all had a snorkel around the ancient harbour to see the considerable amount of pottery remains scattered across the sea bed. We were also surprised at the number and variety of small fish along with some “sea cucumber” and some snake like sea worms which grow to about 400mm long and traverse the sea bed. We had a BBQ on board and after the boys cleaned up the girls at 500 we had a wonderful midnight swim under the moon and stars before going to bed.
On Thursday we went ashore early to explore the ruins on Castle Is before the crowds of day trippers arrive. There was hardly anybody there and after looking over the approx 2,700 year old ruins we had a swim at Cleopatras Beach with only a dozen or so other people in the water. An engineer among us tried to convince us that this sand was not brought over by galleys from Egypt on Cleopatras orders but was the product of some local geological process, however we prefer the original story. When we returned to Envoy there was a large number of Gulets anchored in the bay, one so close that our stabilizing “flopper stoppers” were almost under his hull. Di yelled out to the Gulet skipper who had a look but was totally unconcerned.
We explored the Northeast coast including Akbuk Limani and Oren where there is a very large power station using locally mined low grade coal before anchoring for the night in Cokertme. For the 3rd time we had dinner at the very special Hassan’s restaurant where the atmosphere is fantastic, the food is exotic and the live Turkish folk music provides an intimate background.
We asked for the best Turkish red wine available and were served “Dikmen” which was a great red and which Jane & Di thought the brand name appropriate to the drinkers ! On Friday we went ashore for a look around Cokertme and the time came all too soon for our return trip to Bodrum where we had farewell drinks on board, a great dinner ashore and a walk along the very colorful and busy Bodrum night waterfront.

Amy arrived from London early Saturday morning eager for some sunshine and fine weather after a so far non existent English summer. She was not to be disappointed as the weather here is still great with clear and mostly cloudless blue skies, temperature in the low 30s and sea about 27d.
We started off again with a swim under the Castle of St Peter and its impossible not to enjoy this experience. We then headed to Cockertme and had a rest in preparation for a big night at Hassan’s. Every night there has its own special features and on that night the restaurant was not so busy and there was a Turkish birthday party in progress (they sing Happy Birthday with the same tune and Turkish words). So about 11 pm the two singer / guitarists came off stage and joined the birthday party group in an impromptu jam with one of them playing the flute and several singing. We had such a great time it was 2am when we went to bed. The next morning Amy & Di went to see “the carpet lady” and then we set off for English Harbour where we moored in the same spot as we had with Steve & Jane. Now we had to be careful of a few Compass Jellyfish floating around. These are a brown jelly fish about the size of a dinner plate across and can sting although not dangerously but best avoided.
This is the first time we’ve seen anything in the water you need to be careful of. We went ashore to a taverna for drinks and then had a BBQ on board.
On Monday we set off for the Snake & Castle Islands and we did a snorkel around as we had with Steve & Jane but this time had to avoid a few Compass Jellyfish.
Shortly after 1800 the last gulet departed and we had the whole anchorage to ourselves. As with Steve & Jane we went ashore bright and early and were virtually by ourselves, in fact at one point we were the only swimmers at Cleopatras Beach. While ashore we saw quite a large tortoise – the first one we’ve seen so far on this visit.
Later in the afternoon we arrived at a beautiful bay called Alakisla Buku.
Very clear water, sheltered, a nice sandy beach and only a small fishing boat at anchor there. It was so nice that we decided to have some nibbles and drinks ashore and we had a beautiful 3 hours or so doing just that and we thought of Alistair Ward who had given us the beach blanket and Frank & Marie Curulli who had given us the going ashore backpack which we were using.
On Wednesday we got back to Bodrum Marina by 1030 and Di & Amy went for a look around the bazaar so that Amy could practise her bargaining skills. Then after a wonderful 5 family days with Amy it was time for her to go but with all of us keeping in mind that she’ll be back to see us in Marmaris for Christmas.

We have now left Bodrum and are heading SE about 200 miles to Antalya where we will meet Brian & Carol Restieaux and cruise back towards Marmaris. It is now confirmed that we will winter over in Marmaris Yacht Marine marina.

Miles covered 2510 in 176 days on board with 510 engine hours.

Technical: mostly going well and no major issues. After Amy’s departure I repaired the oil leak from the gearbox cooling pump hose. I’m always reluctant to do such jobs either away from marinas or when people are about to join us in case of complications so this was the ideal time. I now had the correct 21mm spanner to do this so took the fitting off completely, cleaned it up and then secured it using Loktite. Not leaking yet after 4 hours so fingers crossed.
Our fuel transfer pump seems to be running very slow. This is the pump which transfers fuel from tank to tank and filters it at the same time.
Brian is bringing a spare pump to Antalya so we have this one covered.
Our water purifier’s u/v tube has become disconnected from the power wiring. I’ll need to check if there are polarity issues with this before reconnecting. We’ve got a sea water leak from the pump which circulates cooling water around the hydraulic oil for the stabilizers. I have a spare pump on board so can replace this.

Photos taken during Ian & Patsy's stay

Crowds at Cleopatra's beach on Castle Island - see out of bounds sand section as mentioned in text below.

Our anchorage at Castle Island - see text below.

Cleopatra's Beach

Ian & Patsy Ristrom from Christchurch joined us on Friday 10th at our spectacular anchorage under the Castle of St Peter, Bodrum. This castle was built by Crusader knights from Rhodes in the early 15th C. Later when the resident approx 200 defenders were confronted by many thousands of Turks they sensibly left peaceably without resistance.
We set off for a bay with the exotic name of Amazon Creek about 25 miles East. We had a brisk 20-25 knot wind on our starboard quarter with a 2 m following sea so Ian & Patsy found their sea legs pretty quickly. As happens, the creek did not meet expectations and the wind was funneling in there so we moved to a bay called Bayuk Cati. Here we had a great first night. We tied to shore in
2-3m deep clear water of 28d and not another boat in sight. We swam during daytime and after dinner by starlight. Another thing – not a mosquito or any flying insect to be seen and this seems common. Of course nothing in the water to worry you either. It was interesting to hear news from NZ and also of Ian & Patsy’s travels through Europe prior to joining us. The next day we cruised to a large bay with many small coves called Degirmen Buku. We secured ourselves to shore at a cove called Okluk where several tavernas are located and had a great meal ashore at a restaurant which had no menus but displayed options in a refrigerated display case which an unexpectedly dignified maitre de explained.
On Sunday 12th we cruised a short distance to Sehir Adalari - the Snake & Castle Islands. Here we anchored in a lagoon surrounded by 3 islands and the mainland but which was still open to the NW so until sundown we had quite a chop coming through the bay. This island group has considerable historical interest and some ruins to explore. Only 50 metres from the boat was the underwater remains of the old jetty and I snorkeled around there and was able to see the remains of quite a lot of pottery jars fused into the stone of the jetty. The area was originally part of the Rhodian confederacy and then occupied by the Romans in 129 BC. You can still see the remains of a theatre which held 5,000 people, various temples, houses, tombs, defensive walls etc.
On Castle Island is a once beautiful sandy beach about 50 metres wide with clear blue water. I say “once beautiful” because now there are hordes of day trippers who come over by ferry from the mainland and invade the surrounds with their numbers, deck chairs, umbrellas, loud disco music and ice cream stalls. The sandy beach itself is deserted though as its fenced off from the public with a security guard in a tower at each end to ensure nobody goes on it. This beach is composed of sand imported by galleys from Egypt by Cleopatra so that she could enjoy the beach during her time here with Mark Anthony.
The sand has been analysed by one Professor Tom Goedike and confirmed as being not of local origin but as coming from North Africa. Amazing to think of the effort which would have been expended to bring over many hundreds of tonnes of sand ! That evening we saw a 62 ft catamaran flying the Australian flag so made ourselves known and later went over for a few beers.
The cat is fantastic – built in Poland and sailed to the Med by the owners Roy & Janice - South Africans who had emigrated to Brisbane.
On Monday we went back to Degirmen Buku and anchored off a cove called English Harbour, so named because during WW 2 it was used by the English Special Boat Squadron (SBS) as a base of operations. The SBS was a marine version of the SAS and mostly used local caiques for their operations.
There is a book about them called “Improvise & Dare” by John Guard which would be a good read. We had a few drinks ashore and had some funny times with language. Patsy had a glass of white wine and Ian was trying to find out from the waiter what type of wine it was. Ian got into more and more trouble and eventually the waiter bought another full bottle which he thought Ian had ordered. Needless to say we did manage to polish it off. You have some funny situations and they are all the more enjoyable with 4 of you.
On Tuesday we headed for Cokertme (where we previously went to with Sharon & Doug) and Ian & Patsy were able to see the carpet making and enjoy the traditional café including a look into the very traditional kitchen.
While we were there someone managed to set a rug on fire and we saw a lady running across the yard with a burning rug which got thrown into a water trough. That night we were well looked after by Hassan, Mayot and the team at the restaurant and enjoyed the live music.
Wednesday 15th came all too soon and it was time for Ian & Patsy to depart by Dolmus (bus) back to Bodrum about 1 hour away, but not before we saw quite a few fish swimming around Envoy. There were fish which looked like Piper being stalked by large fish about the size of mullet.
It was great to have Ian & Patsy aboard - they are real “water babies” and a lot of fun.
As I write this we are again anchored off English Harbour which has turned out to be a favourite area. We’re going to stay around here until next Monday 20th when we have Steve & Jane Wilson from Christchurch joining us, followed by Amy on Saturday 25th. Then we are going to head South West in the direction of Antalya to meet Brian & Carol Restieaux somewhere around there and enjoy a cruise with them back to Marmaris. We are currently thinking that we will winter over on the marina in Marmaris or somewhere nearby from mid November.

Miles covered 2298 in 162 days on board with 454 engine hours.

Technical: all going well, touch wood !
Gas bottles are an issue over here. When we bought Envoy she had 2 large bottles suitable only for USA plus 2 supposedly suitable for Europe.
However we were unable to get the European ones filled in Italy.
These bottles take up considerable storage space measuring about 2 ft high and 1 ft in diameter so we tossed out the USA bottles and bought 2 bottles suitable for Italy. We found these could be refilled in Greece but not in Turkey.
Also the “European” ones it turns out are Spanish. So here in Turkey we had to buy an additional 2 gas bottles and we now have 6 on board hopefully suitable for most parts of the Med.
I have just completed oil changes on the main engine, wing engine and Genset. On Envoy this is quite easy and there is a reversing oil change pump with a manifold which can connect the pump to any of the 3 engines.
It’s a simple matter of removing the old oil filter, pumping out the old oil, fitting the new filter, pumping in most of the new oil and then fine tuning the oil level against the dipstick.

Cruising in Turkey

Well we are back “on line” again. Thought we had a computer problem but saw Vodafone in Bodrum today and we had simply used all our prepay on the SIM card – probably due to downloading photos. Incidentally Vodafone coverage is great here and there’s hardly a bay where you can’t get coverage booming in.
My last update mentioned the cloudless days – well since then we’ve had several days with a bit of cloud so I spoke too soon. When describing weather, the degree of cloud cover is described as “eighths” – you look at the sky, roughly divide the area into 8 and say how many of those bits of sky have cloud.
So we had one to two eighths of cloud the for a few days but now its back to cloudless – I’m sure you’all back in NZ will feel really sorry for us ! A feature of Turkey is their amazing nationalism expressed in flags of Turkey everywhere – on mountains, trees, buildings and of course boats. Even the smallest dinghy or tender will have a Turkish flag.
Another thing we’ve found in Greece & Turkey is an absence of mosquitoes and sand flies. Mostly you can sit outside without any problem. We did have some mossies in Piraeus and then for a few days we did have a lot of flies but in the main, flying insects are not an issue.
It also has been much less crowded than we expected. Most of the boats we currently see are Turkish and then most common (here in Turkey) would be Greek, German, British, French, Italian, American and then a smattering of Swiss, Norwegian, Dutch, Danish. In the while time we’ve been away we’ve only seen 3 NZ and about 7 Australian boats.
In Turkey there is a large number of what are called “Gulets”.
These are wooden two or three masted vessels of about 70 -120 feet which look like pirate ships and are charter vessels, usually having a whole mixture of people on board. Although they are yachts they rarely sail and their skippers have little regard for the common courtesies of boating. They travel everywhere at full throttle and worst of all are likely to anchor so close to you that you feel intimidated by their size and proximity and end up moving. Of course it is “their country” but they could show a little more regard for others particularly as the anchorages are rarely crowded and there’s plenty of room.
My brother Charles warned us of this and he was dead right.
After Sharon & Doug left us in Bodrum our next stop was Knidos – a beautifully sheltered small bay surrounded by the ruins of the ancient city. This city was established in 360BC and was known as the City of Aphrodite due to a naked statue of her done in the 4th C BC. Naked statues of men had been common but this was the first naked statue of a female. Although the existence of this statue is well proven its current location is unknown except for the plinth on which it once stood. Knidos has a considerable area of ruins and wandering around the ruins its easy to imagine what the city would have been like.
We then headed East to Datcha, a pleasant small town with a nice waterfront, plenty of tavernas and some shops. Actually Datca is where the founders of Knidos lived before they built Knidos. Little to see of historical interest here but nice just the same with North & South bays separated by a narrow isthmus. We departed Datca Mon 30th and saw dolphins leaping out of the water – what a shame we never saw any during Sharon & Doug’s stay.
That night we anchored at Kuruca Buku - nothing amazing but a nice sheltered bay with clear and clean water, trees coming down to the shoreline and nice tavernas ashore to check out. The following day we explored a long narrow inlet called Bencik but decided to keep going and evening found us further East at Kuyulu Buku which was in fact quite similar to the previous night’s anchorage. The next day was really interesting as we went into the inlet of Keci Buku.
This inlet has the ruins of a Byzantine fortress on an Island as you enter and the very nice Marti Marina to port. We spent a pleasant day and evening at anchor behind the island under the ruins.
Thurs 2nd we moved to Selimiye and the next day to Bozburun. The latter is very interesting as you pass through quite narrow channels which were once protected by fortifications – now just ruins. We had a good look around using our dinghy and the harbour frontage here is also really nice and we had a good explore followed by a drink or two in a nice taverna. We stayed the next night at a particularly nice place – Bozuk Buku. This harbour is only accessible by sea so is fairly quiet and is dominated by the ruins of a Hellenistic Fortress on the hilltop close to and overlooking the harbour. This fortress and associated ruins are what remains of ancient Loryma, an outpost of the Rhodian empire (the island of Rhodes can be seen in the distance). Beneath the fortress tucked into a small bay is a makeshift jetty and Ali Baba’s “restaurant”.
This is rustic in the extreme and Diane & I discussed how sadly such a venture could not exist in NZ. The jetty would never get planning consent and use of seabed consent and the structure would not pass Health & Safety regulations. The family owned business was fronted by a guy with the unlikely name of Barbarossa and is open all year around. We asked where they lived and he said their house was a few hundred metres behind the restaurant. Later Di and I walked up there and it was primitive in the extreme. They had a couple of shacks made out of driftwood, hessian and corrugated iron.
Envoy is an unusual vessel and always attracts a lot of attention in marinas, harbours or at anchor. People often cruise slowly around us in their dinghy looking at Envoy and sometimes asking questions. In this way we met a charming Turkish couple Ilkay & Meta. They invited us aboard their 17.5m planing launch powered by twin 750 hp Cats. This was supposed to be for a drink but turned out to be for dinner. Their launch is a well appointed boat and as Ilkay has retired and has some back problems he employs a permanent crewman. The cost is about NZ$1200 per month and he works for Ilkay full time, all year round helping on board and maintaining the vessel.
The use of paid crew is quite common here, even on relatively small vessels and you often see either Turkish or Sri Lankan crew. Ilkay mentioned that when he bought the boat in Italy he spent 3 months cruising it back to Turkey and used 40,000 litres of diesel. An interesting comparison is that we’ve spent nearly 5 months cruising and so far used about 4,000 litres with our single 143 hp. However lkay and Meta do get to travel at 25 knots or so.
Ilkay & Meta live in Istanbul and are well connected, Ilkay being the Chairman of Lloyds Turkish agent. Interestingly he mentioned they recently had Winston Peters at their home for dinner and that they found him to be very charming, urbane and interesting – a small world !
Sun 5th & Mon 6th we stayed in an unassuming bay called Kargi Koyu.
Nicely sheltered and we basically couldn’t be bothered to move so stayed two nights and did some cleaning up and maintenance (as well as plenty of swimming).
We are now back in Bodrum, anchored beneath St Peters Castle and getting organized to meet Ian & Patsy Ristrom on Friday.
In the last few days we’ve seen small yachts called “Tramp” (the name Brian gave to our Markline 700 when he bought her from us) and “Harmony” (the name of our Markline 800 when it was formerly owned by Frank).
I meant to mention before that around the Greek Islands you see a lot of outboard powered rigid inflatable boats, about 7-8m in length with very large canopies installed for sleeping under. People use these to go from bay to bay, mostly eating meals ashore in tavernas and just using the RIBs for travel and sleeping – looked like a great idea.

Miles covered 2040 in 143 days on board with 400 engine hours.

Technical: The navigation computer problem (cursor jumping around the screen) has been solved by my friend Peter Mott. He explained that the computer must be turned on before theGPS and not vice versa. Simple as that. Envoy has a cockpit canopy that we never got around to putting up.
Well we now have and what a difference – really cools down the cockpit and makes the area useable during the day – should have put this up weeks ago.

More photos

Doug & Laurie enjoying a typical Greek taverna - this one in Mercini

Piraeus - port of Athens where we spent a couple of weeks getting various jobs done and where Sharon & Doug joined us. This is an ancient port but nothing left of its history and now all apartments and tavernas.

This is a typical "Chora" - hilltop village with castle. This one is Skala where we visited with Sharon & Doug.

Laurie opening our weekly ration of wine (yeah right !) in the galley. Dinette is to port.

The entrance to the Corinth Canal - we followed this ship through with Kevin & Diane on board and Kevin took the helm for a while.

This very small door is the only entrance to the Monastieri of the Panayia. Now it has the staircase but in former times had a wooden ladder which was lowered from the door.

From Paros to Bodrum, Turkey with Sharon & Doug.

Di, Sharon & Doug in front of traditional Greek boat which an elderly couple live on and sell marine "treasures" - sponges, shells etc

With editor of Turkish cruising guide at Amorgos - see text below

The Monastieri of the Panayia - see text below

We have arrived in Turkey and once again had communication problems until we bought a new Turkish SIM card for our computer
We finally cleared our delightful bay in Paros when the gale warning was cancelled on Tuesday 17th. There was still about 25 knots of wind and 2 m breaking seas but no problem, particularly as most of our passage was to be SE with the N wind behind us.
We wondered if we should have left earlier but when an “official” gale warning is in place a safe anchorage is the place to be.
Our next anchorage was Ormos Mirsini on Nisos Skinhousa. This is a delightful small harbour where we put out a bow anchor and tied stern to the shore. Typically at these spots we walk into the village (usually at the top of a steep hill and called the “Chora”, pronounced “Hora”) to buy some milk, bread etc, check out a couple of tavernas and then sometimes eat out or sometimes eat on the boat. Nearly all of our cooking is on the BBQ on the rear deck as its too hot to cook in the galley. Next stop was Katupola on Amorgos where we stayed a couple of nights.

A highlight of this stay and of the whole trip was visiting the Monastieri of the Panayia (see photo). This dates from 1088 and is set high into a cliff face and only accessible by a steep 350 step path from below. There are still a few monks there and visits are allowed provided that men must wear long trousers and shirts to the elbow and women must wear skirts at least to the knee and have their shoulders covered. One lady climbed all those steps in jeans and was denied entrance. In the monastery you can see icons, religious artifacts and handwritten manuscripts and books dating back to the 11th C. It is said this site was chosen because an ancient wooden icon of the Virgin Mary which had been missing for hundreds of years was found washed up on the beach below where the Monastieri was subsequently built. Many of these ports have shops & tavernas on the quayside and Katupola was no exception. I was in a shop looking at a Cruising Guide of the Amorgos and Small Cyclades when a guy approached me and we got talking about boats etc. It turned out he was the Editor of the book I was holding and he gave me a free autographed copy, a real character! (see photo). We moved on to Skala on Nisos Astipalaia. This island is said to have the “best anchorages of the Greek islands” and there were some great bays and coves, some with buildings ashore and some totally unspoilt.

At Skala there is the almost obligatory castle on the hilltop and we took the bus up to explore. This one was built in the 13th C and survived virtually intact until the 1950s when the interior buildings were mostly destroyed by an earthquake. Nevertheless you still get quite a feeling for the castle and its dominant position. Next stop was Maltezana a short hop up the coast where we had one of our most delicious meals ashore yet. Doug discussed our menu with the taverna owner and we were given the most enormous platter of delicious prawns with pasta.

The prawns are caught locally and were much bigger than Australian prawns. Needless to say we ate the lot and washed it down with a bottle or two of some rather nice Greek wine.
On Monday 23rd we did a 6 hour trip to Southern Kos and stopped at Maltegara before heading the next day to Kos to sign out of Greek waters (see Bureaucracy) heading below. Also here we were able to collect Sharon & Doug’s air tickets which had been couriered from NZ.

Kos is dominated by a huge castle and would be a nice enough place but it ashore it was crowded with visitors and very hot so our stop was only to sort out paperwork which took about 4 hours before we headed the short distance across to Turkish waters and an anchorage West of Bodrum called Baglar Koyu. On arriving in Turkish waters we immediately noticed how green the land is compared with the Greek Islands which are largely brown and desolate looking.
We visited Bodrum and completed our entry formalities – again see under Bureaucracy and then set off East to spend a couple of nights at Cokertme. It was so nice here that we anchored for a couple of nights and had a great Turkish meal ashore at the Cokertme Restorant.

The staff were really friendly and we were all soon on first name terms. We promised Hassan that we’ll go back and we will.
Yesterday, Friday 27th Sharon & Doug departed after spending a great month together during which we cruised 300 miles from Piraeus to Bodrum. During this time they never saw rain and I think saw a cloud once.
Diane & I are now heading South to explore the Southern side of the Dorian Promontory.

So far we have yet to experience the much talked of hordes of boats and crowded anchorages, in fact we’ve frequently had bays to ourselves and so far its been much less crowded than for example Kawau or the Barrier at Xmas. Most boats prefer to go into marinas or harbours, or they tie stern to the shore with an anchor from their bow. We mostly anchor out in 10-25m depth and always have plenty of room and privacy. Envoy’s hull makes no noise and rolls quite gently so we don’t have to anchor in perfectly calm seas.

Weather: There is no doubt the weather in this area is fantastic. Di & I have not seen anything except cloudless blue skies since 8 June. When I say “cloudless” I mean that literally – not a single cloud in the sky all day. We have not had any rain since 24 May. Everyday the temperature is mostly around 28-35 d but sometimes up to 40d – but there is no humidity so you don’t feel too bad, also the u/v level in the sun is not intense so you can stay in the sun OK. When you want to cool off the water temp now is 25 to 27d and that’s even in deep water.

Of course we have experienced some strong winds and mostly in Paros where we had to wait for 5 nights for it to drop below “gale”, but it was a great place to be stuck in. During that time the wind blew nonstop during days and nights but mostly the wind reduces to under 5 knots overnight. In the open sea we have experienced winds up to 45 knots and frequently winds in the 20-30 knot range but have not had waves over about 2.5m so far. With the stabilizers working as they are, Envoy really doesn’t notice seas of this size unless you are heading directly into them in which case there is pitching. Of course the best cruising is with the seas behind in which case Envoy surfs down the waves and we pick up extra speed. So far we have mostly towed our dinghy (instead of lifting it up onto the top deck) , in fact it has been in the water since we left Piraeus. It has been no problem in any winds or seas we have so far encountered.

Miles covered 2040 in 143 days on board with 400 engine hours.

Bureacracy: To sign out of Greece in Kos we had to go with our Transit Log first to the Passport Control then to Port Police and finally to Customs, all separated by about 1 km. There was nobody at Passport Control so we waited around until someone came. The process took about 3 hours and we got a bit of a scare when the Customs Officer said that since we had been in the EU over 3 months, we had violated the Schengen Treaty (under which non EU residents are allowed to stay in EU only 3 months) and would have to pay a fine of Euro 1200 each. I pointed out that Diane & I had not in fact slept ashore at all and were living on a boat which means we can stay indefinitely. After some muttering the Officer agreed and we were on our way.
In Bodrum things were slightly more organized and we had to go to the Marina Office to buy a Transit Log, then to Health Office, then to Passport Control and then to the Harbourmaster. Only the Skipper has to go with all the vessel documentation and Di, Sharon & Doug did the shopping for supplies . No real problems in Turkey except that every time someone leaves or joins the boat you are supposed to report to the Harbourmaster and get approval (this is the same in Greece too). After every three changes you have to get a new Transit log which requires the whole nine yards of visits again. In this area there are various Greek Islands very close(ie within 5-10 miles) of Turkey and we had assumed we would be able to visit both Greek Islands and mainland Turkey up and down the Coast. It turns out this is not so easy as everytime you leave Turkish waters you are supposed to sign out and the same applies for Greek waters – has anyone reading this done this and can offer advice ?

Technical: all OK currently and nothing of significance to report (which is great !). Except one – our Toshiba laptop used for navigation with C-map has a built in fingerpad to control the cursor instead of a mouse. I guess there’s a name for this “fingerpad” but I’m not sure what it is. Anyway sometimes when we switch the computer on the cursor jumps all over the screen and does not respond to commands via the fingerpad. After I reboot the computer a few times it comes right. Any ideas please? We have been dealing with various issues as they arose but have now completed a maintenance schedule based on both hours run and time which we will base our ongoing maintenance on.

The 444BC Temple of Poseidon viewed from our anchorage below with Sharon & Doug 6 July

Remains of a corner tower at 4th C BC Fort of Porto Germano, Gulf of Corinth. There with Kevin & Diane 8 June

Photos

The Corinth Canal we passed through with the O'Sullivans on 9 June

This is the narrow channel at Paros where a ferry almost hit us.

Andiparos & Paros

Photos to be posted shortly ! Having a great time with Sharon & Doug aboard and they are truly chilled out now and in holiday mode. Serifos was great and we spent 2 nights in Livadhiou on the South coast.
On the hill overlooking the bay is the “Chora” or village and we went up by bus to have a look around the ancient village and had lunch there. Also in this bay we tried our “flopper stoppers” for the first time. These are stainless steel hinged plates which hang 5m under the water using the same paravane arms as our stabilizers and they significantly reduce rolling at anchor.
They worked well when arriving large ferries put up a big wake (common in most anchorages). On Weds 11th we anchored off and visited the ancient walled town of Kastro on Serifos.
Kastro is a well preserved medieval village perched on a cliff top above a tiny cove.
It was a very hot day for a walk up there but well worth it to see the beautiful old buildings in streets thankfully too narrow for cars. Kastro is not sheltered enough for overnighting so we headed East to the island of Andiparos and a bay called Ormos Dhespotico. This bay is very well protected and in the 16th-17th centuries was the base of pirate galleys. We went ashore to the inevitable taverna and saw lots of octopuses put out on a wire fence by the roadside to dry in the sun – Doug and I were forced to try some grilled octopus to have with our local Mythos beer. Sharon & Di said we were eating “road kill” but whatever – it tasted great. The next day, Thursday we visited the romantic village of Andiparos, another ancient walled town but with little remaining of the walls. A narrow channel separates the islands of Andiparos & Paros with depths down to 1.8m but we put our trust in our C-map (navigational software) and went through OK to Ormos ay Ioannou on the island of Paros. Paros was inhabited from 7th century BC and was famous for marble – Napoleon’s tomb being made of marble from here.
We had checked the forecast and it advised of gale force Northerlies for several days.
This bay looked like the best one to be “stuck” in and tonight will be our 5th night with no sign of a let up in the 30-40 knot wind at times lifting sheets of water off the sea. However there has not been a cloud in the sky in that time, the water is clear, clean and warm and the bay is very attractive with an old church in one corner and a taverna in another. One feature of anchoring here is nobody takes the slightest notice of the “5 knots rule” – that is keep speed under 5 knots within 200 metres of the shore or 30m from another boat. Here there are water skiers, jet skiers etc passing within 10 m of us. Envoy doesn’t rock with the wake and its something you just have to get used to. This longer than expected stay will mean that Sharon & Doug won’t get to see quite as much but there’s not much you can do about the weather except enjoy what you’re doing. They have caught the ferry each day to visit the town of Naousa and explore around there, while I’ve not been wanting to leave Envoy unattended at anchor in these very strong winds. We hope the wind and sea will drop a little tomorrow and will head South towards Skinousa and then East towards Astipalaia in the Dodecanese group. Sharon & Doug leave us on Friday 27th from Bodrum (Turkey) so we expect to be either in Bodrum or close to there by then. Our next visitors will be Ian & Patsy Ristrom from Christchurch joining us in Bodrum on 10th August and in fact we plan to base ourselves around Bodrum for the next few weeks exploring the Turkish Turquoise coast and the more Eastern Greek islands.
Miles covered 1832 in 131 days on board.
Technical: nothing to report at this time.

The Western Cyclades

As I write this we are approaching the island of Serifos doing about 7 knots in a following 2 metre breaking sea with 25 knots of wind up our rear. Not a cloud to be seen and the sea is a beautiful deep blue.
Sharon & Doug arrived on schedule on Mon 2/7 a bit jet lagged after their direct flight from Auckland and made worse by the heat of Piraeus – well into the 30s. Di, Sharon & Doug went into Athens to see the Acropolis while I stayed on board as the stabilizers were being worked on. Unfortunately they were a bit disappointed by the Acropolis. They found the organisation of the site very poor and the staff mostly less than helpful. Also the site is being renovated and the appearance is spoilt by cranes and scaffolding.
Piraeus itself has little of interest but is simply the seaport of Athens and although it has a long history, there is virtually nothing which survives. But our objective in spending the time there was to get our gearbox oil leak and our stabilizers fixed, both of which were achieved.
On Fri 6/7, after 9 nights in Piraeus we departed for Sounion, on the mainland SE of Piraeus. Here is the Temple of Poseidon built in 444 BC and which still has much of the original structure standing. Sharon & Doug had their first Med swims and it was a fantastic first night out at anchor - the Temple on a hilltop only a few hundred metres away and spotlit all night.
This was made better by the fact that ashore nearby was a wedding and about 10 pm they put on a great fireworks display. You certainly wonder about all the boats which would have anchored in these places during the last several millennia. In the morning we went ashore to visit the Temple only to find out the ticket sellers were on strike and it was closed.
In Greece so far we’ve had several such instances.
The next day we left the mainland and headed East to the Cyclades starting with Kithnos and anchored in a great bay called Ormos Apokrothis. Went to a couple of nice Tavernas on the shore and at one they were preparing for a function – probably a wedding. Well they know how to party and the band only stopped playing at 6.30 the next morning. The next day we had a bit of a rough trip in a 25 knot headwind to the Eastern side of the island and a bay called Ayios Stefanos. This was very secluded with only one other boat anchored there.
Again we went ashore to a Taverna and had a great dinner with local Greeks being the only other patrons. They didn’t have menus but the owner just came and sat with us to talk about what he had to offer. All tasted great especially when washed down with a carafe of local red wine.
Other news is that “Imagine” – the boat which our son John crews on has been sold and is now en route from USA to the Med so that’s great.
Distance covered: 1804 miles in 124 days on board.
Technical: well the engineers did return with our Vickers hydraulic pump fitted with 3 pulleys of a slightly larger diameter than the previous 2 pulleys. Also using cogged drive belts as per Frank’s suggestion. So far after about 20 hours running all is OK and the drive belts are running cooler than the belts which drive our alternator and generator. Belt temps reached so far is about 73 dC, whereas the belts driving our AC generator reach 80dC – I’m not sure what the max allowable temp for fan belts is – does anybody ? Anyway it’s great to have the stabilizers working once again.
Gearbox oil leak is fine apart from a little coming out of a hose fitting that needs tightening.
In Piraeus our Groco fuel polishing pump gave up and with help from an engineer we fitted a new replacement pump we had on board. Frustratingly the engineer over tightened the inlet hose fitting and split the brass inlet of the (US$350) pump. He took it away and repaired it so all is OK apart from a very slight weeping (from me and the pump !)
After over 4 months in the water the underside of the hull needs a clean so I’ll have to sort out my scuba gear and get onto that. The antifoul applied in Italy doesn’t seem as good as what we’re used to in NZ.

Poros & Gulf of Hydra

We left Piraeus on Weds 20/6 and after an overnight stop in a bay on Aigina Island went to Poros – a small Island separated from Peloponnisos by a very narrow channel and with several beautiful bays for anchoring. Here we had several very relaxing days just anchored, swimming and exploring the local coastline in the dinghy. Its quite hard to find a nice remote beach here. Nearly all beaches have makeshift tavernas on them with loud music blaring and every square metre covered in deck chairs, so most of our swimming is just done off the boat.
Poros was settled in the 7th century BC but although its quite picturesque there is nothing to be seen of any ancient ruins. In the narrow channel there are numerous smallish ferries of about 30 feet bringing day trippers from Galatas on the other side and one of them nearly caused a disaster. We were coming down the channel and a ferry was approaching us on our port bow, on a course where the ferry would pass us closely on our port side. Suddenly the ferry changed course to port directly across our bow. We had to turn hard to port ourselves and missed ramming the ferry amidships by only a few metres !
Normally you should turn to starboard to avoid a collision but we couldn’t as we were too close to the shore on starboard side.
The ferry captain and passengers seemed oblivious to the near disaster and gaily waved to us as we passed closely by. Needless to say we’re now treating all ferries with huge caution.
We cruised down the coast of Hydra island where it would have been interesting to go ashore to the town of Hydra, but there are no anchorages there so we kept going and anchored at a very large and sheltered bay called Ormos Skindos.
We came back to Zea marina, Piraeus on Weds 27th so the Naiad stabilizer engineers could start work on the 28th. Once again it was extremely hot in the marina – high 30s but has now “cooled down” to low 30s. Sharon & Doug arrive tomorrow and we’ll do some sight seeing in Athens with them before heading off through the Cyclades and Dodecanese island groups, probably to end up in Kos by the end of July.
1714 miles covered to date in 116 days on board.
Technical: I put this section separately and last as I realize not everyone’s interested – only boating aficianados ! The only real issue currently is the hydraulic stabilizers and it has been difficult to get the engineers to start as here its like NZ in mid December – everybody wanting jobs done. Last Thursday an engineer removed the Hydraulic Pump assembly and the pulleys off the engine and took it away for testing. Their proposed solution is to increase the number of pulleys and drive belts from 2 to 3 and this does make sense. They are also going to try and go to a slightly larger pulley size. However, its not clear when they can do this by and we want to leave here about Wednesday. So we may elect to move on and either have their engineer travel to us or return to Piraeus at a quieter time. The stabilizers are great to have but we also have the paravanes anyway.

Piraeus and 100 days on board

I’m going to apologise in advance if this episode is a bit “dry” as we’ve not been doing anything really exciting in the last week but mostly repairs and maintenance.
We arrived in Zea Marina, Piraeus (seaport of Athens) last Tuesday 12th June which coincided with our 36th wedding anniversary and was duly celebrated with our first Chinese meal since leaving NZ. Piraeus is one of the Med’s largest ports and Zea is an ancient harbour which once housed the Greek battle fleet. It is perfectly sheltered and now holds over 700 pleasure craft including many very large vessels. We are used to being one of the larger vessels around but are now definitely one of the smaller ones here with many boats being professionally crewed. Nowadays there is nothing historical to see here and the port is ringed with 5-7 storey apartment blocks, cafes and restaurants. It is quite hot here – in the mid 30s and supposed to get to 40 in the next few days. This would be great out in some nice anchorage but not so in the marina where we are mostly working and can’t have swims (life is tough !)
We’ll be here only a few more days and then head off to nearby islands and return to meet Diane’s sister Sharon and her husband Doug who join us on 2nd July and we’ll do a couple of days sight seeing in Athens with them before heading out to sea again.
Saturday was our 100th consecutive night on board which of course is quite a long time to spend on a boat. In fact Di & I haven’t spent 100 consecutive nights anywhere even at home, for many years. On board life is quite different to normal home life and many things are quite time consuming. Simple things like shopping take a lot of time as you have to walk to the shops and carry everything back with you. We often use two granny style shopping trolleys to bring the supplies back. Of course on board there’s all the usual things that have to be done at home (we’re very fortunate to have a washing machine / dryer which most boats don’t have) and we have to manage things such as:
- Fuel supply: all diesel is “polished” before it is run in an engine. The procedure is that after taking on fuel it is circulated through a filtering system at about 500 litres/hour to remove any water or contamination, then before it is used it is again filtered into a “day tank” which supplies through yet another filter the engine, wing engine or genset. In addition we have to pump fuel around between port and starboard to maintain the trim of Envoy as water and fuel levels change and for example when we launch the dinghy which takes 350 kg off the starboard side.
- Water has to be managed when not on the marina supply and we produce this using the watermaker at about 100 litres/hour. Normally we need about 90 mins daily to keep up or more when laundry is being done. We use more fresh water than most boats as the toilets also flush with fresh water (which reduces odours). The procedure to start and stop the watermaker is quite complex and needs the genset also as the watermaker runs on 110 volts.
- Sewage from the two heads goes into two separate holding tanks when at anchor or in the marina and this has to be discharged and the holding tanks cleaned at sea.
- Electric power supply has to be managed and especially when not on shore power at the marina. We use 110 volt AC and 12v DC but on the marina also use 220 v AC for some appliances and to charge the batteries. Away from the marina we need at least 90 mins generation each morning and evening plus sometimes a little more in the late evening. We can produce 110v AC and 12 v DC by either of the main engine, the wing engine or the genset.
On average we probably spend about 2 hours per day on routine maintenance so the day soon disappears.
Marine Life: its usually said that “there are no fish in the Med” however this is not really correct. The Romans complained that fishing was poor and comparatively this is so as there is no tidal movement and little seaweed. However even the tiniest coastal village has its own fishing fleet and there are many, many thousands of fishing boats operating here.
The fisherman here mainly use nets but also long lines. We have so far seen whales, porpoises, sharks, turtles and flying fish and everywhere there are markets selling fresh fish such as tuna, swordfish, squid, octopus, mullet, john dory, sardines, prawns, eels, barracuda, bass, wrasse, gurnard, sole, flounder, small snapper plus lobsters, crabs and other fish species we don’t know. We have yet to put a line in the water but this is about to change – we’ll keep you posted.
Technical – the main reason for coming here to Zea marina was to get a few jobs done and this is progressing:
Gearbox – was leaking oil (ATF) and has been pulled out, checked over, new gaskets installed, cooling pump replaced, pressure guage fitted and gearbox reinstalled and tested. This was quite a major as it weighs about 100 kg and is in a tight space at the bottom of the boat.
The engineers were quite competent but pretty rough and were often lacking the right tools and gear which we fortunately had on board. Also Health and Safety would not have been pleased and I was very careful not to place myself under the gearbox as those guys did. However all now done and tested and we have changed from ATF to SAE 30 as the lubricant at the gearbox shop recommendation (Borg Warner manual says either is OK).
Prop shaft – the cooling of the shaft via the stuffing box has been checked over, new stuffing installed, tested and all OK. Still not much water dripping out (you are supposed to have 3-4 drops a minute under way) but the temperature of the shaft and the stuffing box is good at about 30d C whereas a maximum of about 70d is OK.
Spare VHF radio now working and electrician did a number of small jobs at the same time so that now almost everything electrical is working fine.
EPIRB batteries replaced (can only be done by dealer) and our MMSI identification number programmed in so that if our EPIRB is ever activated they will know our position and who we are.
Yamaha 25hp to be fully serviced tomorrow.
Naiad hydraulic stabilizers have been looked at and we’ve had discussions with Naiad USA.
The suggested solution is to increase the size of the engine pulley wheels which drive the fan belts which drive the Vickers hydraulic pump and at the same time to improve the alignment of the pulleys as they are out by about 12mm currently. This is still being worked through but we are not so concerned about this as we were intitially as the paravane stabilisers work fine and are not mechanical so really nothing to go wrong. The difference is the Naiads remove about 80% of the roll and the Paravanes only 50%.

The Oracle

View of Navpaktos from Envoy's anchorage

The two Dianes - modern day "oracles" - by Temple of Apollo ruins, Delphi

Kevin & Diane O’Sullivan arrived in Patras on Friday 1 June and on Saturday we passed under the spectacular Rio Antirrio bridge which links Peloponnisos Island with mainland Greece and anchored off the village of Navpaktos. Here is one of the most preserved medieval harbours to be found in the Med, overlooked by a Venetian castle. We took a long walk up the hill to the castle only to find it is closed for renovations. However we found a great café up there and had a drink overlooking the harbour.
The next stop was due to be Galaxidi but the whole jetty structure was being repaired so we diverted to Itea and laid alongside the jetty which was very smooth concrete with no surge. Nevertheless we deployed our tyres to protect the fenders just in case and stayed two nights.

It was in this bay that one Frank Abney Hastings used one of the first steam powered iron warships to destroy a large Turkish fleet. Itea is not at all “touristy” but just a Greek working town. We found a rather primitive butcher’s shop and asked for lamb but they only had mutton and with bits of bone and fat flying everywhere the butcher prepared some chops which were the largest we’d ever seen and turned out to be delicious. Itea is only 20 mins by taxi from ancient Delphi and we went up for an explore. The ruins at Delphi are spectacular, one of the most important in Greece, covering quite a wide area and well marked out so that you can get an appreciation of how it once was. In particular the Temple of Apollo , the 180m long Stadium (where you can still see the athlete’s starting blocks) and the Theatre were great.

Delphi was considered by ancient Greeks to be the Centre of the World and was inhabited from 1300 BC. The cult of the Oracle was established by 700 BC and the most recent Temple of Apollo of which the ruins can be seen, was built in 330 BC. In the chambers beneath the Temple, the “Pythia” or High Priestess would go into a state of ecstasy and give a prophecy in inarticulate sounds which were supposedly the voices of the Gods. These would be translated by Priests and the Prophecy given to the supplicant who had paid considerably for it.

Alexander the Great took matters into his own hands: after hearing the jibbering of the Pythia he grabbed her by the hair and dragged her around until she screamed “enough Oh unbeatable one”. Alexander said “I have my prophecy” and let her go. There was a tendency for the supplicants to try and seduce the Pythia in order to gain a more favourable prophecy so later all Pythias had to be over 50 years old !
Kevin & Diane, who we’ve known for many years through Coastguard are of course very experienced boaties, Kevin being a commercial skipper and the consummate yachtsman who “wrote the book” on knots. So we’ve been spending time with Kevin refreshing our knowledge of knots, learning some new ones while Kevin has also done some splicing for us at about four times my pace.
For the last few days we’ve been getting Louis Vitton results by text from Frank Curulli & Don Pickering and celebrating in style especially for the final result on Weds 6/6 – the time of the results coinciding perfectly with “beer o’clock”.
From Itea we went Eastwards through the Kolpos Domvrainis to the most Easterly part of the Gulf of Corinth – Porto Germeno. Here is the impressive remains of the 4th Century BC fortress of Aegosthena with stone walls and two towers quite intact. Apparently the area turned out to be of little strategic importance so was never damaged by war or improved upon by subsequent armies.
The next day a small Coastguard vessel pulled alongside and wanted to know what we were “towing in the water”. By sign language Kevin explained they are our stabilizing paravanes.
On Saturday 9 June we left the Gulf of Corinth via the 3.2 mile long, 25 metre wide Corinth Canal, which has a maximum height in the limestone cut of 76 metres. This is quite expensive costing about 200 Euros but saves a several day trip around the South of Peloponnisos Island. The canal was originally started by Nero who used a ceremonial golden axe to make the first cut and then put 6,000 Jewish slaves on the job. The canal was never completed until the French & Greeks did so in 1893.
We are now in the beautiful harbour at Aigina and Kevin & Diane departed this morning.

Last night we met friends of theirs – Takas, Irene and their daughter Katarina who fluently speaks Greek, French, Italian, Spanish, Turkish & English ! Takas was an admiral (a real admiral !) in the Greek navy and had interesting tales to tell about his experiences.
From here we head to Piraeus, near Athens where we will stay for about 1-2 weeks and get our stabilizers working again and the gearbox oil leak fixed. Also do some sight seeing in Athens.
Technical: Nothing much to report - we are using the Paravane stabilizers and the metal “birds” or stabilizing plates which are 5m under water, weigh about 25 kg each and are heavy to retrieve. Kevin has rigged up a block and tackle for us to save our backs when retrieving the birds out of the water.

Patras

With Don & Peta Pickering in stern of Envoy in Fiskhardo harbour

Envoy at Port Spigha

Well the great news is today we got our internet access back again. Since 9th May we have only been able to receive gmails (on my mobile phone) but not reply to them which has been very frustrating. Also we rely heavily on the internet for weather forecasts and are glad to have those again. Today we got a PCMCI card for my laptop which gives unlimited web access.
We tried to get this in Corfu but were told you had to have a Greek address to be able to buy this. However with Vodafone in Patras its no problem.
After leaving Vonitsa we went through the 4 mile long Levkas canal dredged through the shallow salt lakes separating mainland Greece from the island of Levkas. At the N end there is a well preserved castle guarding the approaches. On arrival you have to wait for the floating road bridge to be opened to let boat traffic through every hour. The first canal was dug there in the 7th century BC – that’s 2,700 years ago ! Mind you, labour was pretty cheap in those days.
We anchored in a very sheltered bay called Ormos Vlikho and Don joked that it was so calm you could have anchored with a brick on a string. Nevertheless we laid out our customary 40 metres or so of chain. A few hours later a sudden thunderstorm hit us and the wind went from 5 kots to 32 knots in the space of 5 mins, together with torrential rain. Boats started to drag and visibility was poor. We were OK though and didn’t move at all. The islands around there are beautiful and also very green and forested. One of the islands was the private residence of Aristotle and Jackie Onassis. From Levkas we cruised across to Cephalonia – the largest island of the Northern Ionians. This is the island where the events tookplace on which the great movie Captain Curulli’s Mandolin is based. If you haven’t seen this movie we do recommend it.
The Italians were occupying Greek Cephalonia during WW2 and when the Italians removed Mussolini and made peace with the allies, the Germans on Cephalonia demanded that the 9,000 Italian troops surrender their weapons to the Germans. The Italians refused and 56,000 were killed in the subsequent fighting lasting 7 days. Then 3,000 surrendered to the Germans but were lined up and shot in cold blood. Of the 9,000 troops, only 34 survived. A fantastic harbour was Fiskhardo where we went into the free marina lined with tavernas and cafes. The nearest restaurant table was literally one metre from our passarelle (boarding plank). Here once again we had a very strong blow and had to delay our departure by a day to wait for improving weather, even the ferries being cancelled. On Weds we arrived at Patras marina where Don & Peta Pickering left us today. We had a great time with Don & Peta and they are now off to see the Louis Vitton Cup finals in Valencia. They nearly didn't leave us as their passports etc were i our on board safe and last night it jammed and we couldn't open it. Fortunately through the marina we managed to get hold of a locksmith who came down within 30 mins and quickly was able to open it much to Don & Peta's relief. Kevin & Diane O’Sullivan will join us tomorrow night for some new adventures.
Patras is the 3rd largest city in Greece and on the island of Peloponnisos. From here we will explore the Gulf of Corinth and go Eastwards through the Corinth Canal towards Piraeus – the seaport of Athens. The last time I was there was in 1960 on my way to NZ.
Technical: our genset had an engine oil leak thru the sea water pump and this has been fixed today with a new oil seal. The hydraulic stabilizers are our main problem and we hope to get them repaired in Piraeus where a service agent is located and where we’ll have plenty of time. Also there we hope to get our gearbox oil leak fixed – apparently a 2 day job to replace leaking gasket. Apart from these issues there’s the usual array of minor jobs that need doing. Some varnishing is going to need doing soon – watch out visitors !

Greece (edited 31/5)

Well we have not been able to update the blog as moving from Italy to Greece we lost internet access. We can receive emails on my mobile but are unable to send any or to update the blog. So I'm doing this in an intenet cafe (another first !). We are really well and currently have Don & Peta Pickering with us. After leaving Ciro we went across to Santa Maria di Leuca, our last Italian port and spent 2 nights there. We used this opportunity to stock up on Italian wine which is said to be nicer than Greek wine (so far seems to be true although Greek wine not bad and very cheap). This was a great spot and from there we headed straight out to the islands NW of Corfu. We had about 25 knots of wind on the port quarter so fairly good for our approx 45 mile trip. We arrived at one island - Nissis Othoni - but it was bleak, windswept and a few reefs around so we set off about 5 miles for the next one - Erikoussa. We had only gone a mile or so when we both smelt something burning. I switched on the engine room closed circuit tv and could see a lot of smoke (but no flames). Envoy has a temperature activated auto fire suppression system in the engine room so I figured it was only very hot rubber and opened an engine room hatch to clear the smoke. When it cleared I went in to see what was up and found the smell coming from very hot grease which had come out of a failed bearing which drives our hydraulic motor which in turn powers the stabilisers. This motor is powered via a fanbelt connection to the main engine and it was still turning and spewing hot smoking grease. We started the Yanmar wing engine to give us some steerage and turned off the main engine to stop the problem getting worse. I then disconnected the two fan belts allowing us to restart the main engine without turning the hydraulic pump. It was only 4 miles to our anchorage but quite rough without stabilisers to assist. On arrival we anchored and an inflatable pulled alongside with some kiwis aboard, from Dunedin in fact. They were running a charter boat fleet called Sailing Holidays and invited us to join them for drinks and dinner ashore (which we certainly needed). From there we had an uneventful and pleasant cruise to Corfu the next day and spent a week at a great marina in Gouvia. This marina is very well equipped and we were able to repair a leaking sea water pump on our Genset, do an oil and filter change and various other maintenance. We attempted a repair on the stabilisers and thought it was all OK but on testing it is still overheating so we need to get specialist help from the dealer based in Piraeus.
Don & Peta joined us in Corfu and we moved from Gouvia to a small marina directly under the castle - very spectacular and had a gresat day asnd evening in the old Corfu town. We then moved to the beautiful island of Paxos with an anchorage off the village in clear, clean water and spent two nights there.
Generally we're heading SE at present and everything is great. Be in touch again soon.

The Aeolians to Calabria

On the summit of The Antechamber of Hell

Di and John at the summit of La Rocca, Cefalu overlooking our anchorage.

The Aeolian Islands are North of Sicily and we arrived at Vulcano on Thurs 26/4 for a delightful couple of days at anchor in a sheltered bay with the still active summit in the background, the last eruption occurring in 1890. Had a few swims, explored the immediate area in the dinghy and of course walked to the 391m high summit. Vulcano is quite new geologically rising from the seabed in 183 BC. The Ancients believed the crater was the entrance to the Underworld while in the Middle Ages, Christians regarded it as “The Antechamber of Hell”, a description which the Lonely Planet says is very apt on a hot summer weekend with thousands of tourists ! We were lucky though as its still the quiet season and there were only a few yachts at anchor here.

From there we moved about 5 miles to the Island of Lipari where we stayed in a marina as there are no suitable anchorages. Lipari has a long history being originally settled 6,000 years ago and was famous for obsidian & pumice, the latter being still mined. The township was regularly sacked by pirates including Barborossa or “Redbeard” who rampaged the town in 1544. The town was subsequently fortified and the impressive Citadel remains along with the Cathedral. We didn’t do too much rampaging but had a good explore around.
During our stay there we made a day trip to Stromboli, some 35 miles away. We decided to take the Hydrofoil as Stromboli is not on our way anywhere and there are no safe anchorages. Stromboli is an active volcano and a constant stream of lava “The Trail of Fire” flows down the Northern side into the sea. The last eruption was in 2003 when the town of Ginostra was showered with rocks. Our friend Frank Curulli’s father was born here and we made a “pilgrimage” to see his old family home and then had a great lunch of pasta and Stromboli wine.
We left this area on 2 May in very good conditions to leave the Tyrrhenian Sea (which we’ve been in since leaving Ostia) and head through the Straits of Messina, a journey of about 8 hours. The Straits are really interesting and is one of the very few places in the Med where there is much current. This current causes whirlpools and the cruising guide shows the position of four whirlpools which can be dangerous to small vessels. Needless to say we kept well clear of these !
We stayed that night at a very average marina called Reggio di Calabria and the next morning set off on a lengthy 30 hour cruise to Ciro in NE Calabria (area of mainland Southern Italy). After leaving the Straits of Messina you enter the Ionian Sea and we had to do an overnight cruise as there are no suitable marinas or places to anchor along this stretch of coast.

So we spent another night watching the radar screen and avoiding several ships.
Ciro where we are now is a very basic marina but its quite pleasant and best of all free !

It opens to the North which is good as we currently have a SE gale of Force 7 on the outside. This is forecast to continue another day so we’ll just sit here and wait it out before doing a 10 hour cruise NE to our last Italian stop – Santa Maria di Leuci from where we will head E to Corfu.

Technical. Everything mostly OK. The gearbox has leaked a quarter pint of oil in 55 running hours so its not of concern but I'm not sure how to fix it. The stabilizer water cooling pump needed its 2 fan belts replacing, the first fan belt I have replaced since I was about 18 years old on my Ford 10 !

Photos of Envoy

Envoy anchored off Cefalu with the Duomo in the background.

Amy & Drew aboard Envoy off the Island of Ustica

Cefalu

Well our last entry mentioned our intention to cruise Westwards for a few days prior to John’s visit but like all good plans we changed it and went East about 30 miles to Cefalu arriving Monday 16th. Cefalu is a hugely interesting place with a large promontory called La Rocca, 278m high on which there is the remains of an old castle, originally built by Arabs and then conquered by the Normans in 1063. Di was also impressed by the 4th Century Temple of Diana half way up La Rocca. The medieval village is largely unspoiled and the narrow cobbled streets meander down to the old harbour. As well as the quite modern fishing trawlers which ply these waters there are still fisherman rowing 4 m brightly coloured clinker built dinghys to lay their nets. They have an unusual rowing style in that they row standing up. Although the streets are narrow it doesn’t stop the noisy motor scooters and cars which you have to watch out for (a One Way Street means nothing here !) The Cathedral (Duomo) was built in the 11th & 12th Century with wonderful mosaics dating from that time. The Duomo was built under orders from King Roger after his fleet survived a savage storm. During our stay the Coastguard pulled alongside to check our passports etc, a not uncommon thing here.
So we anchored there for 4 nights and then went back to Palermo to meet John who arrived from Fort Lauderdale via London (where he saw Amy) on Monday 23rd. It was great to see John again and he was keen to go somewhere on Envoy so we decided to head back to Cefalu. John was only here for 2 nights so we spent a 2 great days anchored off Cefalu, doing some walking around the Old Town and the Castle again, had a swim (my first) in the rather cool 17 d water and explored the coastline a bit using the RIB. We had bought a NZ leg of lamb in Ostia and Di prepared a great roast dinner which we washed down with Sicilian Chianti. Last night John took a taxi from Cefalu to Palermo airport – a 90 min drive for what had taken us about 5 hours. John shared with us some great news that he has been promoted to First Mate of the ship he works on “Imagin” on the E Coast USA.
During the last few days the weather has become noticeably warmer – now about 24d in the day and there is a little more tourist and pleasure boat activity. People have warned us about the general lack of competence of pleasure boaters here and we experienced that for the first time when a 9 metre sports style launch anchored and dragged close to us three times before moving off to annoy others. Cefalu is more or less on the way from Palermo to the Aeolian Islands where we are heading as I type this, our first stop being the Island of Vulcano (no prizes for guessing what’s there). After a few days in this area we’re planning to head to Syracuse and then in the direction of Corfu to meet our next visitors Don & Peta Pickering.
Photos: yes we do plan to put some more photos on the site – anyday now.
Technical: mostly going OK currently. Had a minor gearbox oil leak putting red tinted ATF into the bilges. Found a very slightly loose bolt which I tightened a quarter of a turn and this slowed the leak but has not stopped it yet. Also have found the Genset sea water pump intake has a slight leak and this will need some attention.

Palermo

Palermo
After arriving back in Palermo on Mon 16th, Amy & Drew flew back to London on evening of Tues 17th and we’ve stayed here since. Firstly we had a bit of shopping and re provisioning to do plus the inevitable few small jobs. But apart from that, Palermo is an amazing place and we’ve just enjoyed seeing some of the sights. Palermo has a very long history and there are many buildings still standing from about the 13-14 th Centuries, some of which we’ve been visiting. The weather has been fine but got very windy in the last couple of days – 20-25 knots – so we decided to see some more sights in Palermo rather than battle the elements. John arrives in Palermo on Mon 23rd so we now don’t want to travel too far but we plan to take off from here on Mon or Tues for as cruise Westwards for a few days. After John leaves we will head Eastwards to the Aolian Islands, the Straits of Messina, Syracuse, the SW coat of Italy and then across to Corfu to arrive by Mid May.
Equipment: Envoy is a superbly equipped vessel which was a major consideration in buying her – see our blog entry dated 5 Dec '06 . While in Palermo we have bought an additional 130 m of 20 mm anchor warp and some 10 mm chain to rig up a combi rope / chain anchor for use when we anchor in deep water. Sometimes you need to anchor in very deep (by our standards) water eg 30-40 m and we’re reluctant to use our main anchor and chain at that sort of depth.
Secondly we’ve bought an additional inflatable. Envoy has an excellent 3.6 m centre console RIB with 25 HP 4-stroke Yamaha, depth sounder, vhf, nav lights, bilge pump, integral fuel tank. But this weighs about 350 kg and can only be launched in very calm weather from the boat deck (on top of the saloon roof) using the boom and electric winches. This process takes about 30 mins to launch and the same to retrieve. Also the dinghy cannot really be launched except in an anchorage and cannot be rowed. All rather inconvenient if you just want to go 100 m to shore for a walk. So we bought an additional smaller inflatable – a 2.7 m with 2.2 HP 4-stroke Honda which in total weighs around 50 kg. This can be easily launched and retrieved by hand and can be rowed too.
Technical: the master loo is working fine again and the shower sump is too (some crud in the water strainer). There are always small jobs to do on a boat but “touch wood” at present things are working fine except for one vhf which has a power supply problem and a bilge water level alarm which does not work.

Ustica for Easter

Amy and her friend & flatmate Andrew (“Drew”) arrived from London Thursday night and we sampled the chianti big time to celebrate. Fortunately they also brought stable fine weather so we got our first real taste of this when we headed out about 30 miles to the Island of Ustica.
This is a small island, just a little larger than Rakino in the Hauraki Gulf. It was first inhabited around 2000 BC and 6,000 mutinous Carthaginian soldiers were abandoned there to die of hunger leading to the Island becoming known by the Greeks as the Osteodes (island of bones). In the 18th century it was colonised by Bourbons but they were massacred by pirates with only two escaping to tell the tale. We had a much less dramatic time and arrived on Friday. The harbour is very small at about 150 m square and with most of that taken up by moorings, fishing boats and a hydrofoil but with some help from someone ashore we anchored off a jetty and tied stern to as dark set in. Shortly afterwards a port official turned up and was not happy. He said we were “blocking the harbour” and the hydrofoil would not be able to get out. I couldn’t see his point but we agreed to leave the following morning before 0630 to allow the hydrofoil to leave by 0645.
For the next two nights we anchored with a spare all rope anchor in about 80 feet at a beautiful bay on the Southern side of the island. The wind was mostly 3-6 knots, the sea smooth and the water beautifully clear – you can see down to about 50 ft (this is a far cry from Palermo harbour where the water is filthy and everything imaginable is floating around the marina). The “bay” did not really afford much protection but in the conditions was fine. The seawater is still cold at about 15.5 dC but Amy ventured in for several swims and so did Di briefly take a plunge. I’m awaiting warmer temps ! We also got the chance to put the RIB to use for the first time and Amy enjoyed exploring around the island using it.
As I write this we’re cruising at 6.5 knots in perfect conditions back to Palermo for the night. We’ll go out for dinner tonight and spend tomorrow sight seeing around Palermo before Amy & Drew depart on Tuesday night. After their departure we’ll stay in the general area, hopefully going to the Aolian Islands before John arrives in Palermo on 23 April.