Chios and Oinousa

We arrived at 1500 at Emborio which is a lovely sleepy little hamlet on a beautiful sheltered inlet on the southern end of Chios and dropped anchor. There is plenty of room for several yachts and the bottom is hard sand so it was perfect. Fiz was already there and had cooked a meal so we had a lovely evening followed by a couple of rubbers of Bridge. It was so nice that we decided to stay the next day and ended up staying three. The tiny shop is useful for necessities. The tavernas are nothing special but good for a quick meal out or a cold beer or both.
While we there, an extraordinary boat came in. It looked like a sailing catamaran but had no mast. When it left, I figured it out. The whole bridge deck was covered in about 40 large solar panels. These charge batteries and the boat is propelled entirely by electric power. It is heavily sponsored and apparently has been all round the world!






Argosea caught up with us on Monday and we all set off for Chios Limani the next day. It is a huge ferry port too with yachts in one corner, stern-to on a concrete quay. In the event, the ferry only caused a little movement so all was well. We hired a car between th 6 of us and used it to get fuel gas and provisions. Potable water is available from a tap in the flower beds. The town looks really interesting but Fiz wanted to get on so we didn't have time to do the tourist bit. It'll be well worth coming back another time. The restaurant behind the yacht quay, balled Bel Aire, is truly excellent and very reasonably priced too. They have an excellent menu, well cooked, good service and a lovely location. What more could you ask?

In the morning we sailed up to Oinousa, a small island at the Northeast corner of Chios via the partly completed marina. The marina is a graveyard of old fishing boats, ferries and tripper boats but there is still plenty of room for a few visiting yachts. There are no facilities and it's in the back of beyond but it is safe and free.
In the early 20th century, Oinousa was populated by lots of rich shipping magnates from Athens so there are lots of huge mansions and a college for training ships officers - presumably under the beady eye of the owners. Since then it has fallen on hard times and many of the mansions have fallen into decay. There seems to be a bit of a renaissance recently though as many of them are being renovated. It's a charming little place with narrow winding streets, lovely views and one of the nicest policewomen we have met. She spent some time processing my papers helping me practice my terrible Greek and then later turned up with her old school textbooks as a present for me! The electricity seems to be free but the island is very short of water so that isn't available.
For reasons unknown there is also a huge stadium. Maybe it is something to do with the College which is still functioning. It is certainly too big for the tiny population of the island.








We said goodbye to Fiz and stayed an extra day with Argosea. On Monday we set off on the 35 mile hop to Lesvos.

Postscript to Samos

Oh dear - they didn't leave us alone. 10 minutes after I wrote the last post, they turned up in a borrowed fishing boat to tell us there is a ferry due in one hour and we are right in its path. So move!
So back to the quay. We decided to try mooring alongside as there was plenty of space. After fussing around with chains, ropes, planks & fenders for an hour, we settled down to wait for the ferry. What a nightmare! It came in at high speed and then instead of dropping an anchor it continuously ran its propellers against its mooring warps to keep itself off the quay. It then left again at high speed.  All this set up a horrific slop which, if we hadn't been so thorough would have seriously damaged Rosa. As it was we ground large chunks out of the board and tore a couple of fender covers. All ths despite also shoving hard on the shrouds from the quay. And then two hours later at 23.20, it came back and did it again! We won't be going back to Karlovasi.



We left at 0630 for Chios and had a nice gentle passage, over half of which was under sail. On the way, we saw a large warship approaching from one direction and then realised there was a submarine on teh surface in its path. We expected a rendezvous but in fact, the warship (which turned out to be Turkish) steamed past and shortly afterwards, the sub submerged. I took some rather surreptitious photos.

Pythagoreon to Chios

After a day spent working, shopping, doing the laundry, etc, we set off on the longish trip North to Chios. We had very little wind and what there was was on the nose, so we motored through the Samos Straight where Greece is no more than 1 mile from Turkey. This bit of water has an evil reputation as there are often strong currents and overfalls. We saw nothing however and passed serenely through. Then it was round to the isolated bay of Asperokhorti. This was slightly rolley with a Westerly wind although it would have been perfectly sheltered in any other.
The bay had warm, crystal clear turqoise water and nothing but a few fishing boats. Late in the afternoon, a young man built like Adonis took out his fishing boat. The macho image was slightly tarnished by the fact that it was a pedalo! Didn't stop him from catching fish though and I guess it gave his legs a workout.

Then it was on to Karlovasi - just as an overnight before the 10 hour trip to Chios. The harbor is enormous and seems to be the main ferry port for Samos. We moored stern to on the huge concrete quay and L did some shopping (very poor apparently).We were warned by a German Lady to loosen off when the ferries come in as they were now on the hard having a large amount of transom damage fixed - caused by wash.

Just after that a West wind got up that pushed us sideways hard. The anchor was well set - but the bottom must be soft because it kept slackening off and putting us back to the quay. After a lot of ineffectual playing with lines and chains, we gave up and taking L's suggestion, anchored in the North West corner of the harbor. Much safer! I just hope the port police leave us alone.

Tomorrow we're off at sparrow fart to Chios.

Samos and ferry trip to Ephesus.

We arrived in Pythagoreon on Samos on a lovely clear day - the first really warm day of the year. The village is lovely - good shopping, excellent Tavernas and a huge harbour where you can choose to tie up to the town quay or to anchor out off the beach. We decided to anchor while we went to Ephesus as the anchorage was not crowded but was very sheltered and has excellent holding. The town quay, which is curved, has a high probability of anchors getting tangled which would be a disaster if we were not there to fix it.
From the pilot book, we had expected to be able to get a ferry to Kucedasi in Turkey direct from the harbour. It turned out that this has not been the case for some time - but we were able to buy tickets in 'Yacht Services' and arrange a taxi to pick up the ferry in Vathi. The cost of the trip was €75 per person for ferry, coach, guide & entrance to Ephesus with another €10 per person Turkish port tax collected as we got off. The taxi was €20 each way. It wasn't a cheap day but was well worth it. Pythagoreon is a much safer place for a yacht than Vathi.

We were picked up by Aris, a friendly local taxi owner, and taken to Vathi where we kicked our heels until 8.00 when we were allowed through customs onto the Samos Star - our high speed ferry. It whisked us at 25 knots over to Kusedaci in Turkey where we docked beside 3 huge cruise ships. The sea was flat and the journey very comfortable. We had €10 'port tax' extracted (this isn't a visa so the fact that we already had paid-for Turkish visas counted for nothing). Our passports were swapped for a boarding card and we were free to find our coach. Due to a cock-up on the counting front in Greece, we had one too many passengers for the bus so had to wait 20 minutes for a larger one - much to the frustration of Net - our Turkish guide.
After 1/2 hours drive we were there. The cruise ships and probably other tourist repositories make for a very crowded site. Even that couldn't spoil the impact of the place. Even L couldn't call it a 'pile of old rocks'! We were guided from the entrance at the top of the site beside the Odeon (smaller theater), down the ancient main street, to the huge main amphitheater. As we walked we saw very impressive and well preserved ruins which really give a feeling for the size and magnificence of the city.

Here are just a few pictures....

Temple of Hadrian

Library of Cercus

Amphitheater

After Ephesus, we were a captive audience at a nondescript but mercifully cheap restaurant and were then cast loose in Kusedaci. Once we had run the gauntlet of the waterfront bazaar (full of men who all seem to know your home town and have an irresistible desire to sell you a leather jacket) we reached streets full of laid back, friendly Turkish shopkeepers. Having bought loads of apple-tea (unobtainable elsewhere) and chewing the fat for 1/2 hour, we made our way back to the port and back to Pythagorean. After a nice meal in a Taverna, we fell into bed.

Kos to Samos

We left Kos and had a lovely sail up to a small bay on the west side of Pserimos. We had to beat all the way as the moderate wind was on the nose but the sun was shining, the sea was calm and all was right with the world.
Fiz caught us up an hour or so after we moored having first gone to the wrong bay. We didn't see much, mainly because there wasn't much to see other than rocks, shrubs, goats and clear blue water. Had dinner together and then an evening of Bridge.
Next day we motored up to a Xerocambio - a bay on the south side of Leros. A nice deserted little anchorage with excellent holding and good shelter except from SE. We tried to sail the couple of miles round to the small town of Pandeli the next day but with no more than 5 Knots of wind  it was hard to make any progress so up went the Iron Topsail.
The port was full of fishing boats (as expected) but the anchorage off the beach to the south was adequate. We anchored off the (closed) taverna. L took the dinghy with Bill and Lynn to the town and did some shopping. The town is very pretty and, once you have done the 15 min climb to the old town, the shopping is excellent.
Thursday, the forecast was for a North Westerly to build all day starting at around 3 early in the morning, 5 at midday and 6+ in the afternoon. We decided to get away at first light to beat the wind.
Bit of a mistake! When we left the shelter of the bay, the wind wooshed up to a near gale and we were hit by 2 Metre waves. The original plan was to go to Patmos but after 2 hours of battering we had had enough and diverted to a bay on the south end of Lipso. This turned out to be a good choice. It was almost deserted but it was very sheltered, with beautiful blue water and excellent holding. We stayed tere for 3 days waiting out the wind – and Fiz braved the weather on the last day so we had good company, an excellent meal and a good game of Bridge.
We left on Sunday morning and motored round the Southeast corner of Lipso, having plotted the route on the Navionics chart and checked on Google Earth. The chart showed a wide 10M deep channel inshore of the largest island and Google earth confirmed it by showing a ferry route going through. Imagine our horror then when we suddenly spotted a just-awash reef 2 boat lengths ahead of us! Luckily we were still on motor so I jamed her in Reverse and we stopped, backed off and went round the long way. That's the closest we have come to disaster in 4 years though. I'm still shaking.
After that, we had a nice sail over to Agathonisi which turns out to be a little gem. We anchored in the harbour as the whole of the quay (except for the ferry bit) was occupied by a warship. After the ferry came and went, followed by the warship going off on patrol all was calm. There is a tiny village, several tavernas a surprisingly good mini-market and a beach. The harbour is so clean that the beach is inside it.
And tomorrow its off to Pythagoreaon on Samos from where we are intending to visit ancient Ephesus by ferry....

A few days on Kos

Even though we have been here before, we have had  a very useful and enjoyable stay on Kos. We expected the Marina to be expensve and planned to go into the old harbour like last time. However it only cost €21 per night with free water and electricity so we stayed here all the time. Excellent value!
Selas in the marina are an official service center for Ocean Safety life-rafts. We had ours done at their very impressive facility by an obviously competent technician - who spent over an hour showing us every detail of the raft and its contents. It wasn't cheap at €300 but we felt it was good value.

We spent a day with a car visiting the sights. The Asclepion is very impressive. Surprisingly well preserved (and a bit tastefully restored). It isn't actually where Hypocrates practiced as he died 30 years before it was constructed but its very atmospheric nevertheless.

We drove the mountain roads to Zia where we had a very interesting and reasonably priced meal at the Olympia Taverna - despite the place being a tourist trap.

After that it was the big surprise of the day - the castle at Paleo Pili. This doesn't seem to be mentioned much in guide books etc but it was amazing. A rocky peak which already had a nascent castle in it has been conjured into an impregnable fortress by the addition of a few walls here and there. Its a bit of a scramble to get up there - but well worth it (and completely free). From the summit there are stunning views of Northern Kos and across to Kalimnos, Pserimos and Turkey.













The last visit was to the huge fortress built by the Knights of St. John. The exterior walls are very well preserved and very large. Unfortunately there appears to be nothing of interest inside - It is completely overgrown and there do not even appear to be much in the way of ruins under the vegetation. A further dampener was put on the day by meeting a starving dog on the road. L desperately wanted to help it but we felt unable to do so as there is no possibility of it coming with us on the boat and the most likely outcome if we had let it in the car would have been to have to abandon it again when we sailed away. L spent ages when we got back to Rosa, trying to get the local dog charity interested but to no avail. Apparently they are overwhelmed by stray and abandoned dogs.

We stayed around relaxing for a couple more days waiting for a strong Northerly to die and will now set off today for Pserimos.

Nisiros & on to Kos

We put the Spinnaker up in anticipation of a gentle blow to Nisiros. In the event, we had a couple of sessions where I thought the wind was strong enough and deployed it but they only lasted half an hour and we had to take it in again in favor of the iron topsail! L reserved judgment and looked smug.
Of course the moment we reached the Island, up came the wind.
We got into the large harbor to be greeted by a huge flotilla of 20 yachts crewed by Ukrainians and Russians. There were no spare spaces at all. Fortunately, they took pity on us and we & Fiz took a place along side one of their boats.
On Wednesday, L spent hours scrubbing the decks while I did some work. Overnight it blew up an un-forecast hoolie and dumped volcanic grit all over the nice clean decks. It's enough to make you cry.

We set off from Nisiros on another promise of a gentle waft to Kos with a following wind. Well follow us it did but not exactly gently. We had gusts of nearly 30Knots and sustained winds well over 20 knots. We put up a single reefed main which swept us along for an hour or so - and then the wind died to 10 knots. We shook out the reefs but didn't really trust the weather so avoided the Spinnaker - which was fortunate as an hour later 20 knots suddenly came in again. We put in 2 reefs again - and in an hour - guess what?
Finally gave up sailing 40 minutes short of the marina.
We're not great marina people - but I have to say, Kos marina is really impressive. Nice clean facilities, friendly staff and for our 10.6M boat - €21 per night with free water, electricity and WiFi. Instead of the planned 1 night we will stay 3 maybe 4 and take the chance to explore the Island by car with Bill and Lynn on Fiz.