DAYS 26-33
Sailing the Bay of Corfu
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DAY 26 - Sunday 6 May
Swop the car for a boat for a week.
The plan is (why do these paragraphs always start like this, 'the plan is'?). Anyhow, the plan is to drive the pretty way to Plantaria where we meet our 18 odd fellow sailors at 'Olgas' at 2.00pm. We will park R10FFN up somewhere and move onto the 'Saucy Sara' or the 'Black Pig', not sure of the boat's name yet. We do our shopping and 'vittal' the boat. We get briefed on how to sail a boat (which could take 2-3 days, not the 1 hour allotted for the task). On the bright side - we have already boned up on the nautical terminology, Sara has been great on that. Transom, Aft, Sheet, Line, Head, My Man Is Overboard Not To Worry - she has it nailed.
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The day unfolds exactly as planned. We meet the team, meet our boat 'Phersephone', and she is exactly as advertised, big! We settle in and are given a brief briefing. Nice spot of dinner and hit the bunks.
The first day did NOT look like this, sadly, but I thought a nice bright picture should be painted from the off.
This our flotilla in Lakka on Paxos on day two. Idyl!ic!
DAY 27 - Monday 7 May
They really don't seem to care that we have no experience.
Briefing at 8.30 which basically tells us we are sailing 15 nautical miles straight across from the mainland to a little tiny harbour on Corfu. Its a bit of a dull day (while the UK is basking in a heatwave, go figure!) and rain is forecast. Visibility is OK'ish, reasonable winds. The briefing is mainly about a piss up in the evening. We then have a boat briefing where the various parts of the boats are explained, briefly. I take notes, Sara takes fright. Then it is "see you later, tell when you want to cast off, call us when you get there"........... It's a bit like thinking you fancy a private pilots licence for a light plane - and being shown a plane that you can take up solo with no training - just to see if you like the experience. So we cast off..............
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Off into the wild grey yonder. Once clear of the harbour I consult my notes. Push the red rope, pull the blue rope, slacken off the purple rope, and Bob's your uncle, and weirdly it was. My small amount of experience under Rear Admiral 'Dinger' (Steve) Bell came good. The flipping thing sailed. Then came a weird pinging noise from what we finally discovered was a covered up navigation system. Use an actual sailing navigation aid??? I'm sorry - we are Google maps folk, dyed in the wool, out and out. Google coped with no problems at all. Which was fortunate as nobody had told us anything about the apparently quite important pinging thing. They had not even told us to take charts to the briefing.
Despite this we learnt on the job and had a ball!! It was quickly clear who was Captain Pugwash and who was Roger the Cabin Boy. You can see Captain Pugwash in the pics below having the time of her life.
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We duly got to the next harbour some time later after tacking, reaching, yawling and other technical boating stuff that the Captain told me to do and berthed faultlessly due to the excellent shore-side instruction from the team. Time for a party, chat to the other crews, dinner and bed.
DAY 28 - Tuesday 8 May
They still don't seem to care that we have no experience.
Maybe they are right? Maybe you really don't need it?
To be fair to them, there are no tides, no currents and the are is sheltered and has no sudden changes in weather conditions - so it looks like it can be done. Not quite sure about no concern over life jackets or 'man overboard' drills, so Captain S. Pugwash simply tells me not to fall off, job done.
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Quick briefing at 9.30. This time it is head south for 18 miles and meet on Paxos at a small harbour called Lakka. We sail for a couple of hours and get a right lick on, but the Admiral wanted to have a swim in azure waters in a shelter bay, so on went the motor. Just in case you noticed - Captain S Pugwash, having gained confidence decided on a personal on-board promotion to Admiral. I remain one rank below Seaman Stains.
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Lovely day, great sailing, it was a bit blowy and chilly at the start, witness the pic below of Sara looking determined at the helm.
And when we reached Lakka, once again, faultless berthing due to great advice from the shore. All the times I have sailed I have been stuck by how the problems always occur at the end of the day as you try to back the poxy great lumps into a space too small for them. It stresses the Skipper no end. When 'Persephone' come into port the Admiral simply walks to the pointy end and works the anchor. Roger the Cabin Boy does everything else, steers. fends off, throws lines, ties on, comes out in nervous hives, and finally drops the gangplank for the rest of the crew (1) to walk down.
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Having motored to Lakka we moored in the azure bay and were about to dive in when the Admiral spotted a jelly fish. One tiny jelly fish (or piece of floating weed). Swimming for all the crew cancelled. All hands on deck!!! Head for port!!!! No matter, we put on our brand new 'Jelly Shoes' and swam off the beach, or rather I did, Sara spent the whole time wearing a snorkel and bending down in waist deep water looking for them thar'darn jelly fishes.
Action shot of Sara at the helm
Admiral Sara gets so confident that she drives 'no hands'
Roger the Cabin Boy
gets a brief turn at the wheel.
DAY 29 - Wednesday 9 May
Now we have some experience, at last.
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Weather still a bit changeable but it gets nicer in the afternoon
Today we sail from Lakka down the coast of Paxos to Emerald Bay in Anti Paxos. Nice sailing down there and we moor in the bay for a swim then sail back to Gaios, a lovely port where we have a crew dinner with all the people from the other boats. On the right is a shot of Gaios and a small pic of the back our boat.
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The Admirable Sara dressed in her finest sailor suit for the days outing and insisted on working the ropes, or sheets as they are apparently called. You can see her below left in her full dress uniform and below right in her frogman's outfit. That Admirable has something for every occasion, no wonder there is no room in the boot of the car.
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The shot of a damaged Cabin Boy is included for the sympathy vote. Somehow I have managed to pick up a virus that makes my nose run incessantly and my right eye water like a tap. I hope to overcome it before I run dry of snot and tears. The eye patch is supposed to give me a piratical look - do I carry it off? Is it an improvement?
DAY 30 - Thursday 10 May
Getting good at it now.
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Nice sunny start and a wind off the bow for one long reach back to the mainland.
Today we sail back to mainland Greece, about 15 miles to Parga, as you can see it was hard work for the Admirable!! But to be fair to her the stress of command weighs heavily on her shoulders and she deserves a rest from all that flogging and keelhauling. The Cabin Boy deserves a break too, it is actually possible to simply have too much keelhauling in one day and he gets sore.
The run back was great, really nice sailing and so we anchored in the bay for a swim. Once again, wrong sort of water for the Admirable, too choppy. Once the crew swim was called off we thought about going about and heading back to sea for a play around, but the wind suddenly got up to force 6 and the radio messages started to get a bit more edgy and panicky so we headed in to the bay where we were instructed to ram the boats into the sandy beach like Viking raiders. We were assured that this is most unusual and can only be done in a couple of places. Not surprised as it means if you get off you have to swim round to the stern to get back on! It did mean we got to use a 'Kedge' anchor though. Water taxi in to Parga for a nice dinner and a fairly lethal journey back in the dark in the water taxi..
DAY 31 - Friday 11 May
Getting even better
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Nice sunny day with a light wind.
Off to Sivita, a lovely port 11 nautical miles away that Sara and I had visited on the way down. We stop off at Arillas Bay for lunch and a swim. Moor in the beautiful emerald waters. We are only allowed to drop anchor if the water is 'emerald'. The Admirable is very strict on that. She will only swim if it is emerald. Sadly, once again - the wrong sort of water. Emerald yes, warm enough? No. So weigh anchor and off we go again. Into beautiful Sivita for the lovely sunset shown here.
DAY 32 - Saturday 12 May
Bordering on overconfident now.
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Nice sunny day but sadly no wind.
Today is a relatively short run from Sivita back to the start point at Plataria. Only about 7 nautical miles (yes, since you ask I do know the difference. A nautical mile is 1.151 English miles. A Nautical Mile was defined in the early 1600's as imagine the earth cut in half at the equator. The distance round the rim is then divided into 360 degrees and each degree is then further divided into 60 minutes, and each of those minutes is a Nautical Mile. Amazing what you can learn on this blog!).
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You can also learn that there is an infinite variety of 'the wrong sort of water'. After motoring into yet another bay in the so far fruitless search for emerald water of the right temperature, sans jellyfish, sans chop, we failed yet again. This bay was the wrong sort of emerald and a little too deep. So we moor up in the harbour. We pick up the snorkal and mask and put on our jelly shoes and walk to the nearby beach. Yup! You guessed it. Wrong sort of water, onshore breeze at fault this time. That poor snorkel has only 'looked' at water, never actually felt it.
DAY 33 - Sunday 13 May
Back on dry land!!!
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Nice sunny day but sadly no wind. Who cares!
Off the boats for 0830 and give the car a quick clean. Pack the boot. Say farewell to our shipmates. Console the snorkel and explain that there is bound to be the 'right' sort of water in Vasiliki. Hood down, shades on and we head south for 150 miles onto Lefkada and our destination fore the next few days - the windsurfing capital of this part of Greece, the bay of Vasiliki. Sara's favourite paddle boarding and yoga retreat.
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Stunningly beautiful drive down. This part of Greece is amazingly green, wooded, mountainous, deserted and lovely. Fantastic roads, wide, smooth, winding, no traffic.
We reach Vasiliki about lunchtime and book into our hotel. The head of Admin has seen that this hotel has suites as well as rooms but was unable to book them online. We view a suite. It costs twice as much as our room. It has a massive jacuzzi bath. Job done. I pay.
