Antiquities, gulfs, politics and poltergeists

Over the last month we have continued to explore the Ionian islands and have ventured into the Gulf of Amvrakia and the Gulf of Patros, both of which have yielded some interesting and unexpected experiences and contributed to our neglected cultural education.  

We crossed from Port Zakinthos on Zante to Katakolon on the mainland, the nearest point to moor up if you want to visit Olympia, the origins of the Olympic games.   From there you need a taxi, hire car or pubic transport. There is a little train, but it only runs once a day at 08:30 unless there is a cruise ship scheduled.  By the time we realised this…. yes you’ve guessed…. is was well after 08:30 and it was a not a cruise ship day… so the bus it was, breaking our journey at Pirgos famous only for its unprepossessing bus station! 

Being a no-cruise ship day however has some significant advantages; we had Olympia virtually to ourselves and really enjoyed wondering around undisturbed and soaking up the atmosphere!

Statue of Zeus in the Olympia Museum

The Temple of Zeus at Olympia

The entrance to the Olympic Stadium 

The Olympic Arch

They say you have to kiss a few frogs before you get to true beauty and we certainly kissed a frog in Killini where we stopped overnight on our journey into the beautiful Gulf of Patros.  What a dump, don’t go there if you can avoid it!

This summed up Killini....

We hadn’t really heard much about the Gulf of Patros apart from we knew of the Corinth canal at the southern end of it where you have to pay a King’s ransom to go through into the Aegean Sea. This year we were exploring the northern and central area, first crossing under the Rion bridge which at 2,880 metres long is the longest fully suspended bridge in the world. You have to radio ahead on the VHF when you are 5 miles away to get permission to sail under it and again when you are 1 mile away when they tell you which arch to go through.

Rion Bridge

After the bridge we headed for Nafpraxtos.  It is an old walled Venetian harbour and the pilot book said it was a pretty but very small - only suitable for boats under 12metres.  It turned out to be one of the loveliest places we have visited. It is very small – there is only room for about 6 yachts and on the first night we had to moor outside but managed to get inside the next morning,... swooping as another yacht left!  We then climbed up to the castle which was a good walk.

Outside the gates of Nafpraxtos Castle

Inside Nafpraxtos Castle

It was so lovely we were delighted to stay an extra night when we were joined by our friend Simon Thomas sailing with his friend Rog on Rog’s catamaran Polo.   It's a magical place especially in the evening when the lights come on.

Nafpraxtos at night

Moored in the Venetian Harbour at Nafpraxtos

Viridian waiting outside Nafpraxtos

Since the harbour was so small it was very difficult not to foul another boats anchor when mooring, as our neighbours discovered to their cost when they tried to leave.....

From Nafpraxtos we sailed further south to another gorgeous place called Galixidi.  The town reminded us of an old French town with faded paintwork and shutters in tasteful subtle hues and all of the shops untouched by time with regard to their internal fittings. We were joined by Rog’s Greek friend Petros in Galaxidi where we had dinner on the quay side and then the next day we shared a hire car on which Petros managed to negotiate a good price so we could all travel to Delphi. 

Moored up in Galaxidi

We absolutely loved Delphi although it was much busier than Olympus. It was certainly worth the trip and amazing that so much still survives.  I don’t think we had fully appreciated how much this area has been devastated by earthquakes over the centuries though. So many places have had to be rebuilt and so much history destroyed.  

The treasury at Delphi

Views over the Temple of Diana

The running track at Delphi 

One of the amazingly well-preserved exhibits in the museum at Delphi

We next headed north stopping off at Messalonghi to anchor overnight which is a safe stopover and where Lord Byron died.

Fishermen's huts on stilts near Messalonghi

We then entered the Gulf of Amvrakia which feels like an inland sea. We anchored in a lovely quiet spot off Vonitsa on the first night and then moved onto the Vonitsa town quay for a second night and climbed up to the castle.

Viridian anchored off Vonitsa...

We met some people who told us they had been there a month but hadn’t managed to get to the castle yet.  We can't imagine what they had been doing for a month because there is not a lot to do in Vonitsa except visit the castle and that isn’t very exciting – not a sign or information board in sight throughout the visit!

The view from Vonitsa Castle

At the top of the castle

Vonitsa Castle from the sea

Now on a roll in the antiquities department, we stopped off at Preveza and then cycled 20kms to the ancient remains of the Roman Citadel of Nikopolis   Once again we were virtually the only people visiting.  We felt a bit sorry for the chap in the ticket hut as it was clearly a very slow day, he had obviously abandoned all pretence of working as he couldn’t even be bothered to charge us and carried on playing candy crush! 

The amphitheatre at Nikopolis 

Inside Nikopolis

Now feeling sated with ruins and the dead, we were in need of spending a bit more time with the living, so we headed to Meganissi, Lefkas and then Paxos – our favourite island where we met Maggie and Richard again in lovely Port Gaios and amazingly we coincided with Katja Quist (on her second holiday to Greece in 6 weeks!) when we met her lovely friend Tash and family Nick and Nikki in beautiful Lakka. It’s amazing how many people you meet and the new friends you can make following this lifestyle; most people we meet are friendly, interesting and interested.

Port Gaios

At anchor off Port Gaios

Lakka

So, we are now back on Corfu. The weather is changing, it’s a bit cooler and pretty windy.  Some parts of Greece and the southern Med have got huge storms ....we believe the term Medicane has been invented!  We have therefore holed up for a few days until our next guests arrive and decided to do some forays without the boat.  

Firstly, we hired a car and drove around Corfu for a day.  It’s a beautiful island.  We spent several hours following high altitude hairpin bends and cart tracks in search of an elusive restaurant that Greg had read about in the mountain town of Old Peritha.  Sadly, we became far too ‘hangry’ before we found it and realised we had been following signs for Perithia which when reading Greek words looked very similar but unfortunately isn’t the same place at all!!!  We finally ate in Cassiopi on the north coast which is always nice if not as special as was hoped for. 

Whilst driving around we were able to see the reality of some of the local political news we have been reading about.  Apparently, the rubbish tip in Corfu is full and the site of the second tip has been banned by the EU, so there is nowhere to put the rubbish.  The Corfu council is trying to ignore the EU and take the rubbish to tip 2 but now there are protesters trying to stop it and police in riot gear keeping the peace.  We were diverted round them near Lefkimi.  The rubbish issue is now becoming critical and seems to be at stalemate.

The rubbish is piling up!!!

The next day we took the ferry to Albania and visited Saranda.  We had learned the value of doing a recce when we checked out Tangier by ferry and found the marina was closed.  When we got to Saranda we discovered that there is nowhere to moor for a yacht of our size so the only option would be anchoring off the beach.  Having spent the day in Saranda though, we were a bit underwhelmed.

I think we expected it to be more exotic or culturally different but it felt a bit like a Greek version of Marbella.  Lots of people cleaning the beachfront area, numerous high end designer shops presumably catering for cruise ship clientele, wall to wall apartments and hotels all a bit high rise which reminded us more of Spain than Greece.  We probably should have taken the tourist tour to the ancient sites…maybe next time.

Saranda is not a pretty town.....

The beachfront at Saranda

Not known for our language acquisition skills apart from how to order beer and wine I found that I quickly learned and have not yet forgotten the word for ‘For Sale’ in Albanian.

Finally we think we may have a boat poltergeist.  We have ‘mislaid’ quite a few things but these are the creepiest.  If you can explain away these oddities we would like to hear from you…..

1. The wheel and instrument console cover for the boat has disappeared.  Its huge. We’ve ransacked the boat several times in search of it.  

2. I got two matching mooring lines out of the locker as we came to moor alongside in Ormos Nikolaos on Zante.  I took the bow line and attached it, leaving the stern line on the deck.  Went to collect the stern line to attach that and the line had gone.  We have never seen it since.  No, it’s not still in the locker.  Yes, we definitely had it on board. No, it wasn’t in rough seas, it was flat calm.  It was creepy!

The disappearing rope.....

3. This hat just appeared in the cockpit when we were on anchor off Gaios.  It definitely doesn’t belong to us.  Nothing was disturbed on the boat or stolen.  

The appearing cap........

Answers on a postcard…….

Our next blog will entail tales of our trek down to Tunisia for the colder months which we are very excited about.