In the middle of the night the wind shifted and a swell came into the
anchorage making the boat rock most uncomfortably. I even had to get up and take a seasick pill to get back to
sleep.
So we were not unhappy to start out early to make our way to Ios. At first there was actually a bit of
wind. For about an hour we
actually sailed in a force 4, though it was from behind and we were going
rather slowly. But the wind
dropped and the engine was again on.
From time to time the wind picked up to 7 or 8 knots and the sails
helped pull the boat along. But
mainly we were motoring, yet again.
We will really need more diesel soon!
We had breakfast under way, but although it was lunchtime as we
approached the harbour in Ormos on Ios we thought it best to moor up
first. There are at least two
other boats trying to make their way into the harbour with us. In the light of the weather forecast
for very strong Meltemi winds tomorrow we are concerned that the harbour may
get full. We are not wrong about
that. We had hoped to tie up to a
pier that has pick up lines, but they are all taken. There appears to be a space, but it is not clear that the
other boats haven’t already used the forward lines. So we go on the next pier, right next to the ferry
boats. The other boats wait for us
to moor up. We have to use the
anchor. We think we have set it OK
and someone off a very large sailing yacht helps us to tie up. However, when a professional skipper
moors up alongside us, he says that we put our anchor out too late and we
should have more scope. However,
we are now wedged in between two large boats and it is simply impossible to go
out and try again. The
professional skipper comes on board and sets our lines. He says that in the light of the fact
that the wind will push us off the pier tomorrow, we should be fine, but when
he comes back from Santorini in the afternoon we can tie up to him as his
anchor is well set. We shall see
what is necessary. In the meantime
after fiddling with lines for an hour we feel fairly secure as is.
We have a late lunch on board and then make our way around part of the
town to decide what to do. It is
possible with the bad weather coming in that we shall have to be here for a
week. What we do want is to go to
Santorini. It seems there is
nowhere there to put a boat, particularly in bad weather, so the best
alternative may be to take the ferry which leaves from just past our boat and
takes 40 minutes to get there. We
also go to the tourist information and find that there is a very smart hotel up
the hill with what is considered to be the best restaurant on the island and
which also has a spa. We are due
for massages, so we book into the restaurant for tonight and we will book in to
the spa for tomorrow. We will also
try to find accommodation in Santorini for Saturday and maybe Sunday night.
We stop for an iced coffee on the waterfront and have a nice chat with
the waiter. He points out two
lovely bays on the island where we can anchor. They both seem well protected against a north westerly
Meltemi, so we may go there on Monday and or Tuesday. In the meantime we have paid the princely sum of 10 euros
for two nights berthing. We will
have to pay for water and electricity on top, but for the moment we have found
an electricity point with credit left on it, so we have free leccy!
As we are going to dinner at a smart hotel I actually dress up. I am in a dress and have put on make
up. I haven’t done that since we
got to Greece. Dinner is worth it. It is certainly the best meal out we
have had since we got to Greece.
They call it traditional Greek food with a contemporary interpretation. We even drank a decent wine from
Santorini. We have booked in for
our massages tomorrow evening.
Now back on the boat and ready for bed. There is a boat which acts as a nightclub which is moored
about 5 boats down from us. So far
it is not very noisy. We hope it
will stay that way.
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