We set off just after 9am.
The weather was pretty much as we expected, bright and sunny. The wind, on the other hand, was
unreliable. Sometimes it blew the
17-20 knots we expected, but then other times it just disappeared completely
going down to 8 or 9 knots. We
were sailing on genoa only, on the basis that works well in a big blow from
behind. But when the wind fails we
have to resort to the engine. So a
lot of the time we were motor sailing yet again.
The plan was to get to the sister island of Leros, Kalimnos. It is only a 10 mile journey. However it takes us rather longer than
expected as we were trying to sail even though we were only making speeds of
about 3-4 knots. The sea state is
not too terrible. There are waves
of about one meter on occasion, but not all the time. It is a bit lumpy, but
nothing to really worry about.
Richard identified a nice bay where he wanted to spend the night. It is supposed to have mooring buoys
from a taverna. When we get there
the wind is up and blowing about 16 knots with gusts to 20 knots. We can see two buoys with the name of a
taverna on them and we try to go and pick one up. They seem to have pick ups, so I go forward with the boat
hook. The problem is I don’t know
if they will have lines to put on the boat or if I will need to thread our own
line through a pick up. But that
turns out to be the least of my problems.
I get to the buoy and pick up a line attaching the pick up to the main
buoy. Only then do I find out that
there is no long line. They are
all tied tight together. I can’t
hold on to them in the wind and with the boat moving. I try to unhook the boathook from the pickup, but it is firmly
attached and is pulling so it just about pulls my arm out of its socket. There is nothing for it but to let go,
leaving the boathook (our only one) floating in the water. Richard says not to worry we will go
back and get it. But that is not
so easy. I am on the bathing platform
at the back holding on to the boat with one hand while trying to get down low
enough to pick the hook up, while Richard reverses the boat upwind towards the
boathook. But I can’t reach it
without falling in. So then
Richard suggests that I get a line and try to lasso it to. I get a short line with a spliced loop
and have a go. After a few
failures I get it! Even now I
don’t know how I managed it without falling in.
So Richard wants to try to get the mooring buoy again. He suggests we use what we call the
yellow peril. That is a gadget on
a pole that has a mechanism that clips a line through a hoop on the buoy. As the buoy is low in the water and the
only hook is on the pickup, we decide to do it from the stern and then walk the
buoy forward. By some miracle I
manage to get the rope through the ring first go. But again we are defeated. There is little slack on the line to the buoy and Richard is
afraid of going in reverse in case the line gets caught in the propeller. So again I am nearly dragged into the
water trying to keep hold of the line and move it forward. And again I have to let go, first
asking Richard to remove the yellow peril from the line so I can just pull our
mooring rope through. But he does
not do so successfully and we nearly lose half of the yellow peril too! But at the last minute it comes free
and all lines are safely aboard.
I am convinced that these buoys have been tied up in such a way as to
make it impossible to use.
Sometimes where there are these sort of buoys used by a restaurant or
the like there is someone to take your line and put it through the buoy. But there is no-one, only two anchored
yachts watching our performance, no doubt enjoying it!
Richard wanted to try one more thing for us to stay. Seeing the other boats anchored he
tried to find somewhere to put down our anchor. The problem is that it is rather deep except very near the
beach where people are swimming and we are warned that the bottom has a lot of
rocks, which make for bad holding.
We have one go at putting the anchor down, but it is too close to the
shore, and we seem to be on rock and dragging our anchor, so we just give up.
This means we will have to go on to the main town of Kalimnos. We are still not certain what the name
of the town is. The sailing books
call it Kalimnos town, whereas our guide book calls it Pothia. Anyway it is just around the corner
from where we were, so we go there.
We really wanted to anchor, swim and have a night away from a town. So when we see another boat anchored in
the harbour we think perhaps we should go there instead of mooring on the yacht
pontoon. So we put the anchor
down. We are not certain of the
holding, but the other boat looks OK.
We have lunch and then start to worry. We can’t get internet coverage where we are and therefore
are unable to check the weather, which is rather crucial at the moment. So we decide to go into the town
mooring after all.
We get there just in time.
We are directed to a spot.
It is still blowing pretty hard, though luckily blowing us off the
pontoon. This is an anchor down
job. We seem to manage that
eventually. So we are now safely
tucked up in harbour. We have had
dinner on board and are now planning tomorrow. We shall probably go to Kos. The forecast is still for strong winds, but again we will be
going downwind, so that should be OK.
We have been looking at the news.
It looks like the Greeks have voted ‘No’ to the bail out deal. So next week should be interesting!
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