Back in Athens
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All too quickly our two week cruise was coming to an end and we found ourselves back in Athens with the larger than life character Michael the taxi driver waiting to take the guests back to the airport. After doing all the boring but necessary post charter tasks we took a day off to explore Athens. The flea market was very busy and loud with lots of smells coming from the different vendors and the parliament sits in contrast to most of the other buildings in that it doesn’t look like it took 10 minutes to build or is about to fall down. A highlight was finding the shop of Pantellis Melissinos the “poet sandal maker” whose father and grandfathers have been hand making leather sandals to the stars and public for 5 decades. The shop smells strongly of new leather and is adorned with Pantellis’artwork and letters from various dignitaries including Prince Charles. Clare bought a pair of his sandals which he personally fitted and adjusted as we waited. It was really nice to see the smile on his face when he had got them the way Clare wanted. Quite different from the usual faceless branding we are all used to. That evening we splashed out and had an excellent meal on the roof top terrace of the Hotel Grande Bretagne which has a commanding view over the Acropolis. Great food, attentive service, awesome setting and a colossal bill, well you only live once!
The View of the Acropolis from the Restaurant
Unfortunately while we’ve been in Athens, massive forest fires have broken out to the north of the city and while I write this some 30000 acres are affected with 1000’s of people having to flee their homes. Thankfully no casualties have been recorded yet and with international help from France, Italy and Cyprus hopefully it will be under control soon.
The Smoke from the Forest Fires over Athens taken from the Marina
Gordon
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Aug 23 2009
Hydra and Spetses
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Our next port of call was Hydra Island. We anchored in a secluded bay just along from Hydra town and were nearly the only ones there. The following morning I was outside preparing the cushions and I heard a bleeting noise coming from the island next to us and looked up to see a goat running down the rocks! After breakfast, we moved the yacht and anchored nearer the town so that a water taxi could pick them up and take them in to have a look round. Hydra town is full of grand mansions scattered around the hill overlooking the small harbour. It’s a beautiful place to sail past and I’m sure a wonderful place to explore too although neither of us had the opportunity. The island has no cars so transport is by donkey and boat. We had a quick swim instead in the very warm waters (27 degrees) which was very nice if a little too warm!
Hydra Town
We anchored off for the night on the next door island called Dhokos which is a really pretty anchorage but seemed to be fairly busy. The following day was a quick motor down to Spetses Island, another little gem. This time I was able to go ashore for a quick shop for provisions. It’s a lovely little town with narrow pedestrianised cobbled streets lined with smart boutique shops and very busy tavernas. The guests arrived back with a gorgeous array of flowers for my birthday which they then put into a beautiful arrangement for the saloon.
After having anchored nearby for the night with Enigma as our neighbour (Larry Ellison’s previous yacht and one of the 100 largest in the world) we had a very breezy beat with the sails up and the birthday girl was even given the helm! The guests looked slightly uneasy in their seats so we weren’t quite as powered up as we could have been (thank goodness otherwise my galley starts flying around!) but once the wind hit 35 knots, the sails had to come back down again and we sheltered on Dhokos again for lunch whilst waiting for the winds to calm a little. After a trip to Ermioni that night on the mainland and a lack of sleep (combination of bouncing music till 3am and then a huge swell after that) we made our way back to lovely Poros for our final night anchored off a little beach along the coast from the town.
Tonight's Dessert - Grand Marnier Souffle
Clare
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Aug 17 2009
Poros
Posted: under News.
Finally we had some wind and after a bit of motor-sailing, we set full main and genoa and sailed around the Methana peninsula. With the guests at the helm and helping with the trimming of the sails we clocked 8.5knots briefly in 10knots of wind showing that the big girl does actually sail well! As the wind veered we gybed and then ran goose-winged with the mainsail out on one side and the genoa out on the other through the narrow channel between the mainland and the island of Poros. The town and anchorage here is one of my personal favourites in Greece. It is a picture postcard town perched on a hill over looking a large totally enclosed bay.
Poros Town
The water is always very flat and the holding for the anchor is excellent meaning I get a good nights sleep! Also the selection of bars and restaurants and the quality of the food is much better then in most other areas of tourist Greece. Being the weekend we were joined by quite a few large super-yachts including the very sleek looking 200+ feet Perini-Navi “Saudade”, one day……
Gordon
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Aug 12 2009
Idyllic anchorage and Epidavros
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After spending the night anchored off the busy Aegina town we headed off reasonably early to our lunch spot. Thankfully the day was a lot cooler than the previous week with temperatures in the mid 30’s instead of 40’s although the flat calm conditions meant motoring all the way. The bay (really a channel between the south western side of Angistri and an off-lying islet) was idyllic, even after all the bays we have travelled to on Concerto, this one still took the breath away. The channel is quite enclosed by the high land either side which when added to the wind indicator’s 0.0 knot wind speed made for one of the quietest anchorages we’ve been to. There was no noise from other boats, people, even the water was silent. The sea was so clear that even though we were anchored in 25 metres of water you could make out the sandy bottom quite clearly and could see the anchor.
If you look closely you can see the anchor on the seabed!
After a lazy lunch and lots of swimming we headed off to the small village of Epidavros. The anchorage here is a pleasant enough place and the village worth a wander but the real reason to come here is to take a taxi to the ancient Greek theatre of Epidavros 25mins inland. The theatre is one of the best preserved theatres in the world built around 400BC and is vast. The acoustics are world renowned and are used as a case study on acoustics in universities. It is said that a coin dropped or a whispered line can be heard by all the 15000 people it can seat.
Gordon
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Aug 09 2009
Piraeus
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After a week of fixing various odds and ends along with some cleaning and polishing, we moved the yacht up to the marina in Piraeus right on the outskirts of Athens where we would be picking up our next lot of guests. Not the most exciting of marinas but still a nice spot to be in and close to the city centre. Our first port of call was the Kitchen Bar, a restaurant along the marina which offers a good selection of non-Greek food (something we were beginning to get a little tired of!) for a bit of beef and red wine! Provisioning here is perfect with a huge Carrefour supermarket along the marina with plenty of European/French products available which certainly makes my life easier! I even had the time for a quick trip into Athens to the central market which was apparently ‘a must’ and indeed it was. I’d never seen anything quite like it. The meat market was along three of the sides of the building where each vendor had a cubicle and then their meat selection hanging inside clear boxes. The atmosphere was incredible with all the vendors shouting away at the crowds of Greeks and tourists. In the middle of the building was the fish market where rows and rows of ice displays sat with such a variety of fish. I decided I wasn’t quite brave enough to buy anything from the meat market (I’m sure it was very safe but something put me off the fairly dried looking bits of carcasses hanging from their boxes!) but I bought a fair amount of fish including seabass, bream, sole, prawns and salmon. It all turned out to be very good and very fresh although my galley resembled the fish market after I’d finished scaling, gutting and filleting most of them! Getting the yacht charter ready over the few days in Piraeus was a huge struggle because of the heat. It was 42 degrees in the shade at one point so our days would often start at 7 for all the polishing outside before retreating inside at lunchtime to do all the bits and pieces out of the glaring sun. Guests arrived and after one final night in Zea Marina we headed off to the Argo-Saronic islands for two weeks.
Clare
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Aug 04 2009