Sorry for delay since the last post. I suddenly realized if I don’t get these things down on paper (as it were) then i’m gonna totally forget it ever happened. This post is titled as such deliberately in the order of least stressful first! This was truly a fantastic day though, in terms of sailing. Probably our best actually with only a little bit of stress at the beginning (obv.) and end… representatively speaking, that is.
So after our incredibly stressful night we had to find a place to sleep. We were soooo exhausted. We sailed around to the other side of the island, consulted our trusty Greek Water Pilot and saw a small inlet were anchoring was possible. It was a gloriously sunny morning (if a bit early…around 6am from memory) and the white cliff faces were stark but beautiful against the crystal blue sea. We had to be careful where we moored as we were basically circumnavigating mountains, which means that they fall like an escarpement into the sea. Hence incredibly deep for dropping anchor. But we found a beautiful spot and saw that other boats had taken a line to shore to steady the boat. There wasn’t much current but we knew we should follow suit.
Now this process of putting a line to shore. It really is supposed to be quite easy…. but us being novices we had to kind of find our way. We hadn’t really seen anyone doing it but we presumed that possibly they used the dinghy in some way to take the line quickly to shore. But we weren’t going to get that dinghy out again. No way Jose! Besides, we tested the engine and it was pretty dead! Not surprisingly after being 10 metres underwater!! Anyway, all that was required was to take a rope ashore and then loop it round a tree and then Alvaro would tighten it up at his end on board the boat. Yep. Easy peazy.
I donned the highly attractive, blue plastic shoes i’d luckily brought with me and dived in with the rope to swim ashore. God the rope was heavy! You have to be careful that the rope doesn’t drop down in the middle and catch on a rock…..Anyway i made it to the shore. The rocks looked very pretty but each rock was razor sharp so i was thankful for the shoes (no room for fashion conscious sailors here!). Finally, finding a good rock to secure the rope, I climbed down and then swam back. So, depending on the current you can put one or two lines ashore. If you are overnight its best to do two and usually if there’s a current you have to sort it out pretty bloody quickly! More on that later.
We had some brekkie and then slept literally for about 4 hours. After that we felt much more refreshed. Another swim and a snorkel and then we prepared to head off in the direction of Poros. 
I say ‘prepared’ because obviously I had to undo the shore line. That was easy. But then we had to up anchor. We had dropped it earlier at the front of the boat after following the instructions from our guide book. So were were secured at the back with the shore line and the front with the anchor (just in case this was difficult to follow!). Anyway, as I mentioned before the bottom of the sea was very deep. Where we were anchored it was about 25 metres and that was pretty close to the shore. You would think it would be quite easy to up anchor with a motorized system… all you have to do is press a button after all… but what people, including the guide, had failed to tell us was that in deep water the anchor can sometimes be too heavy and will slip back down when the motor is pulling it up. So while Alvaro is trying to steer the boat away from some very close boats (well spinning us round and round in circles) I was trying to get the damn thing out of the water! It just kept slipping back down. Up two metres of chain… down 4 metres of chain….. up 5 metres of chain.. yes yes… its working….. oh shit… down 10 metres of chain. Soooo annoying and also embarrassing as we veered closer to other boats every ten minutes. Eventually I managed to up anchor about an inch at a time.. very slowly. So another thing for us to deal with on our journey. Nice.
Just realised that the above is a good photo of the dinghy motor! So maybe you can get the idea now. We had to lift it off this thing and attach to the boat. Not easy in the dark!!
Anyway we headed off after my anchor chain extravanza. We actually then had a lovely day sailing. Poros was a little further away than we wanted to go in one day but we decided that we really needed to moor in a port tonight and also we had run out of water on board. I know you would think that being surrounded by water would be easy but actually the shower and toilet need fresh water and you cant wash up plates and cups in sea water for longer than a day or so…. things just start to seem very dirty! Just gonna pause here for lots of pics. It really was a beautiful day. We even forgot about our little mishaps earlier that day and the night before.
I want to add a few more photos but technology isn’t my strong point and this blog thing is pretty new to me so instead I have that silly paragraph on the right!! Grrrr. Will sort it later.
Ok, so next stop Poros. We had full sail with really good wind all day. A little gusty as we headed nearer to Poros but we had learnt from our Angistri experience that it was very important to watch out for wind change and make sure we were always protected, if we could.
As we neared Poros we were excited but also nervous. Yes. Mooring!! Aaaaaahhhhh! We knew it was gonna be stressful because it always is in a busy port with all the tourists and more experienced sailors watching. Oh what fun they were about to have with us two attempting to moor for the first time in a busy port. But we knew we had to start somewhere. We’d been learning as we went along and this wasn’t gonna be any different.
The approach to Poros. Again, a breathtaking view. Exactly as it had said in all the guides. A typically greek village built on a hill. The white buildings looking pristine against the blue Mediterranean seas and skies. As we got closer we had a mini disagreement on whether to head for the port and try for a mooring. The guide had said that in August its near on impossible to find a space but we were arriving in good time so we thought we would check it out first. Alvaro won that little argument but it did pay off actually!
It was actually pretty quiet in the port. There was a huge space alongside the quay allowing us to actually moor broadside. This is such an easy way to moor. Cheating really, I guess, but easy all the same. None of that faffing around with anchors and lines. So I jumped ashore and started attaching ropes to the quay… only to see a huge sign NO SIDE MOORING. Oh dear. Here we go again. So off we went with our attempt to moor as we had read in the guide.
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