Continuing West

Just after the sun rose up through the clouds, we motored out of the harbour at Erikoussa leaving Greece behind. Our course was set to travel 175nm southwest towards the toe of Italy, a route that we have followed several times and we hoped to arrive before the sun set the following day.

There was a flat sea with no wind as we left the harbour. After a while, the sea state picked up and we had a light wind but not quite enough to sail, so we put up the main to steady us in the swell and motorsailed. By midday the wind picked up a little more and with both sails up, the engine was finally switched off, we were sailing comfortably at 5kts. We hadn’t seen a single ship so far and wondered if everyone else knew something that we didn’t!

Within a couple of hours, the wind turned more behind us so we took the main down and continued with just the Genoa. We have a large Genoa and find that when sailing downwind it doesn’t help to have the main up as well as it just takes the wind from the Genoa, we were making good speed so continued like this comfortably for the rest of the day.

As the sun went down in the evening, it took the wind with it and the engine was fired up once again. It was a starry night with a full moon lighting up the sky. We had a very calm, uneventful night and still no ships in sight.

The moon was still high in the sky as the sun rose and brought us back the wind which was now a little stronger and Ziggy surfed the waves doing 6kts all day.

We had reserved a berth in the Marina at Roccella Ionica, as we approached, some black clouds descended on us and a rain squall passed in the distance but they quickly disappeared and the sun was shining again as we entered the marina.

The passage had taken 33 hours and although we had endured some swell, it was certainly a lot more comfortable than our previous journey along this route two years ago. Then we had a huge swell from two directions and it had felt like we were in a washing machine.

It was sad to see many damaged sailing boats impounded in the marina entrance that would have been stolen and used to transport migrants from Africa, it is becoming an increasingly common sight along the south coast of Italy.

We stayed for two nights and the time passed quickly doing the usual tasks of cleaning the boat, topping up water and electricity and doing several loads of laundry. We were moored on a very sociable pontoon meeting new friends from the UK, Denmark and Sweden at the one bar in the marina during the evenings. We also said hello to a frog that popped up each night as we walked back to the boat.

We were soon underway again heading to Sicily. The passage would be 95nm, we motored out of the marina at 7am and the sails went up once clear of the entrance as we left mainland Italy behind. There was a nice force 3 northwesterly wind so we sailed on a beam reach at 6kts for most of the day.

Again there was not much shipping action to see and the highlight was a small bird catching a lift with us, landing on Paul’s lap for a rest. We tried feeding him biscuits and water but he wasn’t interested. However, he suddenly lost his charm when he decided to leave a little deposit on the cushions (the bird, not Paul!).

The sun went down and again it took the wind with it. We had misty views of Mount Etna over the flat sea as we approached Sicily.

It was almost midnight when we arrived at Siracusa, another of our favourite places. Normally we wouldn’t plan to arrive in the dark but we’ve anchored here several times before and it’s a large bay with plenty of space, also the big bright moon was lighting our way. Once we found our spot and dropped the anchor we were definitely ready to sleep.

The following morning, the sun was shining and we were pleased to confirm that we had managed to find a good spot to drop our anchor, not too close to other boats or fishing pots and with the familiar view of Siracusa and the historic island of Ortigia.

We watched as large ships arrived and left the harbour.

I never tire of visiting the old town where there’s always something to see, colourful 3-wheeler ‘taxis’, old ruins among the roads and buildings, churches around every corner and it’s easy to get lost in the maze of narrow streets.

Of course you have to visit the busy market where everything is available, the swordfish is fresh out of the sea and the Oysters were delicious!

We visited the Fountain of Arethusa, it was almost time for the sun to set, so along with 100’s of other people, we found a seafront bar to sit and watch it go down over the bay.

We walked back to the harbour through the Piazza Duomo which was starting to get busy with people arriving for dinner at the restaurants overlooking the cathedral and in the small alleyways.

We stopped at a shop for a few essentials before returning to Ziggy and found that almost anything is available!