Dark and Stormy

With a light westerly wind, we had a very calm sail South towards Cephalonia. We headed to Fiskardo which is a village situated on the northern tip of the island.

I think I’ve mentioned before (several times) that Fiskardo is one of my favourite places in the Ionion. The pretty harbour side village has Venetian architecture, colourful houses and hills covered with cypress and olive trees. It is one of the few places on the island that remained largely unaffected by the massive 1953 earthquake. Fiskardo and the dense forest in the surrounding area have been declared areas of great natural beauty and are protected under Greek law.

The horseshoe shaped harbour is always very busy with boats ranging from traditional fishing boats to luxury yachts. Also several ferries come in and out during the day bringing guests from the neighbouring islands. We decided to anchor on the north side of the bay, where there is more space, with long lines attached to the shore holding us away from the shallow rocks.

This is the first time we’ve visited for a couple of years and as we walked around the bay, I was happy to see that nothing had changed. Cars are not allowed into the village, so there’s plenty of space for the harbour side tavernas, bars and shops to spill out onto the streets.

We went for sundown cocktails on a balcony overlooking the bay and ZigZag anchored on the opposite shore.

One of our favourite restaurants in the Mediterranean is the Lord Falcon. With its excellent Thai food, this was definitely part of our plan to come here and as always, it didn’t disappoint. After dinner we stopped for a drink on our way back to Ziggy in a popular rock bar which plays classic tunes into the small hours, luckily we had moored far enough away not to be able to hear it on board.

The following day we made the most of the crystal clear water and did some more hull cleaning much to the delight of the fish. It was like swimming in an aquarium, hundreds appeared around me as soon as I started scraping. If only they would learn to help themselves and not wait for me to feed them!

We stayed for a couple of days but then the forecast was for the wind to turn south which would not be comfortable in this bay, so we lifted the anchor and left Fiskardo behind. There was a light wind as we sailed slowly around the top of Ithaca and down the east coast of the island to ‘Big’ Vathy.

As you enter into the bay of Vathy, there is an Islet called Lazareto with a small 17th century chapel. Since 1560, the islet served as a 40 day quarantine station for ships entering the harbour, later the island was used as a prison.

We dropped our anchor in the deep natural harbour which would give us good protection from a southerly wind. It was very quiet in the bay, when we arrived there were only two other boats anchored so we picked our space in the centre with enough room to let out plenty of chain.

Vathy was devastated by the 1953 earthquake which left only a few buildings standing. Gradually, the town was rebuilt in the original Venetian style. The picturesque town is the capital of the island with colourful houses, red terracotta tiled roofs and sloping green hills. The bay is busy with many traditional restaurants, fish tavernas, cafes, bakeries and souvenir shops. A law was passed in 1978 protecting the architecture of the town, ensuring that the style and colour of all repairs and new constructions are preserved.

We planned to stay here a few days but the following day the forecast suddenly changed and stormy weather was on its way bringing heavy rain and up to 40 kt winds. We considered our options to move but decided to stay as there would be good protection from the expected mainly southerly winds. The only problem was that everyone else also decided that it was a good anchorage and as the clouds descended upon us, more boats arrived. By the evening, at least another 50 boats arrived at anchor, plus approximately 50 more around the harbour wall, so we didn’t have quite so much space after all, and had to take in a few meters of chain as other boats were anchoring all around us.

The storm hit in the evening with a great thunder and lightening show and plenty of heavy rain, at least Ziggy got a good wash. Thankfully the forecasted 40 kt winds didn’t arrive and it only got up to the low 20’s but a couple of boats were quite close so Paul stayed on watch for half of the night until it calmed down a bit. We are where the white dot is on this map and dark red indicates 40+ kt forecasted winds.

We were also keeping a close watch on our anchor and very relieved that it held fast throughout the storm. This map has tracked our movements in relation to the anchor and sounds an alarm if we drag outside of the green area.

The next day the sun was out but more storms were coming and the wind was due to come from the north now which would blow straight into Vathy. Most boats were starting to leave.

It looked to be slightly more settled further North so we decided to go back up to Vlicho which is well protected and has much more space, therefore hopefully, not the worry of boats colliding. The journey North was quite choppy and there were some black clouds over the mountains when we arrived, it didn’t look like the day trip boats were going out as we passed Nidri. Probably to the relief of their customers.

Eventually there was a blue sky and some interesting white fluffy clouds. It is a popular place to go for protection from storms and when we arrived, there were a couple of boats in the bay that we knew, so a few days of socialising were in order before we make plans to check out of Greece.