Steady Passage Towards Crete
Flyer of Lorne
Dave Sturrock
Sun 14 Jun 2009 13:54
Wednesday 03 June, Days Run 140NM
We departed Grand Harbour Marina at 10:00 and made our way to the floating fuel ship some 2 NM outside the main harbour at Misida. After parting with some 200Euros we were on our way at 10:30 and soon has full sail hoisted in the NW'ly F4.
I had planned our departure for 18:00hrs on Tuesday but after a day of fixing our long list of faults, we were unable to get the domestic freshwater pump back in service. I had managed to get the services of local marine electrician "James" who manged to repair the main VHF but not the cockpit instruments. I had thought the water pump fault was just poor connections but the pressure switch had failed. We took the old unit of the original pump which we had kept onboard for spares, guess what. That switch was also out of service. It was too late in the day to get a replacement so we agreed to start again at 08:00 in the morning. No-one was complaining about another run ashore to catch up on our sleep. There were many good restaurants nearby where the old harbour stone store rooms had been converted to good effect. It also gave us a chance to visit some of Richard's favourite watering holes in San Julianne! The only drawback to this excellent marina was the cost which was 80euros per night! Everyone was very helpful and there was an excellent arrangement with on eof the local supermarkets, we called them and they came to the marina picked up Zoe & Mick and returned them with our stores for no delivery charge.
We continued sailing at a steady 7knots on a course of 80degrees until the breeze fell light at 21:00hrs and we reverted to the environmentaly unfriendly option of the diesel ( Chieffy's Friend). We did manage a few hours sailing overnight and even had the gennaker hoisted again at daylight. What breeze there was had backed to the SW and was mainly F3.
Thursday 04 June, Days Run 146NM VMG 141NM
We continued motoring throughout this period only doing some motor sailing from 03:00 on Thursday and then finally a steady F4 NW'ly once again allowed Flyer to make 6knots under sail once again from 06:00. We neede to maintain a 6knot average as we had 600NM to run to Kos and we all needed to fly back to the UK on Monday 08 June.
DS