Graptolite - Sublime to Ridiculous on the Attic Coast
Graptolite's Sailing Log
Martyn Pickup & Heike Richter
Mon 13 Sep 2010 21:53
Last Wednesday I came back from a week in cold and rainy Berlin to sunny
Santorini. On Saturday evening H also turned up and we had a splendid sunset
cruise through the Santorini caldera on our way to an overnight anchorage on
the island of Ios.
It was a bible-black, moonless night on the approach to Ios but the guide
showed a good protected anchorage at a bay called Manganari. We couldn't see
a thing in the darkness but the charts, radar and depth all looked good and
the plan was to drop anchor a few hundred metres out in the bay to be on the
safe side. No worries. Heike went to the bow to keep an eye out for any
unlit boats but then gave a strangled squawk as a tall rock swept down our
port-side only faintly lit by our red navigation light. It seemed like
minutes but was probably microseconds before there was a very loud bang and
we went from flank speed to zero with an instant realisation that the chart
was not just a little out. It was very, very wrong.
Fully expecting to be soon swimming for the beach, we dashed about the boat
looking for holes but all seemed OK. Back-tracking we dropped anchor further
out and shaken and stirred, felt a strong need for some medicinal ouzo. A
daylight underwater inspection showed no big damage apart from the rudder
being a little shorter than it used to be. It was a lucky escape although
the next lift-out will be expensive.
The next port planned was Piraeus but it needed an overnight Sunday passage
through the northern Cyclades to get there so that Heike could get to Athens
airport. After dodging many high-speed ferries during the night, we
approached Piraeus at first light this morning. Zea Marina, once filled with
oared-galleys turns out to be the type of marina now mostly full of big
Sunseeker gin palaces. There are also a few boats sunk at their berths,
likely waiting on insurance money. Not us though.
M