37:22.90N 23:14.00E
Muskrat
Chris and Alison
Thu 27 Apr 2023 19:10
23/04/23
We left Porto Kheli at 0943 intending to sail if we could but typically there was no wind and Chris wanted to try the water maker after the winter layup and this needs the engine to run. It was a lovely sunny day so motoring was not an issue across a mill pond of a sea. We arrived in Ormos Kapari at 1212 and anchored in 4m water with 23m chain. A very quiet bay just a short distance from Ermnioni town quay.
Our intention was to stop here for a couple of nights and then move on but unfortunately, or fortunately depending how you look at it, my antibiotics had got up to therapeutic levels leaving me feeling dizzy, headachy, sick and generally unwell. So a relaxing couple of days were penned in while the antibiotics did their thing and hopefully started to fight the infection in my arm that was now even more swollen and painful.
With a cleaned spark plug, the outboard engine was working again so going ashore was not a problem and it was only a short walk to the town. There is also a lovely walk around the peninsula that we had walked last year while staying overnight to catch the early morning ferry the next day before coming home. Doing this again in the spring was a very different walk with the spring flowers out and the smell of wild herbs.
During our enforced stay, we played around making a rain catcher to catch extra water for showering and washing clothes. Having a water maker is very handy but it needs the engine to be running, so any extra water we can get is very helpful. Added to that the Greek mains water is very salty (they buy bottled water to drink) so clothes never feel fresh and clean or completely dry because of the salt. We had an idea that when we were at anchor we could rig up a system to catch rain water and top up our supplies so we played around with a few ideas. The prototype worked, we think but typically after a few days of some heavy rain, we didn’t get much to prove the system. The forecasted thunder, lightning and heavy rain turned out to be a brief shower but what did fall got trapped in our new system, so with a few alterations we now have a system to supplement our water, if it rains of course.
27/04/23
Last day of antibiotics and feeling somewhat better, although my arm was still stubbornly swollen and painful, we decided to move onto Poros. We have anchored in the bay last year, briefly, while sheltering from strong winds but didn’t stop to look around the town, so, as we were on our way to Athens we decided to stop this time. We left Ormos Kapari at 0854 and had a cracking sail to Poros. The wind was anything between F1-5 during the passage but mainly from the north, slight sea and sunshine although there was a chilly breeze. We arrived at the narrow channel between Poros and the Peloponnese, where the channel is not only very narrow but also very shallow in places, so you have to pick your way through carefully minding the charter yachts stern mooring to the town side and laying their anchors right across the channel, the fast ferry going West to East down the channel and anything else that thinks it has the right of way and is not going to give you any room to keep your keel out of the mud. Today it was two charter catamarans that were both behind us at the start of the channel but who were determined to pass us in the narrow channel. We were travelling at the max speed limit of 4kts but they had other ideas and passed us, despite the fast ferry coming down the channel and another catamaran mooring on the corner of the quay so as to stick its stern out into the channel meaning we had to move out into the channel to get round him. They didn’t understand Chris’s sound signals!!!
The channel safely negotiated we dropped the anchor just off the beach in a lovely quiet bay away from the busy town but within walking distance to it.
Chris at his work bench - not like the one he has at home.
The prototype of the rain catcher - we are still waiting for some rain.
Sent from my iPad