13/04/24 Temperature 25’c - 30+’c during the day. Don’t know what the sea temp is, but it is refreshing.

We are supposed to be launched on Monday (it’s Saturday today) we have lost sight of the sea when a yacht was lifted out of the water two days ago! But, I suppose, in true greek fashion, the first we will know about moving is when the chocks start to be removed from the hull!! So, with that in mind, we are still working towards Monday to get afloat. The eTepai has been paid for the next 3 months, the charts and chart plotter have been updated and we have enough cash to pay Petros, once he pulls out all the stops i.e. moves a lot of boats around, to get us in the water. A yacht two boats behind us also wants to go in on Monday, but I don’t hold out much chance of that happening at the moment.

After a very tense week and emails flying backwards and forwards between brokers, shipping agents and the seller, our new crew member finally arrived yesterday. Rather a shame that it took so long, again, for customs to release her. We could have got her installed by now if we had her on the 4th April when she arrived in Greece. She doesn’t need food or drink or a bunk and will work her socks off 24/7 for weeks on end in almost all weather conditions not using any power, only the wind. Welcome to “Brizo” named after a Greek goddess of sailors and the oceans and an interpreter of dreams. Not that we will leave her completely alone while we sleep on passage, but she will do the hard work of concentrating on the steering during long watches. 

“Brizo”, our Hydrovane, in many boxes. Now all we have to do is installer her on the transom, that means cutting holes in our lovely boat:(

One silver lining is that while we waited for Brizo to arrive, Chris has made excellent progress on replacing some of the old teak deck with Iroko and hopefully, in the process, stopping some of the water leaking into the deck balsa core. Just one of the many jobs that have been on the go while Greek customs worked at glacial speed.

So, hopefully, the next blog will be when we are at sea again enjoying our last 6 months in Greece.