Khania, Crete

Pyxis
Karen & Richard
Sun 27 Jun 2010 22:58

Sunday 27th June – Khania, Crete

35:31.123N 24:01.153E

 

This morning, our Corsican neighbours departed.  Sadly, late morning, a large motor boat, 20m+, came into the harbour and was instructed to berth stern-to next to us where they had been.  This would not have been too bad, as he was on the windward side and could provide shelter for us, however, the skipper managed to lay his two anchors in totally the wrong place so that he was askew rather than straight, with the anchors providing no support to the prevailing west wind and pulling him down onto us.  Unfortunately, the anchor chains were also laid across the mooring lines of about three boats – we had to ease the lines on Pyxis to let our bow up out of the water where she was being dragged down.

 

All the yachties gathered to watch, one brought out by the reverberation on the quayside when for some reason the skipper revved back too quickly and hit the wall quite hard.  We all agreed that the skipper was an idiot.  They were all relieved it was us and not them beside him, though recognised that their own boats were in danger if there was a problem.  I expressed our concerns to the port manager, Thassos, and a chap on the quay claiming to be a ‘friend’ of the skipper.  The ‘friend’ told me that the skipper was rich but not very good at driving the boat.  Thassos fussed and made him pick up additional yacht mooring lines to hold him off us.  It was ‘catch22’ – once he was in we didn’t want him moving again as the wind was building and if he tried to go out to reset his anchors he would definitely be blown down onto us.  Fortunately the wind took pity and eased for the rest of the day.

 

This afternoon the skipper of the ‘pirate’ tripper boat came by and said hello.  He had been skippering a larger boat they have as they had had a large wedding party chartering it for the day; he was on his way to bring the smaller ‘pirate’ boat out for the sunset cruise they run each evening.  He invited us to join him as his guests so we showered and went round to join him.  It was good to see a busy ship and as we set sail, he let me have a go at steering as we made our way out of the harbour and sent a crewman to pour us a glass of wine.  I was a bit nervous, partly because I couldn’t see over the decks, so I gave the controls back before we got far.

 

As we were his guests, I tried to make myself useful and went around to the couples and families and took pictures of them with their cameras – pleased to say they were all appreciative so I felt I’d done my bit.

 

It was a lovely evening and we insisted that he come round for a drink before going home.  He popped by for a beer and we chatted for ages.

 

Khania

© Pyxis 2010