Thursday 20^th May – Póros – Ídhra (Hydra)

37:21.055N 23:27.949E

This morning we had a leisurely breakfast and watched the charter fleets depart.  After catching up on some admin, we decided to move on ourselves and check out a popular tourist destination – Ídhra, the long narrow island just off the Peloponnese coast, 12 miles or so from Póros.

We set sail around lunchtime, leaving Pam and Andy on Grand Slam to spend another day in Póros, and left via the narrow Póros Strait separating the island from the mainland.  It shallowed to around 4.5m as we went through the strait but then we were fine.  At the corner we cut between the two islands of Spathí and Skilli before crossing Kólpas Ídhras to Ídhra.  We had wind on the nose for the first half of the short trip but once we turned the corner we had a great sail as the wind came on to the beam and we clipped on down to Ídhra.

We took the sails down a short way from the harbour and motored in to see what was available.  We had heard that this is a busy spot in high season and were hoping for better luck slightly out of season.  We spotted a gap and went for it – the last in the harbour on the north side.

As I reversed in between a 60 ft Greek flagged boat and a 45 ft French flagged boat, the guys from the Greek boat came to help – perhaps because I had started heading for them.  We were very pleased to have their help to take our ropes as, when I came in between the boats, I spotted a very large, rusty chain coming from the harbour wall into the water and had to get close to their boat to avoid getting the rudder snagged on it (we later discovered it went across to the supply ferry berthed on the other side of the harbour); in addition there was quite a lot of ballasting (rocks) stopping us getting too close to the wall, and also the mooring rings were very difficult to get to being 3ft below the harbour wall L 

We made it in fine but had to stay close to the Greek boat and about 2m from the harbour wall to avoid the rocks and the chain.  Suffice to say, it’s not a good spot.  We had to get our long ladder out to get ashore.

We have berthed here on the north side as we are expecting strong north-westerly winds over night. Sadly, we have experienced a southerly F4-5 all afternoon and been anxious about how tenable our position is as Richard realised that due to the almost claustrophobic nature of the harbour, we have only been able to set about 20 metres of chain.

Not long after our arrival, things got a little more exciting.  Whilst the F5 was blowing through, a Swedish yacht arrived, circled looking for a space, and then tried to take the spot of a yacht just leaving but got far too close to it.  Unfortunately he was being blown down and got far too close to the French yacht beside us and snagged its anchor chain with his rudder.  I called, in French, to the skipper and he leapt forward to drop his chain to let the Swedish yacht go.  The yacht was then being swept towards our chain as he reversed clear, however, instead of going forward over the now lowered chain he hit reverse hard to avoid us and swept past the Greek boat at high speed.  Fortunately he just missed us - we were now relieved to have only a short scope of chain out. However, with the Greek boat being quite a bit bigger than us and with a large scope of chain out, needless to say, the Swedish yacht took its anchor chain with it.  Luckily the chain jumped off its windlass and went free flow so didn’t dislodge the anchor, but things were not good. 

Up until now we thought that it was only the Greek couple on board who had helped with our lines, however, now about six people leapt on deck shouting English obscenities at the Swedish boat – it turned out there were a party of Americans on board.  The Swedish boat left shortly afterwards and another arriving yacht took the single space.

After the excitement, we took time off from boat stress and went to look in town.  It is such a beautiful setting, and the scenery around the town is lovely, but more fabricated than historic.  The history in not as ancient as most of Greece and derives from the 19^th century; the next phase of development appears to have been the establishment of a tourist industry.  Another feature of the island is that there are no cars here, only donkeys or mules.

Early this evening a very friendly guy representing the port police, but more of a liaison officer for the island, popped around to give us all the information we needed for our stay on the island, where the port police office is, where the rubbish bins are and when you are allowed to put stuff in them (really!).  Richard went off to complete the necessary formalities with the Port Police whilst I cooked dinner.

Tonight, I am now worried that our anchor may be caught on the ferry chain given it goes all the way across to the other side of the harbour.  We may be staying here longer than the hoped for one night!  We will find out in the morning.

Ídhra

© Pyxis 2010