No room at the inn.

Serafina
Rob & Sarah Bell
Thu 17 Sep 2009 05:01
36:34.0N 27.51.8E

Tuesday 15th September

Laundry day with the free electric and water! Also the excellent Wi-Fi
allowed lots of other work to be done too, so quite a dull day all round,
but lots achieved!

Wednesday 16th September

Well the day started badly with the German crew on the charter yacht next to
us getting up at 6.30 am and deciding that perhaps everyone in the marina
should share their enthusiasm. By 7.00 am they had their engine running hard
and eventually at 7.30 am they slipped their lines and left. Cue loud cheer
all round!

Seems to be some concern about the weather for the next few days, but
everything we have looked at shows a max of force 6 or 7 and always heading
the way were are going, so at 8.30 am we left Kos and set sail southwards
for Simi.

Spent the day sailing 50 miles in some very varied conditions. Lots of broad
reaching in 20 knots, gusting up to 33 knots and some sections of flat calm!
At one stage as we were doing 9 knots, we came across a whole squadron of
flying fish. They were wonderful with flashing blue metallic bodies and
frantic whirring wings as they skimmed along just above the waves. (Not too
sure about the collective noun really being a 'squadron' of flying fish, but
perhaps anyone who knows better can let me know...?)
Finally reached Simi and headed firstly into the harbour to see if there was
any room on the quay. Goodness me this is a beautiful little place but
packed with yachts with others circling looking for spaces. We spotted a
half chance next to an English yacht and despite the fierce cross wind and
the narrowness of the gap, we gave it a go. This was a mistake and it became
obvious rather late in the exercise that we just would not fit in the gap.
We had to abort the attempt and with our pride a little shaken, we opted for
our original 'Plan B' which was to head for one of the bays on the south end
of the island and drop an anchor. Wind was still gusting hard as we came
into Marathouda bay which is a lovely spot with a taverna at the head of the
bay and a few sun-loungers on the beach. We dropped anchor onto a sandy sea
bed and sat back to take a breather. Sarah had a swim out to the anchor and
all seemed OK, but shortly afterwards more very strong gusts swept through
and the anchor briefly dragged before resetting itself properly. The snag
was that this is a narrow bay and the new anchor position was leaving us too
close to one of the sides, so we re-anchored (giving Sarah her third
swimming opportunity to check the anchor - and yes she had already had her
shower rather rashly) and this time seemed to get a better set altogether.
Mind you at 8.00 pm the wind was still gusting up to 30 knots plus.