Katakolon the scarey bits.  (Good job you didn’t come this week Linda)
 
Now anyone who sails will tell you that getting a weather forecast is quite important when sailing. We spend a great deal of time getting forecasts, getting them is fine, them being accurate is often too much to hope for. We set off for Katakolon on Monday because the forecast said all was to be hunky dorey. Linda it was blue skies with a smattering of ‘Simpsons’ style clouds. Had a good sail there went along side (remember what happened last time). Sea dog brought us in this time and all went well. We thought we were nicely tucked up. Later that day we got a call from our friends who are also ‘sailing the dream’ to say that word on the water was that there was some really bad weather coming. Well it arrived that night, bad weather we could cope with (just about) what we hadn’t banked on was the arrival of two cruise liners into Katakolon at about 7.00am, early by anyones standards, down right rude by ours. The arrival of said liners caused an awful swell that resulted in us and the other boats who were along side scraping up and down the quay, fenders were being popped up onto the quay. It is the most awful feeling, trying to fend off your boat from the quay, if at the end of the day it is going to scrape or end up on the quay there is really nothing you can do about it other than move. Mother nature can be very forceful when she puts her mind to it. Captain Miles then uttered the words I always dread in these situations ‘we’re moving’. We really had no other choice. Sea dog and I did a quick recky and found what we thought would be a suitable spot to attempt a stern to. So we upped ropes and moved to a different part of the quay. Now in the pilot book (our bible) Katakolon gets an ‘A’ for shelter if the wind is coming from the North, which it generally does, but for some reason Mother nature thought she’d have a bit of fun with us and blew from the South! We managed to moor up and Captain Miles decided that the situation warranted 2 anchors being put out. So remember that dinghy that was stowed away, out it came again. Captain M had to row out against the wind and waves to drop the second anchor which he did successfully. We then basically attached all the ropes we had to try and keep us from moving, whilst the Southerly wind howled down on us. Most of the boats that had been on the quay had moved (one had been damaged) and anchored in the middle of the harbour. That is all except the Americans, they spent the day on the quay fending off their boat, keeping their fingers crossed, they even put their dinghy between the quay and the boat to act as a giant fender! Eventually it got soooo bad that even they had to move and anchor in the middle with the other boats. We spent 3 nights in Katakolon and they were all pretty sleepless due to high winds and storms (in between glorious bouts of sunshine during the day).Then each time a cruise liner arrived a huge swell would start up. At least 2 turned up each day to offload tourists to go to Olympia. After the the 3rd sleepless night we decided we could take no more, stress levels were high. We decided to leave the next day and take our chances, getting all the lines off and the two anchors up was a feat in itself and took probably over an hour. Captain Miles had to pull up one of the anchors by hand (my hero). Trouble is he’d done such a good job of laying them, they didn’t want to come up. Eventually we set off and despite a few lumps and bumps just outside the breakwater and the negotiation of getting by the cruise liners, we had a good sail back to Zante, Sea dog is booked on a flight home on Sunday from the island, so we find ourselves returning once again to the bustle of Zante town. Sleepless on Stella Maris XXX
Friday, 29 September 2006