Seasons changing and disaster strikes !!!

Despite the fact that we were still enjoying beautiful weather Susan and I had detected a definite changing of the weather. Nights were cooler, not cold, but we would now have a sheet over us as opposed to nothing at all. Mornings were not hot initially, it would take longer for the sun to really warm things up. We were weather watching as usual and saw some big southerlies predicted on Poseidon and meteo.gr. We were in Vliho to go the the Paliokatouna Palladium with Dave n Sue and Pete n Lyn ( and Pups the dog-well, more like a wolf really ). We dinghied ashore and walked up into the hills for a night of hilarity then 30 minutes walk back down again. Next day we visited the famous Vliho Yacht Club then visited John and Aiveen on Cool Runnings. They told us they had decided to put the boat up for sale. Their Peleponesse experiences had literally 'knocked the wind out of their sails' when they had to be rescued by the coastguards after their engine died in a F7. What a shame things hadn't worked out for them. With the big southerlies due soon we decided that Vliho was not the place to stay and picked Ormos Kapali on the north of Meganissi to hole up. It's north facing so hopefully the wind would over the top of us. We picked our spot, dropped 40 metres of chain on the bow anchor, then took two long lines ashore and tied them to trees. There was a Moody next to us but when the couple came back from shopping, I think, on seeing us, decided to move. " Lets go back to Vliho" I heard the lady say, so the lifted their anchor, slipped the long lines and left. We had a fantastic swim that afternoon and used our newly acquired suction grip on the side of the boat so I could hang on with one hand and clean below the water with the other. That evening the wind started to build so we decided to put a kedge anchor out. This is a secondary anchor that we put out at right angles to our port side and attached it to our bow cleat. This was to stop and wind whipping around the small headland on our port side pushing the port bow and putting the bow anchor under pressure. That night we went to bed at 10pm but were up at 01.15am. The lightening show was incredible, so bright that Susan had her sunglasses on. The thunder was deafening, The rain was hammering down and the wind was well cranked up, from the south, then north, then west, then south, yes it was like a vortex. An italian boat that was free swinging on anchor was pirouetting in the bay. We went back to bed at 4am. By 0800am things had calmed down a little but the rain was still chucking down. We spent the day reading, playing scrabble and dozing. We were sure it wasn't over yet. In the afternoon the wind started building again, swirling from all directions again.By late afternoon it was F6/F7 and the sea outside the bay was lively. A catamaran came up the bay frantically looking for shelter. They dropped two anchors but could not get them to bite into the seabed and ended up giving up and left. We noticed an increase in the water level in the bay and the barometer had dropped six points, sign of big winds. So we waited. But the really big winds didn't arrive. It blew to about 25kns and the thunder and lightening returned as it got dark with the reain still giving it what for, but we held fine. Morning came, and with it calm in the bay. We were going to go to Sivoat for another minor job to be done but wondered if it would be full of boats sheltering. The alternative was to pop into Vliho. I rang Simon in Sivota and asked him what the situation was. "Don't go into Vliho mate, its chaos. They got hit with a tornado last night, its carnage. At least one dead and dozens of boats wrecked". This hit us like a thunderbolt, we had friends in there, Cool Runnings, Huit Huit, Lillybelle and probably others. We got sorted and set off for Sivota feeling stunned by the news. En route a text from Rampage came through. HEARD OF STORM IN VLIHO, R U OK .  Blimey, the news had got to the Aegean already. We text back that we were fine and arrived at Sivota by midday. We rang John of Cool Runnings. " Are you OK mate". "What do you think" he replied " it got us good and proper ". What a kick in the teeth, they had just put the boat up for sale and it had been damaged in the storm, but at least they were OK, physically anyway. Their nerves must be in shreds. We were told that a video of the night was already on Youtube, it made very sombre viewing. http://mylefkada.gr/eidhseis/nea/6435-vlyxo.html
That evening we met Maggie n Bruce ( razzle Dazzle ). They had been in Vliho. Their boat had been knocked flat in the water and the main sail literally ripped off it. Maggie was nursing a badly bruised arm, shoulder and ribs. We went to Yannas for dinner and drank copious amounts of wine, then ouzo. What a good call the move to Meganissi was !!

Back home in the Ionian islands

One night in Zackynthos was all we planned and one was enough. We moved north to Big Vathi on Ithica for three nights. One night at anchor in Ormos Aetou outside of Vathi then two nights on anchor in the harbour itself. After dropping the anchor and settling in we promptly got asked by a messenger of the port police ( they haven't got a boat or cannot afford to run one so they send messages with locals in RIBs ) to move further up the harbour as a big ship was coming in. We obliged begrudgingly, bloody nerve !! Later that afternoon a huge and very beautiful sailing yacht morred stern to onto the fuel pontoon. Very unusual, we never seen that before. It was Spanish flagged and had lots of uniformed crew. It drew a lot of attention and a small crowd formed at the fuel berth, but were kept at a distance by men in plain clothes. We formed the opinion that it was the King of Spain. He is married to a greek lady and is fond of sailing apparently, and an old fella from the yacht went past us very sedately on his SeaDo with an old bird on the back and Susan says it looked like him. So thats it, it was the King of Spain and his woman. After that excitement we had to leave, we couldn't take any more. We headed for Sivota ( again ) and the delights of Yannas restaurant. We needed the fuel injectors testing as they were seeping fuel and the gasket on the sender unit in the fuel tank was also seeping after being replaced following the fuel filtering escapade. The injectors were sent to Levkas for testing and found to be fine so they were put back in. No diesel leaking...hurrah !! The gasket however was still seeping slightly so a new one was ordered. So now we felt like we were back home in the ionian islands after our trip to the gulf and peleponesse, so we just cruised and pottered and bay hopped. Dave n Sue of Scath came back out from old blighty and we joined up again. Beach BBQs, swimming, snorkelling, just chilling out !!.
Brian, me old mucker from work, and his beloved, Rachel joined us in early September. We got on the Neilson pontoon in Nidri to prepare for their arrival. They had booked an apartment on Nidri waterfront ( where Gordon n Pat stayed ). The first night they stayed in it and appeared the next morning for brekky covered in red lumps where the mossies had enjoyed a blood letting during the night. Oh dear, they'd left the windows open during the night and the mossies had accepted the invite. Anyway, that didn't spoil things, we had a cracking week with them on board. The weather was ace and we took them around some of our fave places. Sivota ( again ), Kalamos,  Abelike Bay, Spartachori then back to Vliho. We hope they enjoyed it, I'm sure they did.