May 4th and at 10.30 am I'm at position 38°41.4 - 20°42.1 we pulled up our anchor to start our real season of sailing. Our destination was a Abeleki Bay on the island of Meganisi 30°39.9 - 20°47.3. Well sail is not quite right, we motored.
Blue skies and sea, just a hint of breeze and we made our way out of Vlyho bay and towards our first real anchorage.
As we drifted into Abeliki bay there were just a few boats at anchor and three boats tied ‘stern too’ to the shore. These three had obviously made camp here, one even had what looked like a make shift conservatory on the fore deck and a bee hive on shore. I did wonder if it was illegal plants they were growing but as nothing other than sun power was used i decided it was probably tomatoes or something similar.
Of course a walk and rekey was on the agenda and we set off in a shower of rain. Up hill, down hill, up hill and down till we reached another inlet called Vathey.
Charter boats tied up to the local quay were fendered off amongst local fishing boats draped in nets, buckets, plastic boxes and other fishy stuff.
Neat piles of red fishing nets sat on the pavement while small shops selling everything from sun hats, to reading glasses, aubergines and oranges.
Little tavernas with their sun bleached chairs and bright blue table clothes dappled by the overhanging plants spilled out along the water’s edge.
Every shade of blue through to turquoise sums up Greece. Sky, sea, wooden window shutters left to weather in the sun, fishing boats whose reflection is almost mirrored in the still waters sea.Painted terracotta pots full of geraniums and trees with their white painted trunks to stop insects devouring their fruit. Blue and it’s many Mediterranean shades has become my favourite colour.
There are interesting and beautiful caves, Papanikolis is one of them, named after a submarine that sheltered there during World War II.
The sea here is amazingly clear and you can see clear to the bottom, small shoals of different fish dart around causing a swirling mass in the water. Today we have a sort of ring tailed bream and another stripy one with a forked tail sheltering under the hull of the boat.
By the time we returned to our boat via the hills I was ready to collapse and by 9.30 ready for bed. Being a night owl this is very unusual for me and I put it down to sun and hill climbs and the fact i no longer have Porto on my doorstep.
Painting is one of our must do’s this year, so having selected a subject i set too. I’ve been procrastinating, i pull out all my painting gear and set up then think, hmmmm I’ll just have a cuppa.
Now sat in front of a blank piece of A3 paper hmmm, now how should I tackle the subject, perhaps i should lie in the sun for a while and think about it. Two hours later and a rather red face and a few other red bits i sit down mask of my paper, pick up my pencil and at last start drawing. Why is it so scary making that first stroke of a pen?
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