We have now entered the Ionian Sea after 1270 miles. We have about 120 miles to go to our marina in Corfu and have a week to do it in so we should make it! On our journey we have seen more dolphins than we have seen other cruising yachts or motor cruisers, having seen another school of dolphins yesterday and only a couple of yachts. We have seen plenty of fishing boats, having to dodge them from time to time, a few ferries, some sword fish boats fishing at high speed with two men at the top of a high mast and two suspended a long way in front of the boat, and a few tuna nets which can be several miles long. You have to wonder where all the cruising boats are. Andreu says that they are all in marinas not being used apart from an occasional trip out for the afternoon.
We had expected, from reading the Pilot Books which are absolutely invaluable, that the marinas would not be very good in Italy and fuel difficult to get, but although you might say that they are more primitive than those in France and Spain they have been very friendly, easy to use, and apart from the one occasion Ann has mentioned, fuel has been easy to get. We only have one more Italian port to go before we reach Corfu.
Silueta continues to perform very well. I continue to top up with a little oil at each stop but so far no coolant has been needed. We did have a little trouble with the autohelm yesterday but after a few discussions with Andreu – thank you again Andreu – we think we have solved it but we won`t know until we next put to sea. We had some very rough sea coming in for the last hour before entering the Straits of Sicily, although Ann said it wasn`t too bad, but slowing down to 10 knots helped a lot, but apart from that the sea states have been very good. We are lucky to have time enough to stay in port if the forecasts are poor. Having reached the Ionian, the Pilot book tells us to expect calm mornings with the wind getting up in the afternoon, so we woke up this morning with a lot of wind and the Greek Navtex forecast telling us to expect force 5 and 6 winds! We are well protected in this lovely harbour and I have bought fresh prawns, squid and mussels for a paella tonight, so we don`t mind staying here until it blows over. As far as we can see we are the only British people in the whole of Crotone, the town we are in, which will not be the case in Corfu.
It is sunny and warm, apart from the wind, but we still seem to be having a funny weather for this part of the world and when we went out last night the Italians were in their winter clothes – I was wearing shorts and a tee-shirt – and it rained hard for a while.
So much for global warming!
We have tonight walked through Crotone which unexpectedly is an absolutely delightful town full of happy Italians in their stylish clothes walking through the streets with stylish shops, old walls and a beautifully presented museum showing artefacts from 5000 BC when this was a major in ancient Greek civilisation. They all seemed to be locals and it may be explained by the fact that they all live in apartments and come out in the evenings to take a stroll and meet their friends.
The fish shops were so lovely that we bought some clams and more squid. I have never seen so many fish shops displaying such fresh fish.
