Back in Bristol – again – for a lovely few days with Fay who's broken up for the summer from her nursing degree.
Before our summer odyssey aboard Deep Blue – to brave the more desolate part of the southern Aegean: Marmaris, top right, to Crete, bottom left – 180 miles in some pretty serious wind! Our route shown in red.
From Rhodes, we return to Simi: at Panormitis, the exact same place David dislodged his hip on board 2 years ago! All was fine this time.
A long (60nm) tack down to Karpathos, a windswept, rather isolated place, with a lot of beauty, local talent and friendly, colourful people.
After 50+ miles with F5-6, the very high ridge running N-S made for some wicked gale force gusts as we approached Dhiafani harbour (Deep Blue at centre).
We were here also for the high walking – Olymbos perches on the ridge at the north...
Not a hospitable western coast!
Many older women still wear distinctive traditional dress; not just for the tourists (of which there were very few).
Olymbos perched up high against medieval pirate attack. We walked east and upwards to the practically ghost town of Avlona...
...where this charming and friendly restaurateur broke off from preparing for a large party to serve us a delicious, completely homemade meal: bread, artichoke omelette (his own chickens) with fresh herbs, and his own (deliciously mild) goat’s cheese. He gave us some
It still continued to blow back in Dhiafani where the locals where friendly and generous to the only visiting yacht.
Local artists depict current and past scenes of the island supporting itself...
...but there is sadness ... for men departed to the USA to make money there (mostly Baltimore and New York)...
... leaving families behind in an unsustainable island lifestyle. Fortunately the men return, older with decent nest eggs to keep the place looking very respectable and not desolate or run down at all.
After 3 nights on Karpathos, a gap in the winds allows us to sail the 70 miles South then SW to our destination – Crete and the ancient Minoan city/port of Zakros – I especially wanted to see the summer palace complex. The Minoans civilization was snuffed out in 1450BC, most likely by the vast explosion of nearby Santorini (see blog last year!).
The summer palace is very close to the spectacular, macabrely named Dead’s Gorge.
So here we sit, enjoying very friendly and good value local produce from our first Cretans, with the wind blasting over the steep hill to the northwest, gusting over 40kts. Ahh!! The “Meltemi”... NOW we really know why the Greeks and Romans banned commercial shipping crossing the Aegean in July and August... we’re running out of stuff – day 3 at anchor!
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