South to North

Have I mentioned our route changed and we are no longer staying in the South Ionian?

Thought so. Well today we headed off up north.

We were up at 6am, sitting on the deck with a cuppa. We seem to be the only people who are up and about early. There was no briefing this morning as we did that last night and we’re all under instructions to be away by 9am.

We picked up our croissants and water and enquired about breakfast, nope, they don’t start till 8.30am and we don’t have time. I grabbed some pots of Greek yogurt and quickly ate some with a peach before we set sail.

Henry, our skipper, was back on board today as he needed to get us up through the Lefkas canal and into the North Ionian Sea.

Everyone is going to motor to the canal bridge to make sure they get there. Apparently the bridge is only lifted once an hour (if you’re lucky) on the hour, and you only get 10 minutes before they close it again.

The trip up through the south to the canal was stunningly beautiful. So calm, the sun was shining and I loved that we all headed up there together.

We were all challenged to wear fancy dress as we went through the canal, luckily Colin had his glasses and Hawaiian shirt to wear. I opted for a a tea towel as a hat. Yep, silly I know but you should have seen some of the others 🙂

We all arrived at the canal together with 10 minutes to spare, through the bridge and out into the Northern Ionian Sea.

As soon as we sailed through the bridge the wind and choppy seas hit us, no more mill pond we’d just experienced for 2 hours. This was the start of our 4 1/2 hour sail to Ligia. And what a sail it was.

The boat was tilted over to one side (don’t know the official name for this) and I was scared. It felt like the boat was going to tip over. Henry and Colin weren’t fazed at all.

I decided we should eat. We had croissants, cheese and tomato but I needed to put the ingredients together. So off I went down stairs. Only to appear 5 minutes later feeling really sick with a sea sickness tablet in hand. I announced “there’s food downstairs but you will have to make it yourself” There was no way I was going back down there in the rough seas.

They both opted to eat leftover baguette from yesterday and some crisps.

It took more than and hour for my sickness to subside but luckily survived the rest of the journey.

We made it to Ligia where we had to wait outside the harbour to be guided in my Benjo off the lead boat. It’s a really narrow entrance with hazards both sides. Safely in and docked as a harbour I was relieved that day of sailing was done. 6 1/2 hours non stop was hard going but at least now we are much further up North.

Ligia is a pretty little fishing village with a taverna, showers (check out the pic) and free water. Yes, free water, you soon get excited about these things when you’re sailing. Wasn’t so excited about the showers though, people were liking them to air raid shelters, something off of M.A.S.H or decontamination chambers.

Before my shower I ventured out on my paddle board, sitting down, not sure if I’m ready to stand just yet.

Showered and dressed we set off across all the boats (they are all lined up together in a raft formation) and headed to dinner. We enjoyed some calamari, sardines, Greek salad and chips, yum.