Finally we are on our sailingtrip around in the Med!
After one and a half year of planning, finally we were ready to go to the Mediterraine! We both have quit our jobs and we have rented out our house until 1.1.2024. After two years of covid, and this last winter with war between Russia and Ukraine we were not sure when we could go, but we had a plan to go 26. of June. When it became closer to departure date we got another problem. The technicians on the airports wanted to go ut in strike. So actually until the departure we did`nt know if the plane would be leaving.
We took the bus from Florø to Førde, and luckily, Asgeir, who will rent our house, had a trailer and helped us with all our luggage. From Førde we took a new bus to Oslo Airport Gardermoen. This was a luxurious bus, but it is still hard to sit in a bus for several hours. We arrived Gardermoen 5 in the morning and already the airport was full of passanger going on holiday. Our plane should`nt leave until 5 in the afternoon, so we had to wait there for a while.
Luckily some friends of us, Gerd and Jan Egil, lives not far away from Gardermoen and we could visit them for some hours. We took the train from Gardermoen to Lillestrøm where they picked us up.
They took us to Fetsund Lenser for a coffee brake with homemade cinemon rolls. It was a beautiful morning and something different from all the rain we had in Florø over the last months. (actually the two last days before we left Florø it was warm and sunny)
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A nice view over Glomma, Norways longest river.
After that they took us to their house and made a delicious lunch. It was so nice to visit them and they are very welcome to visit us on our sailboat. Thanks a lot Gerd and Jan Egil!
We got a message from Norwegian that the plane was a bit late but we had to meet at the airport at normal check in time. We already checked in that morning so we could go directly to the security control. I was a little bit afraid for that moment, because I had medisin for a year in my hand luggage. And I also had brown cheese and kaviar. They said nothing about the medisin, and the cheese was okay, but I could`nt take the kaviar with me. I am not sure what I could use that for at the plane.. So to all our future guests; please bring kaviar, but not in your hand luggage! 🙂
Only 30 minutes late we were ready for the trip to Greece!
We arrived Preveza airport, Greece, late in the evening, Astor picked up the rental car and had to go two trips from the airport to the marina. Luckily it was only 2 kilometers to go.
Monday we did some cleaning and put all our things into places (two weeks later we are not finished that project..) and Astor fixed the boat. Before antifouling he cleaned the boat outside. After a couple of hours of working we decided to go to a beach to cool down. It was around 30 degrees so it was hot… But actually it was not that colder in the ocean. Really nice temperature!
A beach in the bay of Vonitsa. (Unfortunatily a lot of names are only written in Greek on the maps… )
Weard crab!!
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After the beach we went to Vonitsa to to some grocery shopping. So much nice tomatoes!!
Cleopatra Marina
Monday evening and tuesday morning we finished the antifouling before the marina stuff picked us up
And pritty late… Astor should change the propeller and started that project when we stayed here in april. But the propeller was stuck on the shaft and after many attempts with heating and different tools the propeller come off and the new folding propeller came on only 10 minutes before our time for splashing.
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Preveza
Finally!! Everything went well and we could sail over to Preveza town from our marina Cleopatra. We took a small swimmingstop on the way.
Miriam and I went for some shopping while Astor did the paperwork. Unfortunately the office closed early so we had to come back the day after. So we needed to stay in Preveza for a night. We paid 16 eur to stay here.
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Homemade Greek food in the boat!
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Wednesday after Astor finished all the paperwork we started our sailing holiday
A beautiful sail.
Antipaxos
Our first stop was Antipaxos, a bay north on the island. There were many other boats, but we found a space, anchored and took a line ashore.
It was a beautiful evening and the water was so nice! But we forgot that after sunset the mosquito woke up… We tried to sit outside having dinner, but we had to run inside and Astor used the whole evening to kill them…
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In the morning we had a short swim before leaving this nice bay
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It was nice weather and perfect wind to try out our gennaker.
We sailed east to the mainland and had a short lunchstop in Sivota where we also had a short stop the last evening on our trip here in april. (more photoes from that evening you can find here
I wanted to have a nice photo, so I dressed up on the way
Corfu Town
We arrived Corfu town in the evening and Astor went to do the check out of Greece. We wanted to check out before 1th of July because if we stayed another couple of days we had to pay cruising tax for a whole month… , but after checking out we where told that we could have stayed until 3 of July without paying extra tax.
Miriam and I took the shopping tour as always. Corfu town is a really nice place to have a walk in the evening. I have been here once before, but I don`t remember anything at all..
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We hoped we could stay in the harbour, but they wanted 50 eur to let us stay there. With no electrisity or water… That is too expencive when you have a plan to sail around in the Med for a while
Of all things we bought fish in Preveza and after anchoring outside Corfu Town we had a nice fish meal.
Friday we sailed from Corfu to Sarande to check in to Albania. We had a short swimmingstop north at Corfu, before sailing to the mainland in Albania.
Sarande, Albania
Sarande was a nice place to stay, and they needed a night to fix all the paper. So went to the beach.
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This is a busy commercial port, you can see our sailboat here. We payed 13 eur + electricity and garbage. We had to go through the port entrance where they had all the traffic for Greece, so we needed to carry our passports in case they asked us.
In the evening we went to the city center to have dinner.
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Friday morning we did some grosery shopping before we left Sarande for this time.
If you ever come to Sarande to check in to Albania you go here. Call up the harbour master before entering.
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We could see a lot of old remnants of Albanys defense.
We found some delicious cherries – my favourite!
Palermo Bay, Albania
We sailed to Palermo Bay and anchored. This sail took only a few hours. The temperature in the sea here was amazing, aorund 30 degrees!
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It was some thunder in the afternoon, but still warm enough to do some water activities
After sunset the wind increased a lot and we decided to move the boat in to an old quay in the bay. There were a lot of cockroaches so we had to find a way to stop them coming onboard.
Cut a plasticbottle and use the bottom on the rope!
Sunday we wanted to check out the old fortress on the top of the peninsula. They say this was build buy Ali Pasha in the beginning of 19th century. If we checked out a little bit before walking there we would know that we had to pay for a ticket. Unfortunately we did`nt had money, and at least no cash, local money.
The sound from all the crickets we can here all over here. But it is not often you can see them
Palermos Bay with the Fortress on the top
Palmeros Bay from the air
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Sometimes you are on the right place at the right time. We saw something was going on and asked the people working there. They could tell us it would be “Miss Albania” this evening. To get in there is another story, but we could stay and it was fun, specially for Miriam.
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Follow us next week, continuing our travel in Albania and nightsailing to Croatia!
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