Team Sivota, Ελλας‚ 2004
"Where's Homer" Tour
Sponsored by Mythos


Getting there
SFO to London to Corfu
Day 1
Corfu to Mourtos-Sivota
Day 2
Mourtos to Gaios, Paxos
Day 3
Gaios to Port Spilia
Day 4
Port Spilia to St. Eufimia
Day 5
St. Eufimia to Nafpaktos
Day 6
Nafpaktos to Galaxidi
Day 7
Delphi tour
Day 8
Galaxidi to Corinth
Day 9
Corinth Canal to Hydra
Day 10
Hydra
Day 11
Hydra to Aegina
Day 12
Aegina to Athens
Epilog


Day 10 - Day in Hydra - Υδρα

Tuesday, October 5
Travel time
: 0, Distance: 0
A day in port

The Re-mooring Incident

Hydra Harbor

Day 10 started around 6:30 a.m. when Kelli and Kevin arose to return the dinghy to Butch. We needed to be up and ready when the regatta participants moored behind us were ready to depart. When Kevin arrived at Butch's boat, the crew of Polo III wasn't ready to go, and Kevin was glad that the loaner dink wasn't holding them up. Kevin and Butch stowed the dinghy and motor, and then Kevin went ashore for a morning coffee and to wait for us to move Didimos, or for the water taxi to start so he could return.

Meanwhile, the rest of our crew slowly crawled out of the sack. We went on deck to find the sun rising for a sunny day and the wind still blowing 20 knots with chop in the harbor. We anticipated an entertaining morning watching the fleet unmoor.
David Kory departing on Tonina

Since all of our buddy boats moored along the quay were going to depart, we decided that as soon as there was space, we would move our boat over to the quay and be out of the way of the regatta fleet. It would give us a great spot to watch the fun. Little did we know we would spend half the day getting ourselves moored again!

Around 7:45 or so, Butch pulled out, and soon a couple of other boats left the quay. We took that as our signal to relocate to the quay. We fired up and untied from the boats around us. We motored forward, but the wind helped us. Mike had to back down to not overrun the anchor. Mercifully, we did not have a crossed anchor.

With some maneuvering, Mike got the boat turned around and we started backing down into the space on the quay. Of course, the wind was an issue, though it was not a crosswind. Kelli dropped anchor with good scope and we backed into the space reasonably well. Kevin was ashore to catch our stern line, and with much rolling and scrambling, we picked our rings on the quay and got two lines on. Unfortunately, the anchor would not hold. Mike was holding us off the quay with the engine, and occasionally going into neutral while Kelli tried to take up the slack in the rode, but when we tested it with the engine, it dragged.
At this point, we are the 4th boat from the left on the quay

We gave up and Kevin boarded the boat. We pulled forward to retrieve the anchor and try again. Sometime during this evolution, another boat had come in and set their anchor over our rode. As we retrieved our anchor, it pulled up their chain. Kevin and Kelli were forward to straighten things out. During this process, the handle to our boat hook came off the shaft, and our boat hook departed our company. They got us off the offending anchor rode, but we were boat hook-less -- not a good way to be in the world of Med mooring

We gave up on that spot on the quay, and decided to try another spot with more scope. The backing was less than perfect, but adequate to get us lined up on the rode and backed into the space. Kevin and Mark got our dock lines ashore and secured us to the quay while we tried to ensure the anchor had set. This time, success!

We thought we had performed this particular mooring in the rolling chop and wind pretty well, given that the anchor didn't hold the first few times. We shut down the engine, and started to heave a mental sigh of relief. The loss of the boat hook wasn't particularly helpful, and we hoped we could find one somewhere in town.

While we were engaged in mooring, boats would occasionally depart, but by now the fleet was getting underway in earnest. About every other boat hooked an anchor rode, and went through the process of trying to free themselves. We got a very explicit lesson watching all this on the importance of an attentive helmsman. In our own fleet, we saw a boat depart from the quay and pick up an anchor chain. An inattentive helmsman then got his boat's keel hooked on yet another rode and was in a predicament with a captive boat blown onto boats still moored on the quay. In yet another instance, we saw a boat hook a rode, and we watched the helmsman leave his station to go forward to "help." Of course, the boat drifted downwind and into the large cargo boat.

The moral of the story was very clear to us. During an unmooring, the helmsman concentrates on steering the boat, monitors activity of other boats nearby, holds the boat in position for the anchor crew to work on the problem, remains aware of the other rodes in the water to avoid hooking bottom appendages to complicate the situation or damage the boat. The helmsman does not try to "help" the crew at the bow other than to keep the boat in position, or respond to requests from the bow crew to reposition the boat as necessary to effect the untangling. This reinforced the lesson of our own encounter between our rudder and the rode in Ag. Eufimia.

As the boats from the regatta untied, unmoored, and got underway one by one, we watched as they handled the crossed anchors with varying degrees of finesse. There was a race committee dink moving around the fleet helping out where it could. It had to retrieve one lost fender and return it to an unaware departing boat. Helping lift many pounds of anchor and/or chain is not really possible from the edge of a dinghy, but he did help direct traffic.
The cargo boat moored on the quay

We noticed another small, wooden boat helping out a blue yacht with a crossed anchor. As we watched that particular evolution, we realized that unfortunate's anchor was crossed by the cargo boat's very large rode. After much struggling it was quite apparent that the yacht's windlass was not going to raise the cargo boat's anchor, and could not get the chain up high enough to reach.

The small wooden boat belonged to a local fellow with a Greek fisherman's cap and a long, gray beard. Donning snorkel gear, he dove into the water. He went down to inspect the situation and came back up apparently asking for a line. He took the line back down, looped in around the big chain, and brought it back up. The crew on the yacht winched the cargo boat rode up enough for the diver to get their line free below. This episode took about a half-hour, so this yacht was a tad late getting out to the starting line.

After resting and enjoying the show for awhile, we noticed the boat unmooring that had been rafted on our portside the night before. At this point he was moored across from us, a point or so off our starboard bow. All went well as he untied and eased forward, raising his anchor. He pulled up an anchor chain.

One of our crew noticed that our anchor chain was vibrating. Oh, no!! He was pulling up our newly and nicely set anchor -- the one holding us off the quay in the strong breeze. Mike quickly got to the helm, started the engine and put it in forward gear at idle speed to keep us off the quay. Kelli and Kevin went forward to watch what happened, and work our rode. The other boat unhooked us, finished retrieving its anchor and departed.

Our crew tried to reset our anchor with the windlass, but of course, it would not set! After trying for several minutes, and praying that it would grab, the crew decided we had pulled in too much scope for this to work, and we had to redo the whole process.
Didimos finally safely moored.
We are the one with the blue
Moorings logo sail cover.

Most of the outer rows of boats along the jetty were gone, but the jetty itself was still mostly full. However, there was a little space between two boats, and Captain Kelli decided that we were going to squeeze into that spot. So we turned the boat around, got aligned, dropped anchor and backed into the wind. People came up on deck on both boats between which we were backing. One has to pay attention to all the activity in a situation like this! We were able to push the boats apart and squeeze in. The skipper of the boat to starboard was very concerned about a chain coming off the jetty underwater. It was in the middle of what should have been his spot between rings for stern lines. They had to reposition their boat.

View from our bow

Our anchor held well, but on this side of the harbor, it wasn't doing much work -- the stern lines were holding us and keeping us from being blown downwind out into the harbor. After a good twenty minutes getting the right lines onto the right rings, and resetting lines for the boats we had squeezed between, we finally shutdown the engine and declared victory (again.) We were on the right side of the harbor given the wind, and finally moored securely.
Mike and Kelli check out the harbor

This whole exercise had taken all morning! From the early rising to return the dinghy to being finally secured to the jetty, we had been "underway" trying to get secured off and on for about 4 1/2 hours.
Didimos, way in the back

As a postscript to this story, by the end of the day, there were two rows of boats in front of us on the jetty, so we were a little concerned about making an early start the next day. But it was time to go spend an afternoon sightseeing (and doing something other than mooring the boat.) And Kevin, bless his soul, tracked down a nice, new, telescoping boat hook -- an upgrade over the lost hook!

Exploring Hydra

Hydra is another charming spot in the Greek Isles. Hydra town sprawls up the hill from the harbor. It is very cosmopolitan, and has often been a favorite getaway for the jet-set. The town is known for great nightlife, and is a favorite spot for Europeans in the summertime.

We all set off to explore Hydra and have lunch. Mike and Kelli found an American restaurant with American food -- burgers, BLT sandwiches, pizza, waffles, American music, and real coffee (not the sludge that the Greeks call coffee.) All that healthy Greek food was getting tiresome :-)

The entire time we were in Hydra, the wind blew from the north directly into the harbor at 20 knots more or less. You can see the whitecaps in the strait outside the harbor in the photos. We were completely entertained watching other sailboats come into the harbor, look around, and leave without even trying to Med moor.

The harbor is bustling with small fishing boats and cruising yachts, ferries and hydrofoils. You can see all the empty tables at one taverna. There are a half dozen more just like this along the quay. One can only imagine the crowd when the summer season is in full swing in July and August.

There are supposedly no good beaches on Hydra. You can see the rugged coastline here.

One unique aspect to Hydra is that motorized vehicles are not allowed. Therefore, donkeys provide transportation for people and goods. They add to the charm of Hydra, but they likely add to the smell, not to mention the braying at dawn.

Here is a mix of modern and classic -- note the fellow in the picture below leading a string of donkeys carrying building materials. He is talking on his cell phone.

Picturesque back alleys, colorful houses, cute gardens. We found a nice spot up in town away from the waterfront tourist tavernas for dinner.

We met back at the boat about 3:30 p.m. Here are a couple of happy cruisers enjoying a Mythos after hiking all over town.