I woke up at 8:20 and the ship happened to be turned in such a way that I saw the beautiful Poseidon Temple right outside my little cabin window--what a way to start the day! We had a quick breakfast and then Maurizio went for a swim; I decided to read a book instead. After years and years of reading just academic texts (no complaints), I wanted to brush up on books that people actually want to read, so I loaded up my iPad with a great battery of choices. I started with "Catch-22."
Last night we left the rescue boat in water so we had to put it back on board first thing. We lifted anchor at 10:10 and soon hit a NE wind against us. We managed to get about 6kn until we hit the tip of the Cape. The wind direction did not change after that, but the wind weakened and we averaged about 3kn for the next few hours. In mid-afternoon we passed one of the huge cargo ships that frequent between Istanbul and Trieste; I used to see them all the time when they were approaching Trieste and it was nice to see them on open sea.
One of countless romantic lighthouses in Greece
Wind subsided completely at around 6pm and we got stuck. I went for a quick swim and then Maurizio taught me how to play Backgammon--I played a few times before, but always managed to forget the rules overnight. But nice as the break was, the time was ticking and we had to get moving if we wanted to make it to Euboea before midnight--it was time to turn on the engine.
Can't beat Greek sunsets!
As we neared Karistos, it seemed that the wind was picking up, so we turned off the engine--all in vain, the wind never came. We tried again a bit later, but remained unlucky. The third time luck was finally on our side and we picked up some wind, but by then we were already pretty close to our destination.
We made dinner while still en route so we could explore Karistos right after we moored. The port was quite lively, with many bustling restaurants on the shore. We walked around to look for a post office and a naval store for nautical charts, but came up short on both counts. What we did find were ruins of a mausoleum thought to have belonged to a distinguished Roman official. I can't think of any officials nowadays with a mausoleum of their own! We walked around some more, found the main town church and a little Venetian fortress near the port. We were pretty exhausted from the long sail so our evening walk didn't last too long. Come 1am I was in bed--more exploring to do tomorrow!
Streets of Karistos
Church in Karistos
Moored at 11:30 in Karistos (Euboea), traveled 74.6 km/40.3 nm in 11hrs 15mins.