Tuesday 4 June 2019 – Patras

When we got up this morning I thought for sure we were stuck in Mesolonghi for at least another two days. It was completely grey, cold and threatening to rain.  But we pressed the agents at Patras to see if they could help and by 9:30 they had secured us a berth so we set off.  The weather improved and we had no problem casting off from the wall.  But we did have a scare getting out of the canal.  As we left the harbour itself there was a huge dredger in the channel.  Richard was convinced we should pass it to starboard and I wasn’t at all sure that we should have gone so close to the shore.  But in the end it was nearly a disaster.  We wound up snagging a line they had out on our keel.  Richard managed to go into reverse and the dredger pulled up the line and freed us.  They then directed us to go to port and we were away. Phew!

Richard was very optimistic and put up the sails.  The wind was initially on the nose but we turned away and we started to go really well on a beam reach.  In a wind of only 9-10 knots we were doing 6 knots speed.  We put it down to a clean bottom!

But the good sail wasn’t to last long.  The wind went behind and dropped down so we slowed to only 4 knots.  That was not getting us to Patras in time, so on went the engine.  But at least we had an hour or so of good sailing.

Coming in to Patras was fine and the agent was at the berth to help us in.  But now we understand what is going on.  We are in the commercial part of the harbour and it reminds me a little bit of Albania.  We are in an area used for superyachts.  The upshot of this is that the pier is much too high for our boat and we can’t use the passarelle to get off.  There is a long board on the pier which we can use, but it is really scary!  We can only use it by putting it on top of the transom.  Even then it is a bit on an upward slope and it rocks back and forth.  I managed to get off and back on again once with the help of the agent - giving me a hand.  Richard has been off and on a few times but with much caution and concern.  I was so worried about it I let R go in to town on his own to shop for some food.  He didn’t get much so I will have to venture forth tomorrow.  This could be a quite expensive mistake.  The mooring fee isn’t bad; 4 euros per metre length for two nights plus 10 euros for water and electricity.  But we also had to pay 40 euros to the agents.  So we will make them help us especially when we leave. They have already organised a laundry to collect all our dirty clothes and linens.  That will work out more expensive than usual also.  Well, we have had it very cheap to date not paying for any berthing so far.

Walking the plank!

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