We spent the next couple of weeks settling in, finding our feet, and of course trips to the vet and pet shops to get Lily sorted out with vaccinations, pet passport, litter tray, toys and all the paraphernalia required for our new crew. I’ll do a separate blog of her later.

Nicolas, as usual, goes back to France for the winter so we decided to hire a car for the three of us to visit the rest of the island before he went home and the weather was still relatively good.

“The lush, green island of Lesvos, or Mytilini as it is also called, is like no other Greek island and perhaps no other place in the world. It is the third largest of the islands in Greece behind Crete and Evia. Virtually unaffected by the mass tourism that has turned other islands into amusement parks, Lesvos is the perfect place to visit for people who want to experience the real Greece”

The above is plagiarised from an online guide introduction to Lesbos, he continues ……

“For the Greek Island traveller who is worried about not having enough to do, Lesvos is the perfect destination with amazing food, beautiful beaches, pine and hardwood forests, rivers and over a million olive trees”

I am sure that in season the narrative is true. Unfortunately however, in November, it is shut.

Being used to the wild expanses of the West Coast of Scotland with little but sheep for company it certainly didn’t detract from my enjoyment of the trip, and in many ways, despite closed amenities, having the place to yourself added to the experience.

We had earmarked a sort of clockwise exploration visiting Kalloni, through Parakila and Agra, stopping at Eressos and Sigri (for the Petrified Forrest), Antissa and finaly Molyvos before returning to Mytilini

If you follow the map our planned route was NW from Mytilini skirting the top of the first big lagoon, Kolpos Yeras, (our 1st landfall) and the second bigger one, the Gulf of Kalloni before turning SW etc.

It is a big island as you can see from the relative scale of the nearby Turkish mainland and the Greece insert , so you would probably, no definitely, need more than a day, perhaps a week or two, to do it justice. Maybe we will do, Siga Siga as the saying goes.

The end of the planning and “Nicolas farewell meal” on Camira. We were not hiring the car until the Friday so the rum was OK, and any event might have helped, as “Jaques Laffitte” wants to drive.

Mytilini Castle

In the interim we visited Mytilini Castle on foot. It’s not far – an easy walk around the main harbour from the Marina.

The castle located on the north side of Mytilini and overlooks the city is one of the largest in the Eastern Mediterranean. Its foundations were laid during the time of Justinian on the ruins of an even older fortification which can still be seen in sections of the walls. It has been used and rebuilt by the Romans, Byzantines, Venetians and the Turks and is now used in the summer for cultural events. There is a Roman or Byzantine reservoir with a 4,000 cubic meter capacity. There are also underground tunnels which cover a large area beneath the castle and the hill.

But : It shuts down in Sept and doesn’t open until April ……. ah well maybe later.

Today is independance day in Mytilini and no alien spaceships in sight. However there were a few fighter aircraft performing spectacular and loud low flying demonstations across the bay.

We headed down to see the goings on and parades. These parades were to honour the liberation of the island in 1912 from the Turks by Admiral Koundouriotis and his fleet, after which the island was united with the rest of Greece.

Its great to see the pride they have. 

   

The harbourside is jam packed and all available advantage points are taken

including sitting “wi yer heid” in a phone booth.

However once it was over it was over the streets were deserted and everyone dissapeared

 

and a happy independance day to you

Independance day night time views of Mytilini

   

On the 29th October we headed for Mytilini Marina our last passage of this year. 930 miles or so clocked up from the Peleponese across the Aegean Sea through the Cyclades to the Dodecanese and finally North to the Eastern Sporades.

 

Approaching Mytilini

Well we have a new crew . This is Lily.

  

Abandoned by her mother. She tried to jump on our boat one night in Scala Loutra , a big lagoon on Lesbos, our penultimate stop for the winter. She ended up in the water – so we washed, dried & fed her but left her to fend for herself when we left to travel the 12 miles or so to Mytilini Marina for winter a few days later. We felt bad yet again!!
Having spent two nights in the Marina, we decided to go back and feed her and the other cats. So we went on the bus with a bag of food.
A first we couldn’t find her and feared the worst but eventuallly we did .She was a bit worse for wear and unlikely to make it through the winter so ………….

She is now on board and settling in.

Louise & I took her to the vet yesterday for initial check up and jags. She was severely underweight but other than that it was relatively stress free visit however she did crap in her basket on the way back to the boat.

The cat, Lily, on the other hand was fine.

  

Early days and an exploratory break for freedom

Although very pretty Scala Loutra has no shops, the nearest are up in Loutra viilage proper, which is a half hour walk up a hill through farmland.

    

So every other day or so we would head up early to mid morning to arrive in time for coffee

  

Coffee day

or sometimes aperetifs and meze.

 

Meze Day

Being Greece it has its fair share of stray cats and the taverna owners were looking after this wee one.

     

The passing cars’ wheels would miss her by inches!  When you were watching your heart was always in your mouth, better order some more wine eh? 

Maybes Aye Maybes Naw

     

Loutra village with Scala in the distance bottom right

On return for some it was time for a cat nap and I mean a cat nap, lol

and for others preparations for the coming winter lay up

Given that our intended berth for the winter was Mytilini Marina we thought we should check it out. There was feasibly still (just) enough time to head back south if it didn’t seem to be what we hoped for. Although that would mean retracing our hard won steps northward, not to mention increased chances of bad weather at this time of year.

So for the princely sum of  €1.40 we caught the local bus into town.

 

The bus stop Scala Loutra style

Mytilini is the commercial heart 0f the island, caiques and fishing craft clutter the harbour, joined today by the Border Force vessels of Greece, Romania & Britain. The town hums with local industry. In the old town the narrow winding streets are lined with market stalls and local craft shops – the atmosphere is redolant of an Oriental Bazaar. Initially it seems noisy and grubby but then begins to work its charm on you.

   

The old town

     

Some interesting grafitti

On the waterfront and scattered around the outskirts are some grand old baronial houses dating from the propsperous mercantile era.

 

View across the main harbour

But far more importantly there is a “Pizza Fan” take away within 100 m of the marina gates.

 

Mytilini Marina

We introduced ourselves to the marina staff and had a look around the marina and the town before a coffee & catching the bus back “home”

 

All in all we were happy with our winter arrangements

We decided to sit out the remainder of the good weather and the last of the summer (wine) in Scala Loutra. We moved in from our anchorage

 

to the quay which wonderfully had  free electricity and water. On the inner basin, not deep enough for us, was an array of local fishing boats, very picturesque.

 

It’s a little village that once was home to a tanning industry but now no more. 

      

During the week it is relatively quiet but on weekends, and particularly Sundays, the local taverna is justifiably packed with visitors from Mytilini which is not far by car, about 20 minutes.

   

There was one other cruising yacht, a German couple but other than that very quiet. There was a seemingly abandoned fishing boat that had a pump going continually to keep it afloat moored to the adjacent pier. Maybe it was due to be repaired soon – there was a small boat yard with fishing boats hauled out for maintenance . Who knows this is Greece? …… Siga Siga.

 

Oh and an old tramp steamer from Cologne that was home to “volunteers policing” the authorities valiant efforts in coping with the refugee crisis. The only thing we seemed to see them doing was eating sleeping and drinking.

That said we did a fair bit of relaxing ourselves.

  

We had our usual visting cats who would turn up early noisily demanding food. Amongst the culprits were T2 (Tiger two) Loulou ,who knew how to milk the taverna clients and a wee kitten who was later to be named Lily (of her more later)

   

The passage from Mandraki to the South of Lesvos is about 35 miles so Captain Chaos decided to fish. You will see from historic blogs the only person to have caught a fish of eatable size was Louise. I caught a wee’er one but didn’t have the heart to keep him, in fact don’t know why I fish at all , I dont enjoy killing them.

I never used to be so faint-hearted. Many years ago my weekends were spent out on fishing boats from Largs when sizeable Cod could still be caught off  the Cumbraes. It is that same trusty heavy duty sea rod I still have on Camira. So out comes the kit and I set the trawl going 90m back from the boat when a big effing seagull dives and takes the lure . I saw the rod almost jump out the boat and the seagull performing a red arrows display in order to dislodge the lure, which he did.

Nicolas calls Camira “Calamita” because I seem to becoming accident prone, well he ended himself when I relayed the “Catching of the Oiseau”

Scala Loutra is situated in one of the big lagoons on Lesbos. It is the more South Easterly one called Kolpos Yeras . About 3 miles inside the entrance lies Scala Loutra, a small village and harbour.We anchored off here for a couple of days, dinghying ashore.

We had contacted the marina to let them know we had eventually arrived is Lesbos, but the weather was still too good so we didn’t want to tie up for winter just yet.

View of the harbour from the church up the hill, why do they always put them up there the poor old souls will have heart failure trying to reach them.

Dinghying  back to the boats in the “posh” dinghy

 

The wee taverna ashore and first introduction to T2 the cat, as he came to be called.

After 15 days in Chios we headed only 8 miles North East to a small island, Oinoussa . It stands between the Turkish mainland and the Greek Islands. This apparently insignificant little island has produced the richest ship–owning families of Greece including the richest of them all,Costa Lemos. Contrary to popular belief not the late Onassis. Mandraki harbour is the port.

Initially we anchored off in the bay but later in the evening the Coastguard asked us to move and berth alongside despite the pilot book advising it was OK to anchor in the bay.  At that time of year there was only one other boat berthed – he too had been asked to move in. The water and electricity points had all been shrink wrapped in plastic for the winter but you could get water from a tap near the coast guard station.

Approach & intial anchorage

We really liked Mandraki and we wish we had actually moved here earlier , however I think provisions might have been an issue. There were a couple of nice tavernas still open though that catered to our needs!

Very pretty and even a small beach

The local fisherman actually rowing his boat

Monhan the cat who befriended us and his pals waiting on the fishermen

Oinnoussas’ “Little Mermaid”

We spent a couple of very enjoyable days here maybe we will revisit on the way back South. The pilot guide does warn very busy with large motor yachts in summer though –  maybe this late season cruising does have advantages .

Monsieur Nicolas et le vin

Many islands claim to be the birthplace of Homer, but Khios seems the most likely. Homer called the island “craggy” and the epithet is deserved. Much of of Khios especially the high moutain range running from Mt  Profita Ilias in the North to  low lying Ak Mastikho in the South is a lunar landscape of parched and pitted rock.

Barren Rocky Mountains
On the last Sunday on the island we walked to Daskalopetra to visit Homer’s Stone and the shrine of the Cybele, much to Louise’s delight – she just loves “Auld Stones” 
Along the way we passed a few more small harbours (not big enough for even Camira) and an outdoor swimming pool. It was a nice warm day and a lovely walk but we got back after dark and I only had my prescription sunglasses on . Couldn’t see a thing , got some pelters from Louise , just for a change !
    
On the way

Daskalopetra
  
Homer’s Stone
 
The way back

Louise had her morning regime of going for a run and then back to shower on the boat and then sit and have a coffee.

One morning an older guy passed and smiled and the next day stopped to say hello and introduce himself to her.

His name was George Vardakas. He had lived in America , was a baker and had had a doughnut shop there. He had returned to Khios after seperating from his wife many years ago and was now on the hunt for a replacement.

Louise was obviously in the running as each subsequent morning we were woken by George’s Vespa arriving and him calling “Hellllooo Louise” . He was usually armed with something  a plant cutting from his garden, some home made wine, or cake

He was going into hospital in a week to have his 2nd knee operated on but before that he invited us up to his house for coffee and cake. He was a very nice guy but it transpired he was tone deaf so the conversation was interesting, the next three hours spent listening to him but not getting a word in -a bit like me old mother.

   

George’s apartment

His operation was succesful but was having to spend a week recouperating in hospital . We visted him there before we left and will keep in touch via email.