- How it all began
- Phasing out from The Moorings Owner’s Programme
- The Project List
- Haul out day
- Lazy days at Levkas Marina
- Finalising the boat paperwork
- Untying the lines
- Searching for ‘Donkey’
- Boat maintenance in exotic locations
- Coffee and solar cake!
- Last minute change to the passage plan
- Searching for Myrto
- A taste of the city in Corfu Town
- Victory and failure in one night
- Teeth grinding, and hoops of joy, at 9.4 knots
- Introducing the ‘freeloaders’
- June-July 2018
- Sharing Nemrod with friends, and discovering Ormos Afales
- Not in the pilot guide
- Yoga on board
On Paxos we had a special mission. Scott had an idea that his ex-employee Myrto ran a shop in the next town (Gaios), so we thought it would be fun to try and find her. So we visited numerous shops asking for her, pronouncing her name wrong (it should be Myr-to with the emphasis on -to), and getting lots of negative answers. Then finally one woman said, yes, she thought a lady called Myrto was running a shop in Lakka, which was the village on the northern tip of the island. We decided to go there the next day.
In the meantime, Scott befriended two German cyclists who were on a mega trip around Europe and had some problems with their gears on one bike. Scott invited them back for lunch. It was a fun afternoon getting to know them. They were around the same age and had a daughter the same age as Adam. They were very pleased to take us up on the offer of a shower, as they had spent last night on the beach.
And Scott’s magic spray seemed to resolve the issue with the gears, so in all, it was a great visit.
Keen to see Myrto for dinner, we set off for Lakka to track her down. It was around 1.5 hour motor north from Gaios. Anchoring in the bay which was pretty full already.
Success! We found Myrto in her shop which turned out to be a high end designer boutique selling women’s clothing and jewellery, as well as some of her own pottery. She was pretty proud of the shop, with good reason, and happy that she was making a good living after so long just getting by. I had not known Myrto when she worked at Hammersmith Ceramics Cafe, but I really enjoyed chatting with her. Arranged to meet for coffee the next morning, as she had her mother staying and wasn’t free for dinner.
When we returned to our boat, lots more had arrived and the bay was really packed, but fortunately no incidents.
The next day we met Myrto, her mother and niece for a coffee. Myrto’s mum offered to take us to Olympia if we are heading to the Pelopponese, as she runs a campsite near to there. Lovely family.
Raised anchor around 11 o’clock and headed north to Corfu and a bay called Petriti. Quiet night at anchor, just a couple of tavernas and a shop ashore. We could just about make out the green screen of a football pitch on the TV in the taverna. Even with our Monocular could not watch the game. : England vs Columbia in the World Cup. Adam gave us a text message run down of the match which finished with a nail biter penalty shoot out.