We are back on board our floating home. Each time we come back it feels more comfortable. But it still takes a while to get into the swing of things. Our first stern to mooring could have gone better – we took a while to choose the right spot – but not too bad. And we forgot to turn off our anchor light the next day – lucky Scott installed an LED and solar, so it didn’t suck up too much energy.
We were in the beautiful anchorage of Agathonisi, a tiny island just south of Samos. Very quaint village up the hill with just one mini-market. They are reliant on getting supplies ferried in, so the choice was limited, but we were just happy to have found such a tranquil spot at anchor to start our six week tour. We had everything we needed on board (Greek salad of course!).
Our next stop was Pythagorian on the island of Samos, which is just a mile from the Turkish coastline. It is the birthplace of Pythagoras. A pretty harbour and small town – you can see it in the main picture at the start of this post. It’s great place to wait out the northerly blow over the next two days.
Our main issue is that we haven’t found anywhere to fill up our LPG canisters. We use LPG for the outboard motor and for our cooking. Scott cycled for an hour uphill to a service station that sold LPG gas, but they refused to fill up our canisters because they are not standard.
When we come back on board after a break there is always a list of jobs to get done. For those interested in more practical matters, here is a list of the jobs we completed before we set sail:
- Thorough clean inside and out. Dust accumulates on the deck whipped up by the wind and it looks quite sad when we first board. We are always keen to give Nemrod a wash straight away.
- Light polish and wax to the top sides of the hull to maker Nemrod shine
- Change oil in the sail drive.
- Coat of anti-foul on the sail drive
- Replenish coolant. I didn’t realise that anti-freeze is not just for cold climates – it helps to avoid corrosion and cools the engine as we motor.
- Attach the genoa and genoa sheets- we had taken them down at the end of the last trip to wash down
- Stitch zip back in to sail bag where it had come adrift
- Mount dedicated block for the barber hauler
- Put new coconut husk in the composting head after cleaning out old compost (nice job!).
- Reassemble the dinghy – mount outboard (heavy awkward job), pump up and clean
- Test motors and instruments