Now sitting in an Ormos on the island of Meganisi situated between the island of Levkas and the mainland of Greece. It is remote with only two other boats in our little bay. The water is crystal clear. I am anchored with a stern line ashore. This is only the second time I have done this but with little wind, 100 meters of rope and the help of a French artist who took my line ashore it was very easy.
The artist invades interesting boats when they come into the Ormos to see if they want their boat painted in watercolours. They are very good and he is now doing one for Lady C.
The journey here improved drastically following a dismal start, although even that was only dull and I had no serious bad weather to contend with.
I met up with a boat called Our Sunwood II, whom I had met in Gibraltar when I first arrived in the Med., at Pollensa in the north of Mallorca. Harry and Silvia, a charming couple who have put everything into the boat to make it their only home, own the boat. Harry had agreed to let me accompany them across to Greece. Our boats work at about the some speed. Harry had some visitors so we arranged for them to keep a watch on me so should I drop off they could radio me if I was heading for disaster.
I can set a guard ring around me on the radar I now have so that if a boat should come within it the radar will sound an alarm. I now have a lot of faith in the boat and the old Pinter autopilot is working superbly.
The first long passage was from Mahon to Oristano on Sardinia, 23 hours. I used to get flasks of coffee and soup and make sandwiches but now I just go below make tea and cook or warm up soup and let the boat get on with it. I was suitably surprised as apart from an odd cat nap I did not feel tired on arrival at Oristano. We had a restful day and night there and set off for Cagliari in southern Sardinia in the morning. Arriving at Cagliari we got involved with the American navy warships on an exercise. We were to get involved with them twice again at sea.
Going into Cagliari the autopilot was difficult to disengage. I found this was due to the clutch cable fraying. Rapid temporary repairs soon solved the problem. One night here and we were off to Castellammare in Sicily, second long passage of 19 ½ hours. Getting used to them now.
Crossing we had two encounters with the American warships. During the day an aircraft carrier carved across my bows at about a ½ mile distance, I thought quite unnecessarily close. The only saving grace was the spectacular show of harrier jump jets and helicopters landing on it. Then at night they were heading straight for us again. My radar has MARPA and it told me they were on collision course. Almost certainly they were not but I called them up as I thought they were unnecessarily close and they obligingly changed course. They sent out a helicopter that put his searchlight on us. Lady Coppelia is now in the log of an American warship called Calder Hall.
Anchored in the harbour at Castellammare. It is a delightfully seedy place; nobody does any repairs once its been built or redecorates after the first coat of paint or emulsion. This seems to be the standard for out here. Perhaps this is because an earthquake is likely to demolish everything at any time. Had a good meal ashore. Sicilian bread is sold by the kilo and is very tasty. It is very dense and covered in caraway seed.
Called into Palermo for fuel and stayed one night. Fuel is very expensive here.
Next stop Tindari, a sandy bay. A short hop of only 10 ¼ hours to enable us to have a rest from night passages.
Down the Messina straights to Catania. We were going to stop earlier but the wind got up a bit and the harbours are not easy so Harry would not try to go into them.
Saw the strangest boat. It had a boom of about 40 feet projecting from the bow with a man at the end of it. Also a 40 foot high mast again with a man at the top. A most weird sight. It is for catching swordfish. They sleep on the surface. So the man on the mast can see them and steer the boat so the man on the boom can catch them before they are woken up by the sound of the boat. Poor things are only having a nap and then wham they are dead.
Going for broke on long passages. Catania to Santa Maria di Leuca on the heel of Italy. This took 29 hours. I was surprised how easy it was. Only 80 miles to go to Corfu and Greece. We had two nights here to recover.
Started out for Corfu but the weather turned rougher than forecast and ended up a force 7/8 and was getting worse. Harry ploughed on but after 2 hours and still with 10 or more hours to go I turned back. By all accounts I made the right decision. The following day was a reasonably calm crossing.
Landed in Ayios Stefanos, a delightful little bay with taverna’s at the head. I spent 17 days here getting back into the lazy cruising mode after the dash across.
Since then passage time has been only 1 to 2 hours. More about my adventures here later, but suffice to say the weather is perfect and the places are outstanding. It knocks the Balearics for six.
Apart from this bit of bad weather we had had calm seas and sunshine for all of the crossings. The early dawn mornings were most strange. The sea was oily calm and reflecting the sky. This together with a slight mist made the sea and sky blend and you appeared to be sailing through in space. Most eerie.
I logged 210 hours engine running time since leaving Aguadulce, which at an average of 8 knots is 1600 nautical miles. Starting out from Aguadulce on the 16th April and arriving in Corfu on the 5th June, 7 weeks. The only problem was the autopilot clutch cable. Not bad for an old girl. I have now logged nearly 900 hours, that’s around 8000 nautical miles, in the boat since I bought her.
Tony Cobb
‘Lady Coppelia’
27th July 2001