The Sami Incident

We have had several friends out to sail with us over the last few weeks. Our friends and former crew from some of the long passages we have undertaken over the last few years, Claire and Michael arrived in Cephalonia and we met them in Sami. It was the first time that I have been to Sami and our stay was short but quite eventful! We met Claire and Michael in a bar ready for a much deserved beverage and as we were there an Italian yacht arrived in port. He appeared to be going much too fast but he lined himself up for his stern too mooring and then put the yacht into forward to in preparation for his manoeuvre. However disaster struck when the cable on his gear box stuck/broke and he found he had no reverse and ploughed into the quay at some speed. It sounded terrible. When John got to him the crowds had dispersed and the poor man was obviously in shock as the boat was still in forward and drilling itself into the quay! John being John hopped aboard and offered him some advice suggesting that from below he(John) could put the boat into reverse manually and this would enable him to go alongside the quay. John advised him that he would have to shout stop when he wanted him to put it in neutral and then he could gently drift onto the quay. Michael offered to help with the lines. As he passed us in reverse he suddenly put the throttle down and hurtled towards the quay with no shout to John just the crunch of the stern hitting the quay. 'I forgot to say stop' was all he could mutter to John. When asked for further advice John just suggested that he phone his charter company. What had started out a 44ft boat was now a 42ft boat!

There is an interesting underground lake at Sami that we got a local taxi driver to take us to. It was gloriously cool and we were taken around in a small boat that was paddled by a local. Lake Mellissani is well worth a visit.
Claire and Michael were very lucky as there was plenty of wind for their stay and we managed several good sails.

The weather continues to be really hot and even the Greeks can be heard to say that they cannot remember such a prolonged period of very hot weather. It has regularly been hovering around 39 degrees and on one occasion the thermometer registered 42degrees. The most productive times of the day are when the sun goes down and before it comes up!

With the weather so hot we often sail around to various bays drop the hook and jump in .... well I climb down the bathing ladder and John jumps in! We have a camera that takes underwater pics and as you can see the fish are not shy!