Author: Gisela Wuerfel

The wind has been blowing from the northwest at over 30 knots since yesterday. We are moored in the harbour of the small island of Lipsi. As the inside of the pier is now fully occupied, boats that have fled the even stronger wind outside in the open sea are now trying to moor on the outside - a very challenging manoeuvre that most do not succeed at the first attempt. The bow anchor needs a lot of chain and must hold immediately, the boat must not slam across and be pushed onto the pier. "Harbour cinema" for those who are already moored, they sometimes say. But this is no fun. Some boats turn away again and look for a bay to anchor freely.

We sailed over from Patmos the day before yesterday with a nice half wind. That was a pleasure. Then the Meltemi came. The strong wind blows directly into the cockpit and there is no balmy summer evening on deck. But we are lying well, the anchor is holding and we have deployed our heavy lines with the jerk fenders to spare the other ropes. 

It's no punishment to be stuck here in Meltemi. Lipsi is a beautiful little island with agriculture, viticulture and fishing. Things are quite tranquil here. While walking, we see bays with beautiful beaches, countless little blue and white churches, and on the heights we always have wide views over the many small surrounding islands. We can also see over to Leros, our next destination.

Manolis, in a white chef's waistcoat, comes onto the pier with his little daughter and hands us the menu of his restaurant in the village. We see very interesting dishes on it, for example "Grilled vegetables with honey vinaigrette" or "Tenderloin stuffed with dried tomatoes and cheese". We can't resist and go to "Manolis Tastes" for dinner one day. Simply delicious!

While walking, we discover Dimitris' farm. Here, Dimitris' son, Kostas, runs organic farming and winegrowing. We tell him that we also come from a wine-growing region and that, due to climate change, completely different grape varieties can now be grown there and the grape harvest is starting earlier and earlier. This is also the case on Lipsi, he reports. In the past, the grape harvest would have started towards the end of August, now it starts in July. We taste his wine, which he grows without using herbicides and without adding sulphur during pressing. The strongest one we taste has 16 alcohol percent. We take two bottles with us and decide to drink it only in small quantities. At Dimitri's farm we also meet three young women from Germany. They are doing a four-week voluntary service here to help with the local agriculture.

Back on our boat, the wind blows unabated and we wonder if we will be able to make our last beat to Leros tomorrow to the summer place for our boat as planned.          

More pictures from Lipsi:  

We look out over a rugged island world from the main village of the island of Patmos, the Chora, and can well imagine that there was a volcano or even several here in an earlier earth age. Today, the peaks rise out of the sea - a sunken caldera, a beautiful island with many headlands and wonderful anchorages.

The panoramic view also extends to the surrounding islands: Arki, Lipsi (that's where we want to go next), Leros (our mooring for the summer break can be guessed at in the haze), to the north the Phournoi Islands and Samos, to the west Ikaría (that's where we came from).

Video: Panorama

Above the Chora of Patmos towers the great monastery of St John, one of the most important pilgrimage sites of the Greek Orthodox Church. This attracts not only believers, but also otherwise many tourists.

We also walk to the three windmills on the Chora hill. The wings turn in the wind. They look much nicer than the modern windmills. In the past the farmers brought their grain there to be ground.

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Our boat is moored in Patmos Skala, the harbour town. There is a lot going on here. Ferries come, many sailing boats, also large exclusive cruise ships such as the Club Med ship that we have already seen in Saint Tropez. The harbour town of Patmos Skala seems a little oriental. Yes, we are not far from the Orient. And in the eventful history of the islands in the eastern Aegean, there were also times of Ottoman domination.

By bus we drive to Ormos Grikou, a totally protected bay with an imposing rock. Here there are mooring buoys, which are all occupied in the evening, and beautiful beaches. Summer has begun and it is already really hot. It's good to be in the shade under the trees on the beach. The water is crystal clear and not as cold as it was a few weeks ago. Before the bus takes us back to our boat, we have a cool draught beer in one of the beach tavernas. Ormos Grikou: an idyll.

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"All good things come in threes", they say. Does that also apply to bad things? We hope so! Yesterday on the way from the island of Icarìa to the island of Patmos, our engine didn't start. We had sailed, but then the wind took a break for lunch. It was like déjavu: the same thing had happened to us in April near Monemvasia. We then sailed into the harbour with our small sails. Lots of mud in the diesel tanks had blocked our fuel line. After the tanks and lines were cleaned, everything was OK again. Then a few weeks later at the northern tip of the island of Euboea the same thing. So, in the harbour of Oreoi, we put in an additional pre-filter. This third pre-filter was supposed to catch additional dirt. Well, that's what it did. After we couldn't start the engine for the third time and had ruled out all possible causes for the problem, we replaced the new filter in zero wind but a little swell. A bit of a mess. But with success. The engine started again and ran perfectly. And the removed filter was totally dirty. Where does all the dirt in the diesel come from? 

In any case, we were able to reach our destination on Patmos relaxed. One thing is clear: we will buy a family pack of these pre-filters. And: All bad things are hopefully only three.  

At the island of Icaría, Icarus had flown so high that the sun melted the wax that held his wings together - he crashed, his father Daedalus buried him here - so far the legend goes, a huge impressive monument on the harbour pier in Agios Kyrikos reminds us. 

We came the 47 nautical miles from the south coast of the island of Chios with a north-northwest wind and a very strong swell to Icaría. In the afternoon, the already strong wind increased again and we had to contend with fierce gusts shooting down from the high mountains of the island. So once again a tough ride.

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The port of Agios Kyrikos is not recommended in the sailor’s guidebook - the strongest gusts in the Aegean are found here, they say. We made it, no sails were torn from the mast, but when you sit in the cockpit in the morning and want to put sugar in your coffee, the spoon is three-quarters empty when it arrives over the cup (in the harbour!).

Icaría - a very wild island, with gorges, vertical cliffs, tiny bays and picturesque villages, some of which are so narrow that it can be scary, when you drive in - as we did - with the rental car. How do we get out of here? So are the breakneck serpentine roads around the many rocky outcrops, some of them almost 1000m above sea level, with vertical drop-offs right next to the narrow road. 

Ag. Kyrikos is very Greek, very relaxed, very quiet, the few tourists here are mostly Greeks. Very winding alleys, sometimes you can hardly get past the chairs and tables of the restaurants.

We are moored in a tiny little marina that has functioning water connections, but no electricity. But it doesn't cost anything either. And: in the rock face at the edge of the marina springs a hot, radium-containing healing spring. You can bathe in it in Therma, two kilometres away, where it flows directly into the sea. You swim through 50 metres of sea water, currently 20 degrees, then you are in a natural pool like in a bathtub, estimated at 40 degrees, the water comes directly from a grotto in the rock face. 

Icaría - all in all a beautiful mixture of rugged wildness, intensified by the extremely strong winds, and cosy relaxed idyll. 

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Under cloudy sky in a thundery mood, we leave the harbour of Psara and set course for Chios. On the west coast, after a beautiful day of sailing with plenty of wind, we moor in the harbour of Limia/Volissos.

Homer is said to have come from the island of Chios - he is said to have taught children here, but nothing more precise has been related. The island has been inhabited for 5,000 years and experienced several periods of prosperity under the Greeks, but also under the Venetians and Turks, until in 1824, when Chios joined the Greek liberation struggle, the Turks killed 40,000 inhabitants and sold 25,000 into slavery........Chios itself is historically said to have had the first slave market, but under Greek rule.

In the northern part of the island there are not only high, barren mountains, but also wonderfully green and fertile valleys.

In the small harbour of Limia/Volissos, there are usually a maximum of three boats - but now another 15 came to take part in a regatta from Athens to Chios and back. The second event on the Greek Whitsunday was 20 horsemen who rode into the bay with their horses and held a feast. Most of them looked quite wild with their black and white neck- and headscarves and leather boots. Are these the cowboys of Chios? 

Volissos is a beautiful little medieval town, 2 km from the harbour on the hillside, with a Frankish (here the collective term for crusaders) castle from the 11th century. Steep winding streets, partly dilapidated, partly very nicely restored houses, lead up to the castle, from which one has a wide view of the many bays and the entire coast. 

After three days, we set off in the direction of the southern part of the island, in the meantime the Meltemi announced itself with a strong north wind. There is a lot of wind and waves. On the way to Ikaria we stay for one (restless) night in a small anchorage in the southern part of Chios, as the only boat, far and wide no house, no artificial light, very lonely and very impressive. The southern part of Chios is rather barren, rocky, with little vegetation, not as lushly green as some valleys in the north - in any case, a very varied island. 

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If it wasn’t so warm, you'd think we are in Norway.

A small village with a harbour, two modern windmills, old windmills, beautiful bays with sandy beaches, rugged rocky coastline and countless churches and chapels - we are on the small island of Psara. It lies about 15 nautical miles west of Chios. Turkey is not far away either. 

With the electricity working perfectly (thanks to the new batteries), we have come 57 nautical miles over from Skyros, heading east-southeast. Here we moor alongside at the pier (later also in the pack). Village life takes place right before our eyes. Fishermen are sorting their nets, the walkway to the ferry pier is painted white, people drink coffee in the shade during the siesta, and when the ferry from Chios comes over, there is a lot of activity. Everything is a bit sleepy, as befits such a small island, but not at all quiet. The men in particular communicate by shouting, from house to house, from the kafenion to the fishing boat ... And in the distance you can always hear at least one rooster crowing. This is the soundtrack of Psara. We find it very cosy here. 

We can also get enough exercise here. A board with a map of the island shows us various hiking trails. As sailors, we hike to the lighthouse, of course, meeting shy goats on the way, standing high up on boulders like the chamois in the Alps. The boulders are interesting - sometimes it's slate, sometimes it's marble. It looks as if a giant had thrown them into the landscape. 

The people of the island have suffered heavy blows of fate in their history, which began in the time of Mycenae. There were times when the population was expelled, new settlers then came, for example from Euboea. When Psara took part in the liberation struggle against the Ottomans, these killed a large part of the island's population in revenge in 1824, and the rest were taken into slavery. The paintings on the harbour pier created by a street art artist on the occasion of the 200th anniversary bear witness to this. Together with the city of Messolongi on the mainland, Psara is revered as the most important heroic city in the Greek liberation struggle. 

Now a strong south wind is blowing. We stay here for another day. Time to read and play the guitar.

And here a few more pictures:

Shouts in the harbour of Linarià (Skyros Island). Everyone comes out of their boats onto the pier to our boat. A motor yacht has torn off our mooring line with its propeller while leaving. With only the two forelines still attached to the pier, Aglaya drifts across in gusts of 4-5 gusts and is pushed alongside onto the pier by the wind. We like to moor alongside, but not like this! Everyone on the pier holds Aglaya away from the pier so that no damage is done. A toast to the helpfulness of the sailors among themselves! 

Alexander, Georgios and colleague, who look after this beautiful little harbour, quickly repair the mooring from the dinghy and then pull Aglaya back into position with the stern. It all works quickly and smoothly. High praise for the three of them, who do a super job for sailors here anyway (help with mooring, all important information, in print even in German). Totally fit, helpful and always in a good mood. 

A nice place to stay. There is also comfort: clean showers and washing machines. Also great is the beautifully designed information about the interesting bird life and the ecological concept on the whole island.

Yes, and then we have been dragging along a problem for the last few days, which Georgios actively helps us with: our three mega-heavy service batteries are so deeply discharged that we need new ones. We have been observing that the voltage of the batteries is dropping for a week now. Too many consumers? Too many IPads and mobile phones permanently charged? At least that's what's killed the five-year-old batteries. We order new ones through Georgios, hopefully they will arrive soon with the ferry. It's a blow to the ship's cash box, but it has to be done.

For the ferry, which arrives once towards evening, the café-bar Cavos announces at great volume and with astonishingly good sound quality: "Also sprach Zarathustra" in the original version by Richard Strauss resounds in the harbour. Since we are still waiting for our new batteries, we have the opportunity to go to "Cavos" and find out, why this particular music is being played.

Video: The ferry is coming

And tomorrow we will explore the island further with a rental car. Then there will be a few more photos of this beautiful island in the blog.