Greece 2016

Greece 2016

Normally in the Blog I tend to recount our trips after the event as I never can find the time when we are away to put pen to paper (or cursor to screen?), but for 2016 as we are only planning one trip for Tra Bhui albeit a longer one, I hope to set out some of our plans now and use the Blog updates to see if they actually come to fruition.

So what is the one trip? 

We are off to Greece - sunshine and warm blue seas!

We (Kathleen and I) plan to sail from Thessaloniki at the northern end of the Aegean Sea around the coast to Igoumenitsa which lies just below Greece’s border with Albania towards the northern end of the Ionian Sea. 

Basically we plan to keep the land on our starboard (RHS) and follow the coast line around the bit of Greece that has Athens at it’s southern end and back up the other side. I am sure that geographers will cringe at that description, but I know what I mean.

Subject to favourable weather we hope to follow the full coastline and not cut through the Corinth Canal. This will give us a total passage of somewhere in excess of 1000 miles.If we meet adverse weather we have the option to cut the south west corner and head north through the canal. 

To complicate the logistics a bit, we need to break our adventure into stages fitting each stage in around my work schedule which requires me to fly in and out of Glasgow airport every four weeks. 

Our passage plan is based on taking advantage of the Meltemi – the strong dry northerly winds found in the Aegean and which start to blow in April / May and which gradually get stronger as the summer progresses. 

The winds which are at their strongest in the afternoon each day tend to die down at night so lots of early starts may be required while we are in the Aegean.

 With the Meltemi's potential to easily reach Force 7 plus and to blow continuously for days on end, I am keen to get some mileage under our belts early in the trip making the best of the months before the Meltemi peaks in the summer. Even if we manage to clock up some early miles, being storm bound for a few days at a time is a distinct possibility

With our initial preparations made out itinerary looks a bit like:-

Stage 1 - shown in red above

25th of March to 14th of April 

Leaving home just north of Glasgow on the 25th with Tra Bhui in tow of march we will take the overnight ferry from Newcastle to Amsterdam. From Amsterdam we will drive down through Germany and Austria before stopping for a week or so in Italy, first at Sirmione on Lake Garda and then in San Marino. From Italy we will catch the overnight ferry on the 1st of April, from Ancona to Igoumenitsa (Greece) from where we will drive to our start point in Thessaloniki. 

Allowing a couple of days to sort out the various bits of paper we need to get to sail in Greek waters, launch Tra Bhui and find somewhere to store the car and trailer we hope to set sail from Nea Michaniona which is just outside Thessaloniki on the 4th of April.

In planning our passage we are not aiming for big daily mileages so based on an average of circa 18 miles per day we hope to have allowed sufficient time to sit out any bad weather and do a bit of coastal exploring.

Hopefully we can make Volos some 150 miles or so to the south before we have to find a safe berth for Tra Bhui and make our way back to the airport at Thessaloniki for our flights home on the 14th of April.

Stage 2 - shown in yellow above

18th May to 9th June

Stage 3 - shown in orange above

13th July to 4th August  

Stage 4  - shown in green above

9th of September to 29th September

Stage 5 - not shown

4th November to 15th November

Fly back to Thessaloniki to collect Tra Bhui and return to the UK via ????? (still to be decided)

The table below contains the flights that I have booked to date, all of which are with Easyjet. I will book our final few flights after mid September once we have an idea of where and when we will eventually end up!

Day	Date	Month	From	To
Thursday	14th	April	Thessaloniki	Gatwick
Thursday	14th	April	Gatwick	Glasgow
Wednesday	18th	May	Glasgow	Gatwick
Thursday	19th	May	Gatwick	Thessaloniki
Friday	27th	May	Athens	Gatwick
Friday	27th	May	Gatwick	Glasgow
Sunday	29th	May	Glasgow	Gatwick
Monday	30th	May	Gatwick	Athens
Thursday	9th	June	Athens	Gatwick
Thursday	9th	June	Gatwick	Glasgow
Wednesday	13th	July	Glasgow	Gatwick
Thursday	14th	July	Gatwick	Athens
Thursday	4th	August	Kalamata	Gatwick
Thursday	4th	August	Gatwick	Glasgow
Friday	9th	September	Glasgow	Gatwick
Saturday	10th	September	Gatwick	Kalamata

To be honest sailing the coastline of Greece is a long held ambition of mine, since as a 12 year old I read Ken Duxbury' s wonderful books "Lugworm on the Loose" and "Lugworm Homeward Bound"  which recount the voyages that Ken and his wife Bea made over 45 years ago in their early wooden Drascombe Lugger "Lugworm". 

While a lot has changed in Greece over the years and even in the Drascombe world, I hope we  capture part of the magic that is contained in the books despite Tra Bhui being made of fibre glass and being a few feet longer.

So what now?

As I write this I am looking out at a snow covered landscape in Tengiz,  Kazakhstan. Tra Bhui is resting on trestles back home with her trailer is a state of disassemble and in the middle of a full refurbishment. To prepare Tra Bhui for the trip a fair amount of work needs to be completed (started) and includes a few little projects in addition to the regular annual maintenance that I carry out to woodwork, rigging, engine etc.

The two weeks that I have at home at the end of January are certainly going to be easily filled!

I will endeavour to post details of the pre trip works on my other Blog “Tra Bhui Projects”, but this has a backlog of some 12 or so uncompleted and un-posted articles so it may be a few weeks or months before they appear.