Monday, 21 September 2015

Leaving Greece via Italy to Sicily


Spartahori on Meganisi

 Sally and I at one of our favourite spots in Spartahori overlooking Port Spilia and looking over the island of Skorpios to Greek mainland. Well worth the walk up the steps!

Monganisi

 A new find this year but went straight into our top three spots - Monganisi bay on Paxos, south of Corfu. A delightful anchorage or quay to moor stern to if winds get up. Clear water for swimming and .......
 .......a lovely taverna ashore for evening meal. I should have focused the camera before I gave it to the waiter to take the picture but silhouettes are quite effective!

Gouvia marina, Corfu

 We had a great ten days with Steve and Sally. A shame they couldn't come across to Sicily with us as planned but the weather can be so fickle. However, it meant we had a wonderful time showing Sally all the spots Steve had talked about when he and Dave worked for Neilson up here.

 Wonderful figurehead on "Merlin"

Goodbye Greece!!

 From Corfu we sailed north to the small island of Othonisoi, seen in the distance here. There we left Greek waters and headed off on our next adventure to Italy on our way to Sicily.

 Sailing into the night
A 20 hour trip took us across to Crotone on the south coast of Italy

 The town of Crotone
 No I am not swimming with those!! Lots of them in the harbour - most about the size of a large dinner plate. We also saw lots out to sea - quite beautiful in their own way!
 We sailed in company from Corfu to just outside Siracusa on Sicily with John and Lynne on Tumbleweed which was great.
 Two of the gas platforms outside Crotone.

 We said goodbye to Tumbleweed outside Siracusa as they were continuing on direct to the marina in Licata where we shall all be for winter. We decided to go and visit the town here as we had been told by many people how nice it was. There was bad weather forecast so we could anchor here for a few days and wait for better weather to take us the next 100 miles to Licata.
  After 30 hours and losing our autohelm a couple of hours out, we arrived in Sicily.
The typically Italian seafront of Siracusa - calm weather before the winds got up!
Siracusa is the birthplace of Archimedes

 The font of Arethusa
"Half a dozen Greek poets wrote the tale of the nymph Arethusa, who was bathing in the Alpheus River in Greece one day when the god of that river took a liking to her.
She begged for deliverance from his advances, and Artemis in pity turned the nymph into a spring, allowing her to escape underground. She traveled under the sea to emerge here, in Siracusa. Alpheus, though, was hot on her heels, and came gushing out in the same spot, mingling his waters with hers for eternity.
Apparently this, to the Greeks, was romantic.
They used to say you could toss a goblet into a spring at Arcadia in Greece and it would pop up here.
Today the font still flows softly from its grotto into the pond, swimming with fish and ducks and planted with puffy-headed, willowy papyrus—Siracusa is the only place outside of Greece where papyrus grows wild" 
Half a dozen Greek poets wrote the tale of the nymph Arethusa, who was bathing in the Alpheus River in Greece one day when the god of that river took a liking to her.
She begged for deliverance from his advances, and Artemis in pity turned the nymph into a spring, allowing her to escape underground. She traveled under the sea to emerge here, in Siracusa. Alpheus, though, was hot on her heels, and came gushing out in the same spot, mingling his waters with hers for eternity.
Apparently this, to the Greeks, was romantic.
They used to say you could toss a goblet into a spring at Arcadia in Greece and it would pop up here.
Today the font still flows softly from its grotto into the pond, swimming with fish and ducks and planted with puffy-headed, willowy papyrus—Siracusa is the only place outside of Greece where papyrus grows wild
- See more at: http://www.reidsitaly.com/destinations/sicily/southeast_sicily/siracusa/sights/fonte_arethusa.html#sthash.HAHioEbJ.dpuf
Half a dozen Greek poets wrote the tale of the nymph Arethusa, who was bathing in the Alpheus River in Greece one day when the god of that river took a liking to her.
She begged for deliverance from his advances, and Artemis in pity turned the nymph into a spring, allowing her to escape underground. She traveled under the sea to emerge here, in Siracusa. Alpheus, though, was hot on her heels, and came gushing out in the same spot, mingling his waters with hers for eternity.
Apparently this, to the Greeks, was romantic.
They used to say you could toss a goblet into a spring at Arcadia in Greece and it would pop up here.
Today the font still flows softly from its grotto into the pond, swimming with fish and ducks and planted with puffy-headed, willowy papyrus—Siracusa is the only place outside of Greece where papyrus grows wild
- See more at: http://www.reidsitaly.com/destinations/sicily/southeast_sicily/siracusa/sights/fonte_arethusa.html#sthash.HAHioEbJ.dpuf


Half a dozen Greek poets wrote the tale of the nymph Arethusa, who was bathing in the Alpheus River in Greece one day when the god of that river took a liking to her.
She begged for deliverance from his advances, and Artemis in pity turned the nymph into a spring, allowing her to escape underground. She traveled under the sea to emerge here, in Siracusa. Alpheus, though, was hot on her heels, and came gushing out in the same spot, mingling his waters with hers for eternity.
Apparently this, to the Greeks, was romantic.
They used to say you could toss a goblet into a spring at Arcadia in Greece and it would pop up here.
Today the font still flows softly from its grotto into the pond, swimming with fish and ducks and planted with puffy-headed, willowy papyrus—Siracusa is the only place outside of Greece where papyrus grows wild
- See more at: http://www.reidsitaly.com/destinations/sicily/southeast_sicily/siracusa/sights/fonte_arethusa.html#sthash.HAHioEbJ.dpuf
 The Cathedral of Siracusa

A much needed and much appreciated cold beer at one of the many street cafes in the myriad of lanes and alleyways in the old city.

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