Leaving Gaios we returned to Corfu but this time we anchored in the bay under the castle, a short walk to the airport to drop off David.
Corfu bay - about 20mins walk to the airport.
After taking David to the airport, we weighed anchor and set off across to the mainland for an overnight stop in Parga bay to break the journey down to Lefkada. About halfway across we spotted something bright blue floating so went to investigate. We now have a lilo with drinks holders!
We left Parga bay at 06:00 and watched the sun rise over mainland Greece.
Not many other boats out at this time of the morning, just a lone fisherman.
We arrived at Lefkada bridge in time for the midday opening. The bridge you see on the right connects the island to the mainland but has to be removable as Lefkada is very keen to remain an island - a permanent bridge would mean that it wasn't. Also it is quite a busy waterway for boats heading south.
Back to familiar waters, we anchored in Tranquil Bay. It lived up to its name when we arrived so, having dug the anchor in well, we headed off in the dinghy to Nidri to watch the World Cup match England v Sweden. By half time the wind was getting up and, as there were quite a few other boats coming in, we decided to return to Serenity and watched the second half on Dave's phone (England won!). Just as well we went back as, somehow, a catamaran had hooked up the chain of the boat in front of us, we think around one of their drive shafts. This meant that the two boats were drifting around in fairly strong winds with two others in dinghies trying to help untangle them. Once it got really dark they had to abandon their efforts, tied the two boats together and stayed on the catamaran's anchor overnight. In the morning more help arrived and they were sorted.
We then headed into Vliho bay to Sail Ionian (Serenity has come "home") ready to have the engineering work done. Chris came on board and soon decided that the vibration that had been a problem for so long, was probably caused by the rudder.
The following day we were lifted out of the water and put up on props in the boatyard. We hired a car from Vassilis in Nidri as we would be out of the water for a while waiting for new rudder bearings to be delivered and fitted.
As Dave's heart had been in AF and wasn't resolving itself we went off to Lefkada hospital They checked him out, tried a large dose of Amiodarone which didn't work so they decided he needed cardioversion (using electricity to stop and restart the heart). This was then done and he was in recovery for the rest of the day to stabilise his blood pressure. Back to the boat that evening but to take it easy. Thank goodness, for the first year ever, we had asked the company to do the antifouling and polishing for us while she was out.
Gentle walks in the morning and evening (when it is a bit cooler) to recover, no tea, coffee or alcohol for a while. This was the view from our early morning walk round the top end of Vliho bay. The boatyard is in the distance.
Our view from the boat up on props (looking towards where the previous picture was taken).
The tractor and trailer in the foreground is how they lifted us out.
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