Norway, London & Greece April/May, 2025

The first month of the 2025 sailing season has been consumed with preparing and launching the boat, shake down sailing, heading South East to the Corinth Canal, around the Athens peninsular and into the Euboean Gulf. We traveled through many towns that we have written about in the past, however there were also some new locations that are well worth mentioning. We also had the pleasure of hosting our future in-laws onboard for a few days, which really was a highlight.

Norway & London

Before we even started on shipyard jobs in Greece, we had minor diversion to the UK, where we had booked a 7 day cruise to see the fjords of Norway. Norway was stunning. Such a beautiful place and interesting culture, but boy was it cold. On returning to London, we managed to meet up with Alex and Emily, as well as Emily's parents, Nick and Christine for a spot of wedding dress shopping.

May, 2025

Shakedown sail to Paxos and Parga

As soon as we were back in the water, we headed North to Paxos. We had some time to kill before our guests arrived in Corfu, so we visited some anchorages that we had not been to before. We spent a few days on the Gaios town quay, which was lovely. A night in a remote anchorage on the rugged west coast. We spent a night at a popular beach bay on Antipaxos, and we spent some time on the mainland in a town called Parga.

Corfu & Paxos with the “Outlaws”

Only a few weeks after meeting up with them in London, we were delighted to have Nick & Christine onboard with us in Corfu. We sailed them down to Paxos and spent a day/night in both Gaios and Lakka. A highlight was our hike out to Tripitos Arch.

East to the Aegean

We needed to cross to the Aegean quickly to catch up on our schedule. We sailed long days and had early nights. We had been to most of our stops before, so there wasn't much new to see. We did however stop long enough in a town called Palairos, where we had some of the best Indian food we had tasted in ages. We had 30 knot wind on our approach to Trizonia, which was a real handful after a long day at sea. By the time we got to Galaxidi, we were ready for a break and a day off. NJ desperately needed a wash too. The Corinth Canal was easy this time as we booked and paid in advance. Though facetiming my dad during that passage was probably not such a good idea. We had a cracking sail from Corinth, all the way to Vari on the Athens peninsular, and the next day motored all the way around and up the other side of the peninsular to Chersonisi, our first new destination for the season.

Eretria and the Euboean Gulf

After a lovely night and spectacular sunset at the Island of Chersonisi, we headed up the South Euboean Gulf towards the town of Eretria. Eretria is a holiday town that once had a thriving resort. Unfortunately the resort did not survive the 2008 financial crisis in Greece, and is now a shell of what it once was. It makes for an interesting walk however. Eretria town felt a little like a rural Victorian town in Australia, with its eucalypt lined streets. For us though, it was really just a safe harbor and a place to sleep before heading on towards Chalcis.

Chalcis

Chalcis (pronounced Kalkis) sits at the narrowest point between the Greek mainland and the enormous Euboea Island. There is a small retractable bridge that spans this gap that is opened once a day for yachts to pass. This is typically some time between 9:30pm and 4am depending on tides and traffic. The current running through the gap can be as much as 6 knots (our normal motoring speed), so the opening is timed for slack tide. Thankfully, the bridge opened for us at 12:45am. As a town, Chalcis is a bit hit and miss. Some parts are nice and others grubby. 

Chalcis to the Sporades

Early the next morning we sailed up the North Euboean Gulf, first NW and then NE towards the Sporade archipelago. We had a night in a gorgeous little bay called Vathikelou before heading to the island of Skiathos. More about Skiathos, Skopelos and the Sporade archipelago in our next blog…