Gouvia Marina is located six kilometres north of the city of Corfu. After checking in on our Powercat 393, we leave the charter base in our wake and motor south-east towards the island's capital, Corfu. The Ionian Sea will be our holiday destination for a week. We have booked a one-way trip and are not yet sure whether this will be advantageous in this case or not. The starting point is the town of Corfu on the island of the same name. The destination harbour is the town of Lefkas in the north of the island of Lefkas. In between are not only 70 miles of Ionian Sea, but also beautiful old harbours and ancient sights.
The old town of Corfu comes up on the starboard side: old harbour facilities with ramshackle charm, modern ferry terminals, fortress walls, churches and tavernas. The crew stand on the foredeck and take photos while our cat slowly rounds the old town of the island metropolis in the annoying swell. As often as I have chartered in Corfu, I have never allowed myself the time to see the island's capital as such. While we are at the height of the imposing castle, we spontaneously decide to stay in Corfu for a day.
But where do you moor in the city? The harbour facilities in the north of the old town don't look very inviting. What's more, the swell of the Mistral rolls right up against these piers in the afternoon. We round the fort, now have the old town to the north and sail into the large, open Garitsa Bay. It's nice and quiet here. To the south of the fortress is the massive concrete pier of a former municipal jetty.
On the outside of the pier, two mega yachts are mooring one after the other with their sterns towards the pier. We try to moor on the sheltered inner side of the pier and discover a free berth. A man with a half bald head, gold chain and handheld radio is running around excitedly on the pier and directing the incoming ships. We make ourselves noticed, but he doesn't respond. I call him on the radio, but he doesn't answer.
Goldkettchen is busy with the mega yachts. Even when their stern lines are already firmly and safely over the bollards of the pier, we are still ignored. I head for the free space behind the pier. We deploy the bow anchor, hang the fenders up, manoeuvre slowly backwards into the box, throw the stern lines around the bollards and take them tight. At that moment, the man turns round and tells us to cast off again.
Slightly annoyed, we untie the mooring lines again, shimmy out of the beautiful box on the anchor chain and haul the iron on board. Just as we are free again, want to haul in the fenders and sail away, Goldkettchen, no sorry, the harbour master, asks on the VHF who we are and who we are from.
I reply that we are charter guests from Moorings and that our base manager Toni Tsoutsoudakis sends his best regards.
"Why didn't you say so in the first place?" replies the now very friendly harbour master and directs us to the very same free box from which he chased us away a quarter of an hour ago. Welcome to Greece! What we didn't know beforehand was that the former municipal pier is now home to the elite N.A.O.K. - Navy Athletic Club of Corfu. While the mega yachts are moored on the sea side, the Ukrainian hostesses are already patrolling the pier. We pay a modest 80 euros mooring fee for our 39-foot catamaran, which suddenly seems very, very small.
The pier of the N.A.O.K. is the best location for exploring the old town. The castle or the oldest part of Corfu are just a few steps away. The town, which dominates a rocky outcrop overlooking the sea, is one of the oldest in the Mediterranean and was settled 3,000 years ago. If you wanted to describe all the sights of Corfu, you could fill a book. That is why only one particular highlight should be mentioned here: the Palace of Achillion.
The Austro-Hungarian Empress Elisabeth (Sissi) had the palace built between 1889 and 1891. Sissi was a great admirer of ancient Greece. She named it Achillion in honour of the Homeric hero Achilles, whose strength and divine beauty she admired. The palace is located around eight kilometres south of Corfu, near the port of Benitses. However, the Austrian empress's estate is not by the sea, but up in the mountains.
The Achillion, which is definitely worth a visit, is built in the Pompeian style. Sissi had the building completely decorated with depictions and statues from Greek mythology. The empress herself visited her Achillion several times during the summer. Unfortunately, she did not enjoy it for long, as she was stabbed to death by the anarchist Luigi Lucheni in 1898.
In 1907, the German Kaiser Wilhelm II acquired the Achillion and turned it into a centre of European diplomacy. After the end of the First World War, the palace fell under the war reparations of the Treaty of Versailles. Today, the property belongs to the Greek tourism organisation. It is definitely worth a visit!
We leave the megayacht pier and head southwards close to the coast.
A cape with an old, stone windmill borders Garitsa Bay to the south. Corfu remains astern, the landscape becomes greener. At the southernmost end of the city, where the runway of Corfu Airport reaches down to the sea, lies the most photographed postcard motif of the Ionian Sea: the tiny monastery of Panagias Vlaheron on a scoop of stones in the sea with a cypress tree on top.
The island is so small that you can walk round it in one minute at a leisurely pilgrim's pace. Orthodox clergy have lived on the island in the sea, which is connected to the mainland by a narrow causeway, since the 17th century. As long as I've known the island, I've always wanted to dock at the monastery. But I had never ventured into the shallow bay to the monks, neither with a sailing yacht nor with a motor yacht. But with a catamaran? We occupy both prows with a lookout and follow a rowing fisherman at walking pace.
As we glide slowly and silently into the harbour on both skids, an Airbus heads for the runway above us. We instinctively duck our heads. As it roars over us, we can see the tread of its tyres. The plane touches down softly just three hundred metres away from us. At the same time, our cat brakes softly and comes to a halt. A monk steps out of the monastery and rings the bell for prayer. Our echo sounder rings too. Both hulls push a tangle of lines in front of them, which lies on the bottom of the monastery harbour.
harbour.
The monk watches us, he has probably never seen such a large ship in front of his monastery. We carefully move the control levers aft and after a short jerk the ship moves backwards. The monk crosses himself and waves after us in a friendly manner. Not far from the monastery, we drop anchor at one and a half metres and take the dinghy to the abbey. We buy a candle in gratitude, light it and put it in the bowl of sand in front of the altar.
The narrow, stone causeway from the monastery to the mainland is a hundred metres long. At the landward end is a small pebble beach with a fish frying kitchen on it. The old sounds of Mikis Theodorakis blast from the loudspeakers. It smells of fish and seafood. The young owner of Taverna Pontikonissi says that unfortunately all the tables are booked. However, if we accept, she can move a table so close to the water's edge that our feet are almost in the sea, provided we don't mind. We eat grilled scorpion fish, Greek salad and wine from the island - simply delicious.
We leave the anchorage next to the monastery with the bells ringing for morning prayers and the first Airbus approaching. We make a stopover in the small coastal town of Benitses to do some shopping in the supermarket right by the harbour. In the afternoon, we head for the fishing village of Petriti in the south-east of Corfu. Petriti is still home to the largest fishing fleet on the island. My hopes of finding a berth among the trawlers are dashed when I see that a sailing flotilla has already taken over the harbour. Every free space is taken, including the restaurants on land. So instead of fish, I have spaghetti from the oven.
We set off early in the morning to visit the rugged rocky coast on the west side of Paxos. According to Greek mythology, the sea god Poseidon used his trident to separate the island of Paxos from the southern tip of Corfu in order to create a protected love nest for himself and the beautiful nymph Amphitrite. Since then, the trident has been the emblem of the island.
The west coast of Paxos is known for its cliffs that drop steeply into the sea and can be up to 150 metres high. There are numerous caves and grottos at sea level. If you want to experience this rugged landscape by boat, you have to get up early, as you can only venture onto the cliffs when the sea is calm. The mistral, which blows from the north-west, usually wakes up around 11 a.m. and then develops its greatest strength during the afternoon - and with it a high swell that lashes against the west coast. Experience shows that the sea is still smooth until around 1 pm, after which it is better to keep your distance from the rocks.
Shortly before midday, we reach the Bay of Achai, which lies roughly in the centre of the west side of Paxos. We are not the first people to come up with this idea. In front of Stakhes Cave, also known as the "Blue Grotto", there are quite a few snorkellers in the water. The captains of the excursion boats boldly press the horn, shoo the swimmers aside and drive into the cave, turn round and head for the next bay. Our skipper Siegrun does this much more gently. Hard to believe! Our wide catamaran with its not exactly low flybridge is easy to manoeuvre into the cave. And there is also enough space in the grotto for relaxed tacking. At around 1.30 p.m. it gets uncomfortable. The excursion boats call the swimmers and snorkellers back, and we also move away from the rocky coast, against which the waves are now crashing higher and higher.
We round the equally impressive south coast of Paxi, pass the Kaltonissi Channel and do a lap of honour through Mongonisi Bay in the far south. To avoid being buffeted by the wind and swell of the mistral, we sail northwards close to the east coast of Paxos. This way we sail right through the natural harbour of Gaios, where at 5 p.m. it is already too late to find a berth for a yacht over six metres wide. We have little desire to spend another night on the chain and would prefer to leave our gangway in front of a taverna in the evening.
The only chance we see is in Lakka in the north of the island. We get there a good hour later and are lucky. There are already eight sailing yachts moored stern to the small promenade in front of the pubs. But in the far south, where it is too shallow for a keel yacht, there is still a space available. We throw the iron and shimmy backwards on the chain into the shallow water. With the symbolic hand's breadth of water under the keel, we moor in Roman Catholic style on the promenade. How good it is to have a catamaran!
Although Lakka is not quite as touristy as the better-known Gaios, it is no longer an insider tip. The harbour is lined with tavernas and bars, where the atmosphere is lively until late into the night. The village is very picturesque, with small supermarkets, bakeries and a few souvenir shops. And if you're lucky, you might even bump into the incense-waving priest. From Lakka, we take a detour the next morning to Loggos (in some maps: Longos) in the north-east of Paxos. The village around the bay of the same name with its colourful houses looks very picturesque from the sea. Small fishing boats are parked everywhere, but there is no berth for a fully-fledged charter yacht. And the bay, which is open to the east, is not very sheltered for anchoring.
We head further south to the impressive south coast of Paxos. To the east of the Tripitos rock gate, we sail with the cat into a natural labyrinth consisting of rocks and deep blue lagoons. The boat can be manoeuvred very precisely and safely. We discover small and shallow bays that you would never venture into with a monohull.
We now leave Poseidon's island of love behind and head southwards to its little sister Antipaxos. Here, paradisiacal bays beckon, of which Emerald Bay in the north-east is probably the most famous. - Unfortunately, a charter week only has six days. At the small harbour of Agrapidia Po, we say goodbye to Antipaxos and point our bow east towards the mainland. After 13 nautical miles, we reach Fanari Bay, where the River Acheron flows into the sea. You can either anchor in the round and reasonably sheltered bay or sail 500 metres upstream along the River Acheron and moor in the village of Ammoudia.
The Acheron is the famous river of the dead in Greek mythology. It was here that the incorruptible ferryman Charon once rowed the deceased to the realm of the god of the dead, Hades. The ferryman received a coin for the crossing, which had to be placed under the dead person's tongue beforehand. This is the origin of the custom of giving the dead a coin for the ferryman. Odysseus had himself rowed from Acheron to Hades as a living person in order to enquire about his fate from the souls of the deceased. In the realm of the dead, he spoke to the souls of the warrior Achilles and the seer Tiresias, who helped him find his way back home. The cunning Odysseus managed to have the ferryman row him to the realm of the dead and still return to the living.
Once we arrive at the River Acheron, we decide to take a short trip to the realm of the dead. I pocket two euro coins in case we find the ferryman Charon. I keep the second coin ready for the way back. Better safe than sorry. But there is no sign of old Charon, who rowed millions of people to Hades and who should have been a multi-millionaire by now. He's probably just buying an outboard motor or helping his home country out of its financial crisis.
In search of the famous ferryman, we discover a young man called Minas Paschos on the banks of the Acheron, who runs the Acheron Kayaking company and could be a great-great-grandson of ancient Charon. Minas gives us life jackets and paddles and shows us on the map exactly where the Nekromanteio, the passage to the realm of the dead, is located. Then we get into the kayaks.
The river Acheron with its dead trees provides a mysterious foretaste of the realm of the dead. After seven kilometres, we reach the legendary Nekromanteio, an ancient oracle that leads to the realm of the dead, near the village of Mesopotamos. We enter a former temple, then walk through a labyrinth before descending steep steps into a deep, underground hall. In this mystical place, it is said to be possible to meet the souls of the deceased.
After a few minutes, we want to get out again. We are glad to be able to climb out of the underworld and are happy when we see the light of the sun again at the top. We quickly leave the realm of Hades and paddle seawards on the Acheron to Ammoudia. We moor up on the shore of the living, where Minas Paschos from Acheron Kayaking is already waiting for us. I'm just about to put a euro coin under my tongue to pay when the young man says with a grin: "Please no coins. I only take banknotes or credit cards."
We leave the Acheron in our wake and head back out into the Ionian Sea. Just 1.5 nautical miles south of the estuary lies Odysseus Bay, where the most famous of all ancient seafarers once anchored to be rowed to the realm of Hades. The circular and well-protected bay is empty, and it's time for us to leave the realm of myths: the next day our plane leaves Preveza for Frankfurt, so the catamaran has to be in Lefkas in the evening.
We enjoy the last 27 miles to the entrance to the Lefkas Channel, where we pass the bridge at 8 p.m., then refuel the boat in the marina and return it to Moorings. It was an exciting journey; the decision to go one way was absolutely right.
INFORMATION ABOUT THE DISTRICT
JourneyCorfu as a port of departure can be reached from all major German airports, with low-cost airlines and from as little as 100 euros if booked in good time. Before booking a one-way trip to Lefkas, you should enquire whether there is a seasonal flight connection to Germany from there (the airport is located between Lefkas and Preveza). In 2012, only Condor flew from Lefkas to Frankfurt - for 123 euros.
Cruising tips
- You should definitely visit the Achillion, the former palace of the Austrian Empress Sissi. The easiest way to get there is by taxi from Corfu Town, a distance of around 8 kilometres. It is also possible to take a boat to the port of Benitses and then walk uphill for around four kilometres to the palace. Open daily in summer from 8 am to 7 pm. www.achillion-corfu.gr
- The cliffs on the west coast of Paxi and Antipaxi are well worth seeing. Be sure to get up early so that you have enough time for caves, grottos or snorkelling. You should leave after 1 p.m., as the Maistral usually blows in summer and causes the seas to lash against the rocks in the afternoon. The harbour villages of Gaios and Lakka are both very beautiful. Arrive early to secure a place in front of the taverna.
- If you are interested in Greek history and mythology, you should visit the river Acheron, which is (almost) on the way. Next to the estuary, you can anchor in a bay with a sandy beach or sail a little way into the river and go alongside in front of the tavernas of Ammoudia. Guided excursions or kayak trips lead to Nekromanteio. The excursion is more relaxed if the crew takes a minibus to the ancient temple and paddles back downstream on the River Acheron in kayaks. Highly recommended! Price is a matter of negotiation, we paid 50 euros for a crew of four. www.acheronkayak.gr
Cruise stages
- Marina Gouvia ▹ N.A.O.K. Corfu 6.0 nm
- N.A.O.K. Corfu ▹ Panagias Vlaheron Monastery 2.5 nm
- Panagias Vlaheron Monastery ▹ Benitses ▹ Petriti 10.0 nm
- Petriti ▹ round Paxos ▹ Lakka 32.0 nm
- Lakka ▹ Antipaxos ▹ Ammoudia 23.0 nm
- Ammoudia ▹ Lefkas 30.0 nm
Total: 103.5 nm
