Ancient Coasts

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Some five weeks ago I departed from Murter, Croatia, to sail south to the inland sea of Levkada in Greece…

My sailing yacht Helena, a Beneteau Cyclades 39, is very easy to handle and performs well, including the Genaker, one of my trip gadgetsthe ultimate toy. Top speed we reached was 8.7 knots sailing downwind surfing from the waves, faster then the 7.8 knots we reached with the Genaker. I am speeding I think as she was never pushed to before.

The other gadgets are my BBQ – used well – and a Go Pro high definition wide angle video camera. Only my MacBook is not speeding as I wished due to the installation of a Croatian Internet Stick. So I do feel crippled this sailing trip and I cannot upload any of the video’s made.

After 5 weeks one of the lessons I have learned is that I am now an internet addict officially. So my the gadget for my next sailing trip will be  a high-speed satellite internet connection mounted to the boat

Trip Summary

Since last Tuesday I am heading home, after having thrown my anchor at Ithaca, home of King Odysseus, the ultimate destination of my Odyssean Trail, so time for an update.

From tomorrow I will be heading back to Croatia. But I have learned from the classics and know never to rush things and unplease the Gods like Odysseus did. So I will sail via Puglia in Italy, enjoy the Italian food and maybe sacrifice some of it to the Gods before returning Helena to Croatia.

Heading to Ithaca

Some pictures of the sailing trip along the ancient coasts of Croatia, Montengro and Greece

31 Photos

Croatia

Of the first 2 weeks in Croatia worth mentioning are the waterfalls of Skradin, Ancient Split with its palace of Diocletianus, Hvar still the Ibiza of the Adriatic and Stari Grad, the BBQ in a bay in Lastovo, brutely disturbed by a thunderstorm  (Lastovo was forbidden to enter until the end of the 1990′sand we anchored left to departed submarine bunkers and VHF monitor buildings), Sipan (I will retire there once), and Dubrovnik and Cavtat (Port of Entry) in Croatia.

Weather conditions where light the first week and brilliant the second week where we had 28 knots of wind between Hvar and Vis. Fantastic to sail so much wind just in your shorts. Of the 2,5 weeks in Croatia, only one day was with rain. We did get some anchor showers though

Montenegro

In Montenegro I have visited Kotor with it’s immense city walls from around 1500 and also Tivat, where a superyacht marina is being build currently. Nice to be provided with a personal naval assistant.

Perast and the islands “Gospa od Skrpjela” are impressive. Perast was in ancient times the maritime center of the Venetian Empire and the church on one of the islands served as votive center for seafarers.

I see Sveti Stefan as the highlight of the country. Similar to what celebreties of the 1950′s like Sophia Lorenz thought. It attractiveness declined after the death of Tito and the civil war of yugoslavia but now it is being restored to it’s previous glamour. The visit to Montenegro ended in Bar, where we left the country.

The weather was not in favour of us in Montengro, although always sunny and around 28 degrees, we had no wind for almost 1,5 weeks.

Greece

Corfu Town was the first city we touched in Greece. It was good to be in Greece but the bureaucratic system is something you don’t want to have to deal with. It took me 4 hours of waiting and formalities to enter the country with my Croatian ship. Later it took me about 2 hours to pay 88 eurocents of taxes in some obscure tax office.

After Corfu town, our destination was Ay Stefanou. A very tranquille bay to anchor and come to strength after the crossing from Montenegro (circa 175 nautical Miles, about 50% of the time 15 – 20 knots of wind from the back). Via Gaios on Paxoi (or Paxos) we arrived at Levkada itself.

Last week it was my intention to have a more holiday oriented week with low profile sailing, just to digest the almost 800 nautical miles already sailed in the first 4 weeks. Finally time to do some decent snorkeling and firing up the BBQ. But also reached my destination: Ithaca.

After Ithaca and having visited the ruins of the castle of King Odysseus (one of the 3 possible locations on the island, not to mention other islands) we went to the Bay of Pandelimon where a Dolphin family was entertaining us during the evening and the next morning. It was the first time I have swum with dolphins.

Weather conditions in the last week was top, no wind in the mornings and around 14:00 the Gods switched on the wind and we got 20 knots of wind almost every day.

Tags: Bar, Corfu, Croatia, Dolphins, Dubrovnik, Elephati Islands, Genaker, Greece, Hvar, Ithaca, Kakan, Kotor, Levkas, Luka's Taverna, Montenegro, Odysseus, Perast, Sailing, School of Homer, Skradin, Split, Sveti Stefan, Tivat

When sailing around the Levkas area, anchoring in deep blue bays, hopping around the mountainous islands and mingling with the locals, you don’t think immediately of war and the cruelty people can do to each other in such times. When reading “Captain Correlli’s Mandolin” by Louis de Bernières you will be confronted with life during war and associated crimes in this area based on true facts.

The Facts

In the Second World War the Ionean island Cephalonia (Nisos Kefallínia) in Greece (close to Levkas & Ithaca) was occupied by 9,000 Alpine Acqui soldiers of the Italian Fascists army in 1943. Greece, although a totalarian state at that time and more a partner of “The Dark Forces”, was betrayed by Mussolini who was desperate in need for some success after several fiasco’s in Africa. He didn’t succeed in Greece alone by the way and the occupation of Greece by Italian and German troops was the result.

After Italy was defeated by the English around 1943, the Italian troops in Cephalonia refused to hand the island over to the Nazi’s. For seven days the Italians fought the Germans until eventually the remaining soldiers of the Acqui division, around 6,000 men, surrendered and were betrayed by the Nazi’s and executed, it is said on Hitler’s personal order.

The killing of 5,500 Italian soldiers and nearly 500 officers is thought to have been the second-largest murder of prisoners of war during the Second World War, ranking alongside the infamous 1940 Katyn Forest massacre of Polish army officers by Soviet military police.

One of the last survivors of the massacre is Salvatore Di Rado, now 94, who lives in the Abruzzo region of central Italy. He told in the newspaper Il Messagero that he was lined up in a firing squad but the bullets missed him. “I was saved by the body of a comrade which shielded me. I stayed still under all the bodies, pretending to be dead, and then when darkness fell, and the Germans went away, I hid in the scrub, suffering the agonies of hunger and thirst. But I was alive, and farmers on Cephaloni later gave me help.”

The Novel

The novel by Louis de Bernières deals with the above mentioned occupation and historic events of Cephalonia and adds the love affair between the Italian captain Corelli and the young Greek girl Pelagia during the second World War and the arrival of the Germans and the Communist resistance. This book has been laureated and at the end made a movie of it. Although the movie does not have the depth of the book (again the book is so much better), is hard to watch completely after having read the book, the movie does show you some good shots of the beauty of the Greek islands as a book never could do (but a visit would).

Personally I found the book one of the best novels I have read for quite some time. Besides love as a main theme in the book, as a romantic always good to read (and visualizing Penelope Cruz as Pelagia, well casted I would say), it also clearly provides an image of the horrors of war and what it does with people, weak people becoming in power because of the gun and the bestialities in them that open up and what they are then capable of when suppressing civilians. The book also gives you insights in the occupation of Greece in the second world war and the Civil War after WWII had ended of which I was unaware.

Get the Flash Player to see the wordTube Media Player.

Some links for further reading:

History of Greece: two relevant articles, the first on Greece in the Second World War and secondly on the Civil War in Greece after WWII. The role of the Communist partisans in Greece presented in these page are certainly not in line with the view of de Bernières by the way.

The Telegraph – Investigation into massacre which inspired ‘Captain Corelli’s Mandolin’ reopened: In the article some actual news is given on the prosecution of the ones held responsible for the slaughter of the Italians on

The Random House – Captain Corellis Mandolin: The publisher  The Random House provides a summary, short analysis of the themes of book of de Bernières and an interview with the author

IMDB – Captain Corelli’s Mandolin: The movie with Penelope Cruz and Nicholas Cage has been rated a 5.8 on the IMDB

Tags: Captain Corelli, Cephalonia, Greece, Levkas, Louis de Bernières, World War II

Back from an overwhelming sailing trip with the Zeezeilers across the English Channel.

In a staccato summary, we sailed from Boulogne-sur-Mer (France) to Cowes (UK), the Mecca for sailors on the Isle of Wight. After which we left England for Guernsey passing the famous Needles (can you see them on the picture above?). Having visited the other Channel Islands like Alderley and Sark, it was our plan to leave Jersey for Granville last Saturday.

We knew we had windforce 8 to deal with and had to change our destination during sailing, all according to our prepared plan. We entered the harbour of Saint Malo in France just before midnight. This last tour was again overwhelming as it is extremely exciting to surf from waves of over 3 metres and see them break in front of you.

More about the sailing trip (pictures, GPS track etc.) to follow…

Tags: Alderley, Cowes, English Channel, Guernsey, Isle of Wight, Jersey, Sailing, Sark, the Needles

Thunderstorms were forecasted when we sailed to Terschelling last week. Happy to say we managed to keep it dry. No wind on the first day from Volendam to Makkum so we had to go to Hindeloopen to fill up the tank.

Our stop at Hindeloopen took longer then expected  when some local punks decided to molest our the dinghy (see also our track in the lock of Hindeloopen in the mapmania). We had some argument and at the end they paid so we could continue our trip to Makkum.

The next day was just fantastic sailing to Terschelling in the sun and tacking against about 15 – 20 knot wind from the North.

See the next page for the virtual sailing log and mapmania.

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The Beancounters Voice

A quick and dirty way of telling about a sailing race is just showing the numbers. It is the beancounters way of telling a story and it would go like:

Raced from Barcelona to Ibiza with S/Y Colombe, a Swan 441 R from 1979 during Eastern. The track distance of the race was 138 nautical Miles (nM), we sailed 152 nM in 25.8 hours and had an average speed of 5.9 knots. We had finished as 2^nd in our class.

Nice? This is just the start…

Step 1: Data Visualisation

To get it a little bit more attractive you could start visualizing the data. Using the combined magic of Google Earth, GPSBabel, GPS Visualizer and good old Excel you could tell the story of route, speed, distance, heading as a more attractive story:

Average Speed per Hour	Speed per 20 minutes
Speed versus Heading over Time	Measurement Statistics

Step 2: Get your Mediaman

Although numbers are always correct and the summary above provides a pretty good picture, you seldom will get the feeling of taking part of the race. It is still not the story giving you the feeling such as  ”Yes! I want to be on that sailing yacht!”.

Similar why a London-based Investment W Banker earns a 1,000 times more then the accountant or the chief scientist, it is all about sales. A more epic version is to be narrated from the data collected during the race. This is the something you need your Mediaman for… Get him now for free!

La Ruta: The Epic Version

01 April, 11:00 AM – Leaving Les Botiques

We prepare the  boat from the largest Genua to the Spi, because you never know. It is unlikely to be raised, but you just want the 150 square metre of extra sails up…

Meanwhile the tactical team struggles with iPhones and UMTs modems to get the latest Gribfiles downloaded and save the latest Windguru predictions. Fair weather and southeastern wind of 10-15 knots expected, meaning an upwind course to Ibiza.

Around 1100 AM we leave the harbour with the other participants heading to the startline. In the middle of the harbour one of the bigger ships hit grounds, damn boy, that looks stupid in front of everyone.

12:10 PM – The Start

At 11:50 AM the 10 minutes before start signal is given. Hundreds of boat make their moves to get the best position for the start. A flag is raised, a delay of the start for 10 minutes. Reasons unknown, no one really cares. All boats, from a classic cut schooner to a big dark Wally, have to rethink their strategy. Stick to the strategy shown to the sharp observer or change plans to the best start approach.

We have a good start and because we expect a windshift more from the North we head for a port tack first.

14:35 – The Chase

About 80% of the participants do the goose walk along mainstreet and went starboard along the Spanish Coast. Some brave challengers tried to follow the Eagle and are heading their first tack also to the east expecting the more northern wind.

17:00 PM – The 5 O’Clock Show

At Five it the ancient wisdom prevails, a “kopstoot” (I am told it is translated something like a “gin with a chaser“) along with our Dutch national bard & boozer André Hazes.

Statistics: Sailed 26.8 nM in 4.8 hours with an (ergo) average speed of 5.54 knots

20:00 PM – Dinner

At 8 oclock we have a lucios dinner. A special prepared meal by the top chefs of Barcelonetta.

The delicate mix of the finests ingredients of Catalunya combined with the splendour of powerfood. No iceberg will stop us with this ménagerie à trois of bami, rice and pasta.

02 April, 00:00 New watch

An impressive moon is born out of the sea. The gracious star-spangled sky is replaced by the full moon coloured to red by the asscloud of Icelandic Vulcano called Eyjafjallajokull. The cloudless night gives a panoramic view over the Balearic Sea lighted by the full moon of Eastern.

Unfortunately this poetry just does not cover for the extreme coldness of that night.

In reality five deepfrozen people dive down looking for their berth. Five just awakened but still sleepy people have to go outside taking an ice-bath. Picking everything up that can provide some shelter (from hot coffee to a nice comfortable warm sock).

Statistics: about 61.30747 nM further from start in 10.8 hours averaging it out at 5.7 knots

11:00 AM – Sailing & Sleeping

The old ancient wisdom of racing the Balearic: it is just better to sleep and enjoy.

02 April 13:58 Finish

Raced from Barcelona to Ibiza with S/Y Colombe, a Swan 441 R from 1979 during Eastern. The track distance of the race was 138 nautical Miles (nM), we sailed 152 nM in 25.8 hours and had an average speed of 5.9 knots. We had finished as 2nd in our class.

Our Eagle Swan has beaten the goozes.

Colombe crossed the line as second in our class and 10^th overall of the ca. 300 participants. “Jay Walker“, a Dutch J-35, finished first in our class and “La Floresta del Mar” a Swan 56, won La Ruta de la Sal overall. The complete overview can be found here.

Time for a drink in the Pacha

More pictures at Flickr (including the directors cut of the return to Barcelona)

Tags: Barcelona, Colombe, Data visualisation, Ibiza, Mediaman, Race, Ruta de la Sal, Sailing, spain, Statistics, Swan 441 R, Virtual Log

Did some nice sailing on the IJsselmeer lately.

A nice long weekend along the coast of Friesland – the Dutch province with a hang for independence similar like Scotland – with the four of us (good) on a Bavaria 38 (yes, I know) with a bow thruster (even worse… ) but more noticable, it was also the first summer weekend in the Netherlands.

Click here for Full-screen Sailing Mapmania

Left from Lemmer with around 15 knots of northwestern wind to tack to Stavoren on Friday. I think we sailed around 30,886294 nautical Miles (nM) that day, more or less.

We had dinner that evening in Restaurant “De Koebrug”, which was a vary pleasant discovery. A restaurant inspired by the Scottish culture and serving local dishes (lambs from the neighbours and cheeses from some villages away) combined with one of the 500 whiskeys in stock.

Next day to Makkum (Wikipedia in Frysk) with around 15 – 20 knots of wind from the North so more tacking (circa 20 nM) for some serious monkey yawning, so when back in Amsterdam I bought my lottery ticket immediately.

On Sunday we left Makkum for some serious motorsailing of 32 nM as there wasn’t any wind at all.

Virtual Sailing Log

National Sailing Heritage

One of the cool things of the IJsselmeer is that you can still find national heritage sailing around. Respect for the people keeping these boats afloat and finding the time and money to keep them in shape.

The boat above, the VD 17 (VD stands for Volendam) is a boattype called “Garnkwak” (more about this kind of ship) and is built in 1919. This type of ship was used for a special way of fishing with the nets put behind the ship using two trees to drag it across the seabed, while the ship sailed downwind.

The ship was in use for fishing from 1919 – 1952. It was brought back to the Netherlands for restauration in 2009, after it has been used as a charter in Bonaire  (rent the VD 17).

My best guess is that these boats are of the type called “Schokker“ in Dutch and my inital research makes me believe that the first image of a Schokker is known from 1791 by the painter G. Groenewegen (currently looking for a picture of this image).

Tags: Bavaria 38, De Koebrug, Friesland, Garnkwak, IJsselmeer, Lemmer, Makkum, National Sailing Heritage, Sailing, Schokker, Stavoren, VD 17, volendam, Zeilen

Two more weeks before sailing in Sardegna, found the clip on YouTube doing my research, counting down the days

Added two more books to my library for this trip. The pilot for Corsica and North Sardinia and the Rough Guide to Sardinia.

First impressions: the Maddelena Archipelago will be beautiful and I hope we can make the crossing to Corsica from Sardinia as Bonifacio looks as a place not to be missed.

Lot of wind to be expected though, crossing the Bonifacio Strait between the islands. The well-known Venturi effect (kiting paradise) will create gale-force winds. Some people will not like it being aboard…

Just as a reminder for myself, the latest weather forecastfor sailing of Sardinia: SardegnaARPA

Tags: Appetizer, Bonifacio, Italy, Maddelena Archipelago, Movie, Sailing, Sardegna, Sardinia

One of the better races of the Netherlands, was held this weekend in Scheveningen. The Delta Lloyd North Sea Regatta 2010, a three day sailing event along the coast of the North Sea.

I was invited to participate the first races on GfK, a Beneteau First of 40.7 foot. The weather conditions Friday were light, northern wind of around 10-15 knots.

Around 13:00 the races started in two shifts.

The Start

It was quite a straight parcours in line with the wind direction. It had a bouy with a spreader in the North and a Gate in the South. Boats were going up and down along the same rhumbline, you just had to be careful not getting sandwiched.

Sailing the rhumbline

Unfortunately the weather conditions changed to the worse. The second race was cancelled due to fog and we had to return to the harbour. We were not the only ones there.

For the record, we finished second in our class (ORC-1) that day, just 32 seconds (on 1,5 hours) behind the overall winner of the NSR 2010.

For more pictures see the Flickr Slideshow

Tags: Beneteau First, Gfk, North Sea Regatta, Race, Sailing

What to say about a classic designed Swan from 1979, the lean and mean racing machine?

First thing is that such a classic racing boat certainly has a charm you feel directly. The very spartan interior doesn’t change the instant affection for the boat, not to mention the sailing.

Cool to be on such a boat during the race for La Ruta de la Sal. Everyone focused on speed and speed only. A slight change in wind and everyone was running to change the sail for the newborn circumstances.

Yelling heist, heist, heist and the Genua 3 was changed into a Genua 4 in less then a minute. Lot of sails and lines on a racing boat although. Could still prefer a good old cruising boat for sailing the Ancient Coasts.

Below my impression of Sailing Yacht Colombe.

The Toolset

The Wheel	The Grinder	The Winch

The Mainsail

The Genua

Pulling The Lines	The Genua

Raising the Spi

Colombe Sailing

Flickr

The complete set can also be view as a Flickr Slideshow (click link)

Tags: Barcelona, Ibiza, Mediterranean Sea, Middle Sea, Ruta de la Sal, Sailing, spain, Swan 441 R

Returned from La Ruta de la Sal for about 3 weeks and (finally) time to look back to the sailing race from Barcelona to Ibiza with S/Y Colombe.

First impression from the pink cloud of experiences, is about the impact of just little week of sailing on your ability to process complex questions about the purpose of life. Sailing has definitely a different impact then holidays like skiing or 3 weeks in France.

So if you ever have some challenging complex thoughts about the purpose of  sitting in the office 8 hours a day. About having a screensharing “Live Meeting” with your colleagues all over the world by phone and internet. About the why of living in a rainy climate with glasshouse grown vegetables or defrosted fresh fish. Just do some sailing!

Whether it is in Spain or along the coast of any other Mediterranean country (Carib might do as well), be gifted by the lightness of thinking!

Schopenhauer: You have to depart before you can arrive

Departure from Schiphol, Amsterdam

The Road (not so less travelled)

Arrival at Port Vell, Barcelona

Colombe , our ship for the race, has it’s homebase in Port Vell in the centre of Barcelona (you can see it in the center of the picture from the plane), although sailing under Dutch flag. The old Cathedral or the Ramblas just a 5-minutes walk. Next to the harbour: Barceloneta, the former dangerous slumps of Barcelona, a good place to go out for drinks and tapas. May I recommend you the Foc bar?

PS It is more that I would like to dedicate my most “philosophical” quote in this post to Schopenhauer. I don’t think there is anything said close to being well thought off. It is just that there was philosophical course at the University of Groningen called after him during my study. By just only subscribing to it, you got a grant of the government for an extra year studying…

Preparing Colombe

Colombe is a classic designed Swan 441 R designed by Ron Holland and built in 1979. It has 2 main sails, 4 genua’s, a Genaker and a Spi. No fancy cabins and bedrooms inside, just a large compartment for the sails and to sleep in (although a decent toilet). A lean and mean racing machine.

Without proper preparations no racing, mind you, preparations can make the difference between winning and complete failure. In trying to capture the tension of preparing  the yacht, I attached my camera to the bow and programmed it to take a picture every 30 seconds using an interval timer. The movie is made of circa 450 pictures that have been glued together. The ground idea of this movie came form the inspiring movie Sandpit on Vimeo.

See below “Preparing Colombe” which took us in total about 5 hours. Bear in mind, a mean and lean racing machine designed and designated to win!

Preparing Colombe for the Ruta de la Sal 2010 from Ancient Coasts on Vimeo.

Next Post

So long the preparations, next post will provide you with full disclosure of the ship, the race and it’s crew. So stay tuned.

Tags: Barcelona, Columbe, Ibiza, Port Vell, Ruta de la Sal, Sailing, spain, Swan, time lapse photography