Serifos & Sifnos!

Well, the first thing to say is that someone has turned the temperature gauge up here in the Cyclades, it has gone from mid 20’s to the mid 30’s overnight and that is in the shade !

We finally left Naousa on Saturday 24th June and with no wind whatsoever, it was clearly a sunbathing on deck day, as we made our way 40 odd miles westward to the Island of Serifos.

On arriving at Serifos we headed to the only real bay on the Island, Livadhi and caught our first glimpse of the Chora on the top of the hill. Serifos is a very mountainous and barren island, reknowned in the sailing world for its katabatic winds which, fortunately given the wind conditions, we did not experience.

Arriving late, we decided to drop our anchor in the bay and spend a peaceful dinner, accompanied by some lovely wine, free swinging through the night, catching what little breeze there was.

The following morning, once all the charter boats had left, and wanting to go to visit the Chora, we made our way into the little harbour, dropping our anchor and tying our stern to the quay, hopeful for some electricity (and aircon!), but sadly no, there was none, so it was definitely going to be a hot one!

After strolling around the  seaside town of Livadhi, we caught the bus up to the Chora, where supposedly most of Serifos live. It was very cute, tiny, but with no soul in town. The best part however was the views of the bay we got which were fantastic and we could see across to Sifnos. The small square in the Chora was very picturesque with a number of bars scattered around it, but very few people, it might have had something to do with the fact that there were only about 8 seated places where you could get any shade, needless to say we were in two of them, but you have to ask yourself, why would you limit your opportunity to add significant business for the sake of a few parasols!  The bus that took us there and back, I am convinced only had two gears and a top speed of about 15km p/h…   but even so the 15 minute journey down the hill and round the bends was pleasant enough, but it sure as hell wasn’t like in the Italian Job (the original of course)!

We stayed the one night and then headed southwards to the Island of Sifnos, occasionally under sail when the wind decided to puff a little, but mostly under engine. We had decided to stop the night in a small bay called Áyios Yeóryios on the north west of the island, which was said to be very cute. We couldn’t argue with that, bad sadly the tiny inlet had too many private moorings dotted around for us to be able to drop our anchor in waters that were shallow enough, and spend a couple of hours there, let alone the night!

We therefore headed off again, southward to the bay of Kamáres, which was also the main port of the island. Rather than be close to the ferries, we anchored off the beach and spent the afternoon, chilling and relaxing and ultimately watching a fabulous sunset.

The following morning, we jumped in the dinghy and went exploring, before setting off again to the south of the island to Plati Yialos, where we could moor up safely and explore the island knowing Seaclusion was tucked up all safe and sound.

Kamáres

Kastro is a village comprising of a huddle of medieval houses perched on steep slopes, blissfully quiet as we meandered through the streets, but we would have hated to be there in August, the walls radiated the heat and that was without any body heat adding to it! Also the bar we found, nice as it was, charged 6 euros for a bottle of Corona, so we managed to fight the urge to have a session and got a taxi back to the marina about 15 kms away, the driver also managed to stop at strategic moments, allowing Chantal to take the best photographs of the views..

With not much more to see on the Island, we are heading off tomorrow to the first of the Islands in the Southern Cyclades, Kimolos & Milos, looking at the forecast, under engine again. Where are these ferocious winds everyone has warned us about in the Cyclades, we ask ourselves, not that we are complaining, this is the most relaxing of our sailing trip so far!