Sunday 3 September 2017 – Porto Palermo and Marina di Orikum

As you can see we never got internet to post a blog on Saturday, so I will deal with both “interesting” days.  Saturday morning was lovely and we hoped to get away by 9am.  But we had to see the agent Agim, who kept putting us off paying him.  So it was rather later in the morning than we hoped when we saw him, paid and finally got some papers to prove that we had legally signed in to Albania.

So we got away at about 10am, which wasn’t too bad.  Richard wanted us to go to a little bay that one of the pilot books said had an unmissable castle near it.  The problem was that there are no real provisions for yachts there and part of the bay is taken over by the military who have been known to tell people to move away.

The bay is called Porto Palermo and it was only about 15 miles from Sarande, a nice short trip.  We hoped we might be able to sail there, but there was literally no wind.  So we motored all the way.  When we got there it was plain that the military were going to be no problem.  There is a tall quay there for fishermen, but private yachts do tie up.  However it is very high and difficult to reach the bollards.  So we decided to anchor as was suggested by the pilot books.  We put the anchor down in what looked like sand (although the books did say it was sand and stone and unreliable holding).  We even managed to put a long line ashore, using our old main halyard, which we kept for this purpose.  The boat seemed fine.  It was sitting beautifully in a straight line from the shore.  Richard checked the anchor with his snorkel and mask and said that it wasn’t dug in, but seemed to be holding fine particularly in this settled weather.  He also took a scrubbing brush to the bits of the hull that are particularly weedy including where the log emerges, so that might help.

So off we went in the dinghy to look at the castle.  The best part of it is its position at the top of what was a little island, but now has a causeway.  It is very hot.  We had been swimming, but the walk up to the castle was hard in the heat even though it was now late afternoon.  The castle looks very old, but it was only build in the early 1800’s, so not so exciting as all that.  Lots of rooms, though.

Back to the shore, where we had a drink and managed to use a little WIFI, but we are reluctant to take the computer in the dinghy because we do not have a waterproof bag big enough to take it.  So no blog.

Dinner on board and then early to bed because for some reason we were both exhausted.

I don’t know why but I woke up at 4:30 am and became a bit concerned about the weather.  The wind was up to a force 4 and there were flashes of lights in the sky that seemed to be lightening, but there was no thunder and the sky was pretty clear with a lot of stars shining.  So I just went back to bed.   However I was awoken again about 45 minutes later by the boat rocking a lot and then a loud noise from the anchor.  On looking out I could see that we had badly dragged our anchor.  We were lying parallel to the shore instead of at right angles and perilously close to two concrete pillars in the water.  We had to fix the anchor immediately.  So I woke up Richard and both of us initially stark naked decided the only thing to do was to drop the line ashore, because there was no way to get it off quickly, the wind now up to a force 6 and blowing us down on one of the concrete pillars, and we had to move the boat quickly.  So we let the line go and put out 20 metres more of chain which stabilized the situation somewhat.  Then all we could do was wait for the dawn and keep watch.  So that was the end of our nights sleep.

Dawn came at about 6am.  The weather now was bad.  Clear storm clouds were overhead and there was real lightening and thunder.  Soon the heavens opened.  That one storm abated so we decided to try to move and re-set the anchor and retrieve our line.  However that was impossible.  First Richard cut his toe running around the boat barefoot.  With the blood thinners he takes it makes him bleed terribly and the cockpit looked like someone had been murdered.  So I had to bandage him up first.  Then a further storm squall hit with very high winds and we could not get the anchor to set.  So we decided to abandon the line (it wasn’t worth risking us and the boat for) and leave the harbour to make our way to Orikum, which is what we had planned to do today anyway.  As we left a worse squall hit, a katabatic wind straight from the mountain to the east of us.  When the first storm abated Richard had undone the sail bag, hoping for a nice downwind sail.  Now with a force 6-7 (I saw 30 knots on the instruments) blowing the sail was all over the place and it was far too dangerous to let Richard go forward. 

So heart in mouth we motored out. The rain was coming down hard and the sea was awful.  But as we got out of the bay we could see what looked like clearer skies in the direction we wanted to go.  Finally the last squall left us and Richard was able to put up the main with two reefs in.  But by now the sea was very lumpy.  There were waves coming at us from the side at about a height of 1-1.5 metres.  Not dangerous, but very uncomfortable.  I took a pill fairly early on.  In the beginning I was too afraid to feel sick, but later I was grateful for medication.  I stood it in the cockpit for about 2 ½ hours.  We had a seven hour trip in front of us, so I retired below and went to sleep for nearly another 2 hours.  By the time I came back up the sea had flattened out a lot and the sail working with the engine was making us whizz along at over 6 knots.  Richard was now tired so I took over on watch and he had an hour’s kip.

Thus we made it to Marina De Orikum.  This is the only marina for private yachts in Albania.  It was built and is owned by Italians.  It is very small, but we phoned ahead and they promised us a berth so that was a relief.  It has lazy lines, electricity and water and toilets and showers, and free WIFI.  But it is pretty much in the middle of nowhere, some miles south of Vlore.  But we are safe.  The weather report for tomorrow is not good, so we will be here another day, despite the rather high charges (40 Euros a night).

I am not looking forward to the next trips.  They are long passages of about 12 hours.  I thought I had been promised no overnighters!

We can’t post this now because the entire marina has had a power cut.  Maybe tomorrow.