Síkinos

We all slept well during our second night on Sífnos after a busy and quite tiring couple of days. Having gone ashore for bread and a few other supplies, we up-anchored at 1130 and, with 3 reefs in the main and about half the genoa unrolled, set off for Síkinos at the rush. The wind was greatly reduced compared to Friday but it was still pretty brisk (17-19kts from the north-northwest) and we bowled along at a good speed mentally racing the two other yachts near us that were headed in the same direction. Nicky had planned for us to stay to the north of Síkinos, go round the eastern tip of the island and then run back down the southern side of the island for 5nm to the harbour. The yacht ahead of us looked as if they were going to go around Síkinos’ western tip and then abruptly changed course to take a similar route to us, just closer to the Síkinos’ northern coast.

As we went west the wind gradually reduced so we shook out some of the reefs and then, as we approached the acceleration zone between the eastern tip of Síkinos and the northwestern tip of Ios, we gradually rolled away some of the genoa again.

Síkinos is a fairly brown and barren looking island which provides something of a lee from the northerly wind, though in places the wind gusts strongly down valley features. The harbour at Síkinos is said to silt badly and most of the beach is buoyed off for swimming in the summer months restricting anchoring space.

We had hoped that there might be space for us to go onto the quay but expected to have to anchor off, particularly as the yacht ahead was, disappointingly, going to get to the port before us. Nicky and I remembered visiting Síkinos when we had chartered a yacht in 2000 and on that occasion we had taken the risk of joining another yacht moored stern-to the ferry quay. This time we anchored just inshore of the yacht that had arrived ahead of us. They had put out 30m of chain but, being ahead of them and in only 4m of water, we decided on about 20m, with the anchor chum to intensify the catenary effect of the chain. The bottom was sand and excellent holding and the water so clear that we could see where other anchor chains had moved across the bottom and left marks like tank tracks.

We dived on the anchor, saw that we had dug it in securely and watched the anchor chum hold the chain down towards the horizontal as the wind gusted across the harbour blowing BV back on anchor. We were very secure.

Though we had thought about going ashore to explore, in the end we didn’t and had a peaceful evening on board eating an excellent chicken hotpot (thank you Neil, a great ‘Ready, Steady Cook’ result!) and enjoying the sunset. In the morning (1 September) Nicky had an enthusiastic swim around BV and a quick scrub at the waterline before we headed northeast the few miles to Íos.

Síkinos