Néa Klima

Leaving Skópelos

Agnóndas

At lunchtime on Wednesday 17 June, we left Skópelos Harbour to head south-about around the island towards Néa Klima. En route we poked our noses into several interesting bays to checking out possible lunch-stops and overnight anchorages for when Charlotte and Sophie join us in July. There was very little wind initially so we motored about half the way but the wind built somewhat by about 2pm and we had a very pleasant gentle beam reach for the final hour and a half of the trip.

Approaching Néa Klima

Our pilot book describes Néa Klima as ‘a small harbour…….crowded with local boats and there is little chance of finding a berth.’ However, we had spoken to a couple of crews who had said that the quay there had been extended (thanks to €4.4M of EU funding we saw on a sign later) and that the harbour was a nice little place to stop, so we decided to see for ourselves. When we arrived, the harbour was quite full with visiting yachts, probably about 20 in all, ranged along the new quay. At the inner end of the quay, were about 5 yachts alongside; the remainder were all moored Med-style, bows or stern to the quay. Happily, there was space for 2 more yachts (us and a chartered Bavaria 49 ‘Anax’ that arrived a short while after us) at the outer end of the quay near the breakwater. We went in stern-first, laying out about 35m of chain. Unfortunately, the skipper of the yacht on our port side had laid his chain somewhat skew-whiff and rather than being out straight from his boat’s bows it angled off to starboard, towards where our chain should (and did) run, and away from the prevailing wind. Consequently, we laid our chain out over his but agreed to sort it out when he wanted to leave the next day.

There is a lovely beach just the other side of the quay to which we were moored so we took a swim before doing a cursory exploration of the town. As we enjoyed sundowners in the cockpit we spotted a thunder cloud building towards the north end of Skópelos. Over the next couple of hours this grew, and grew, and grew…. We were playing backgammon in the cockpit and the crew of the yacht to port of us had gone ashore for dinner when the wind began to blow. Predictably, the yacht to port of us started to sag downwind to lean on BV and, because her anchor chain was not tight enough, the yacht also surged back and forth almost onto the quay, as the strong gusts came through. I hopped on board to try to tighten up on the chain, but there was no power applied to the windlass, so I moved a couple of fenders to protect the stern. Meanwhile, ‘Anax’, on the other side of us, was starting to sag downwind too, despite the crew having relaid the anchor earlier in the evening with more chain and a better angle to the likely prevailing wind. And then the anchor of the yacht just beyond the one on our port side started to drag and she too sagged down to leeward, adding her weight to that already on poor BV’s anchor, whilst her crew tried to fend the bow off the quay.

At this point the crew of the yacht to our port arrived back and a South African chap called Alan appeared. Alan and his wife, Deborah, keep their catamaran in the Gulf of Volos and frequently cruise in the Sporades. Their boat was alongside the quay at the top end of the harbour but he knew that there would be some boats struggling with the gusts of 26-33kts that were crossing the harbour, beam on to the Med-moored yachts. With his help we managed to jury-rig lines to provide additional, wider strong points from which other lines could be run to the beams of ‘Anax’ and the yacht to our port. This, tightening up further on anchor cables and adjusting other lines reduced the amount they sagged downwind and helped to stabilise the situation. Meanwhile the rain poured down, the strong gusts became more frequent and the crew on the yacht with the dragging anchor got their engine going – it rather seemed as if they might have to stay motor in reverse all night!

Eventually, things started to calm down but with much of the weight of 2 additional yachts being taken on BV’s anchor when the wind was above 10kts. I held an anchor watch until 0230 and then handed over to Nicky. By that time the thunderclouds had pretty much cleared so Nicky held the watch for only a short period before deciding that there was no longer any need for it.

By the light of day the impressive night-time giants’ knitting match was clear for all to see. And we could see how much BV’s water/wind powered generator bracket had been rotated by the force of the black line to the left of the picture bearing on it (prior to moving BV forward a little in her berth and re-running the black line to the rope loop as shown in the left-hand photo above).

Streetlights at noon

After a lovely start to the day, the clouds returned and by 11am it started to arin again…….. and, boy, did the heavens open! The rain bounced off the quayside producing a mist about 4” deep and it was so dark and gloomy that all the streetlights came on!

We waited until the worst was over, the 2 yachts to port had left and ‘Anax’ to starboard had repositioned to alongside another yacht on another quay and grabbed the chance to moor alongside too, though with the wind off the quay and the available space not much longer than BV, it took us 3 attempts to get it right.

We stayed another 2 nights at Néa Klima and, happily, there were no further storms as violent as the one on that first night. It rained for most of the second day and a lot of that night too, though we spent the evening very convivially on board ‘Anax’ with Peter and Rachel and their large crew of friends and family. It was, again, brought home to us just how small a world it can be, when we discovered that one of their team, Ian Davies, had been best man to Scott Eldridge, someone I used to work with. Furthermore, Scott will be joining Peter and Rachel on board ‘Anax’ in a week or so’s time – what a coincidence!

View from Néa Klima towards Skópelos, thankfully now without the thunderstorms    

Néa Klima, Greece