Órmos Vourkari

The island of Kéa was on our track to get to Athens and, since we had not visited it before, we decided that we would stop there, in Limín Agios Nikólaos, for a night. It’s only about 30 miles from Batsí, 5-6 hours sailing, so there was plenty of time for us to go ashore to buy fresh bread and some fruit before departing. We left at 1230, unrolling just the genoa to make idle use of the dead-astern wind which was 18 knot even as we cleared the entrance to the bay. We gybed around the Greek Navy frigate, which had been anchored outside Órmos Batsí for our entire stay, and headed southeast. It was a passage of little excitement [Ed: always good!], with the only complication being the amount of shipping we had to work our way through. The AIS plots the location of in-range ships and we have set it up to show their and our predicted tracks/positions over the next 30 minutes. That takes away a lot of the stress of sailing relatively close to large ships because a quick glance at the chart plotter display shows you if you need to take significant avoiding action or just adjust heading slightly to pass clear [Ed: usually behind!]. Off the north of Kéa, the wind dropped so, cursing our earlier idleness, we hoisted the mainsail but it kept BV moving along nicely – so much better than switching on the donk.

On the northwest side of Kéa is deep enclosed bay. The entrance is marked by a lighthouse and up on the hill above is the chora, a vision in Cycladic-style white-painted cuboid houses.

Looking north – perhaps a better placeto anchor   

As we entered the bay we could see to our right, in the southern part of the bay, the village of Korissía, where the ferry stops. However, the wind was still reasonably strong from the north and with that part of the bay open to the north, and with a ½ mile fetch too, we thought that we would have a better night’s sleep at anchor elsewhere.

Old coaling station (top) and Órmos Vourkari   

So, we turned left and headed up towards the old coaling station, which used to refuel steamers making their way up to the Black Sea ports. Apparently, pilot books of that era really rated Limín Agios Nikólaos as a harbour both for the shelter and the holding. The hold was said to be particularly good off the bunkering station and it probably still is. However, there are now 2 underwater cables that come ashore at that point; anchors and electrical cables don’t mix well, so we headed up the other arm - Órmos Vourkari. This inlet is very popular with Athens-based yachts and by the time we arrived the anchorage was already pretty full.

There was, however, an obvious space between 2 Amels, so we dropped our anchor ahead of them and settled back into the space, putting out quite a lot of chain as the water was deep and the wind still gusting.

Vourkari quay by day   

However, behind us was the town quay and despite being over 100 metres away from it, the chap who helps yachts moor up felt that we were too close. We duly raised the anchor and dropped it again, this time a little further away from the quay (much closer to the yacht ahead, much to her crew’s interest whose heads popped up like meercats) and we settled for putting out just 3 times the depth of water in chain. The mooring chap seemed happy (or too preoccupied with arriving boats) and so we settled in and watched the steady stream of yachts arriving for the weekend.

Vourkari quay by night   

Come sunset the quay was full, most of the available anchoring space seemed to have been filled and, happily, the steady stream of arriving boats had slowed. We had a good dinner in the cockpit enjoying the sunset and plotted our next move west - a nightstop at off the temple at Cape Sounion and then on to Kalamaki Marina at Athens.

Órmos Vourkari, Greece