Páros Órmos Áy Ioannou

When it came to leaving our mooring at Náxos on Monday morning, 1 August, the anchor windlass initially operated very slowly before speeding up and sounding normal. Under load it slowed down again. Despite that it still managed to haul up 3 extra chains from other moorings in the harbour on which, it turned out, our anchor had become fouled. Rather than disturb the moorings further, I got snorkel gear on and ran a line underneath the chains. Nicky secured both ends of the line tightly to BV so that we could lower our anchor to unhook it, before fully raising and stowing it. Once I had towelled off and we were ready to go, I let go of one end of the rope and BV was free for Nicky to steer out of the harbour. It all went well but we were left with a question mark over the serviceability of our anchor windlass.

Approaching Órmos Áy Ioannou 

Originally we had intended to sail upwind to Míkonos from where Charlotte was getting her flight home. However, on balance, it was decided that flogging upwind did not involve enough sunbathing. So, to fit in with the holiday aspirations, we moved 10 miles from Náxos to Órmos Áy Ioannou, a lovely anchorage on the northern tip of Páros. As we approached the sheltered area of the bay it was clear that a lot of other people had had the same idea.

Órmos Áy Ioannou   

Checking the anchor windlass gearbox   

The anchorage was full of all sorts of yachts, some of which were really quite large. We found ourselves a suitable spot and dropped the hook. It was a nice place to stop but at some stage we’d need to raise the anchor again so Nicky and I used the time to remove the windlass and split open the gearbox as I wanted to check that the bearings were good and that water had not got into the gearbox or the electric motor. It was a relatively simple job but it took a few hours to complete. [Ed: meanwhile Charlotte had plenty of time to ‘panic sunbathe’!] We found that the gearbox was fine and that there were no signs of any water leaks into it. Liberally greased we put everything back together with a new bearing, seal and gasket [Ed: happily there were no small cogs left over at the end!]. Then we checked the wiring connections and the solenoid and, again, all seemed good. But when we operated the windlass it was still very slow to get going and then sped up. We concluded that we need a new electric motor; one of the spares we should have on board but don’t!

'Nomad'   

Confident that we’d done everything that we could and that we’d worked out a couple of contingency options to get the anchor up if the windlass failed completely, we relaxed, swam and enjoyed watching the activity in the bay. It was busy with water-skiers, jet bikes and a constant changeover of yachts. The arriving motor yachts seemed to get progressively larger and larger. The biggest was a very elegant motor yacht called ‘Nomad’.

In the evening we concocted a marinade for chicken pieces and lit the barbeque. Almost as soon as we’d put the chicken on to cook Michael, Kerstin and Olive the dog came over in their dinghy from ‘Tosca’ and invited us on board for drinks. They had been moored close to us in Náxos and were now anchored nearby. We accepted the invitation and had a very chatty time on ‘Tosca’ whilst the chicken was cooking on BV. When we got back on board the chicken was cooked to perfection and we had a lovely meal discussing from where would be best for Charlotte to get a ferry to Míkonos. Pároikía was the conclusion and so that became our planned destination for the next day, Tuesday.

Órmos Áy Ioannou, Greece