We arrived in Porto Paulo on 6/17 and spent 2 nights there. That was the best anchoring location we have had from a view and comfort perspective. There are 2 issues when anchoring: where the wind is coming from (Ideally you want the wind to be pushing you away from the shore) and where the waves/swells are coming. Best is if the land is protecting you from the swells. Unlike lake Ontario the Mediterranean has a long memory and the swells can different from the winds for a long time. If you end up with the swells coming at you sideways it is very difficult (i.e. impossible) to sleep.
From PP we went to Syracuse harbour which is a *huge* harbour (maybe 2km across?) and anchored on the south side…..may have been a rookie error on my part. It was good from a wind perspective but we ended up getting waves from the harbour entrance in the middle of the night. I finally got up to see what I could do and I put out the mizzen sail at an angle to push the boat (there was some wind to do that) so we were more head on to the swells and we could suddenly sleep! I should have done that earlier.
From Syracuse we went to Taorima which looks like a big vacation spot for the locals. It was beautiful (see some instragram pics I put up). Lots of people on boats zooming around, lots of jet skis, lots of drunk people in boats with loud music…..but it was still beautiful
I should mention that at some point during the above time I noticed that the engine was not starting on the first turn. Usually I turn the key and *boom* the engine starts immediately, but now I was turning the key and nothing. After a few tries it would start. I’m 90% sure that I need to either clean or replace the starter solenoid (a simple device….electromagnet energized by the starter battery pulls a magnet to complete the connection to the starter motor) but this was disconcerting because at some point you may *NEED* the engine to start say if your anchor is dragging in the middle of the night (only happened once so far the wind switched 180 degrees and I have an anchor alarm so this was handled). Anyway I’ve learned a lot about how the starter works and I can hot-wire it to start if needed.
We have been in a very nice marina in Roccella for 2 nights and will leave tomorrow. We will do 2 hops to get to Crotone and will then do a larger trip across to the heel of Italy, and then another largish trip to Corfu and we will be in Greece!
One thing I wanted to mention is that during our trip here we were monitoring channel 16 (you do this it is the emergency channel) and suddenly I heard ‘This is Warship 71, please be advised that we are doing live fire exercises at 35.51 North and 18.26 East’ About the same time I saw a military looking boat kind of far ahead in front of me and I thought **YIKES**. Turned out that the life-fire exercise was over 100 nautical miles south east of us (right in the middle of the Med) and the military boat in front of me was an Italian coast-guard boat that was towing what looked like a refugee boat…..anyway it was exciting for a few minutes 😉
This part of Italy is not great for sailing so hopefully we will be motoring less and sailing more.
Jeff
Jeff how does an anchor alarm work???
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Wonderful.
His Kingdom is not a desirable destination! 😄 If I should be careful, with no real ties to his Kingdom,…
Adventures on Spruzzo 
App on my phone. Uses GPS and you make a circle where the boat can swing. If it goes outside…