Private Yachts and Meltemi

We are in a large natural harbour on the east side of Koufonisi, just under Naxos (the big island near here). We picked this spot because the forecast was for strong winds today, which have just started. Yesterday the winds were from the east, then they moved north, then south west, and this morning they have become strong from the north.

This was in the forecast, which is why I wanted a big harbour with good protection and a nice sandy bottom, because I knew the anchor was going to get pulled around and I didn’t want to be somewhere that the anchor was going to drag. A hard bottom or too many plants can stop the anchor from re-setting……we seem to be good.

Just as the sun was rising I woke up probably because the wind picked up and the boat was moving. I checked the anchor alarm and we had moved a bit, but I could feel the anchor holding the boat (the boat springs forward a bit after it pulls on the anchor). I went on deck, and both nearby boats had someone on deck. It always amuses me when I go on deck and I see other people checking their boats. We are probably all woken up by the same thing.

Nearby there is a 40m motor yacht, MAZY, who had been stern-anchored to shore with lines, and was now maneuvering to bring up their two anchors. It was windy from the side, and this is a very large boat and they would get a lot of side-force from the wind, so I was interested in seeing how they handled the situation.

I often look up the details of the big yachts we come across, and big charter boats like this will say they come with 6 to 9 crew. Seems like a lot. MAZY had a crew-member in a dingy around the front of the boat watching the anchors come up and pointing where they were in the water. Two crew were watching from the front of the boat and someone not in uniform (I suspect the owner this is not a charter boat) was on the bridge driving. I can see why you would need a lot of crew on a boat like this if you were moving 7×24, and even if not you would have someone on watch at night. You don’t want to wake up with your $100m+ baby stuck on shore. I can’t imagine how much diesel those guys must burn when they are moving.

It took some time, but finally they had both anchors up. MAZY had a crane on their foredeck and they used the crane to pickup the dingy with the crew-member still on board! I suspect this is an older design as the newer yachts seem to slip their accessory boats into the back either from the stern or the side. (We saw a mega-yacht last year that had a full-size catamaran as one of their ‘small’ boats!.)

There was another big power yacht beside it that left later. Here is a picture of them both at night on the left hand side. The bright lights on the right are a catamaran trying to run out his batteries as quickly as possible.

Victoria and Nour decided they wanted to go into town. It was a bit windy, but no issue in the dingy with the outboard motoring them to a little cement pier used by the shuttle-boat from town to here. There were only 2 other boats in the bay, as compared to the dozen or so from yesterday which was a postcard perfect day. Mid-afternoon it got seriously windy…..45+knots or 80+ kph. Forecast was for 20 or so knots and I was thinking maybe less because Naxos is north of us and I thought might block some of the wind. Didn’t happen. I was worried that the dingy, tied to the back of the boat, might flip even with the outboard attached. Not good. Even in the bay we had whitecaps with spray flying and the boat was sportingly bouncing around. I went to the front of the boat to check on the anchor and it was a bit of an adventure just walking…..I had to hold on and make sure I didn’t get tossed overboard with the rolling. If the girls came back now I wouldn’t be able to pick them up. When they did come back the winds were only 30 or so knots so it was still an adventure to get them it wasn’t impossible. We are going to have a bit of a rolly night tonight until the wind hopefully calms down for tomorrow.

I have to also mention the bay here has a taverna with the most 1-star reviews I’ve ever seen…..bad food…..ripped off for a drink……so we didn’t go. I feel for these places because they need to make all their money in 4 or 5 months. Mostly they are family run and quite good. Not as cheap as in Crete during the winter though. Miss Crete winter pricing!

Next stop is Naxos. It is going to be windy again so we will need another good harbour to anchor.