It’s Mothers Day. - in America, at least. Not sure if it is the same day or even a “Day” in Greece.
But apart from that, the day was to be special for another reason. We have been sailing in Greece now for five seasons and never had a fouled anchor once. A fouled anchor is where one boat’s anchor gets tangled up in another’s. A big annoyance. If you’re lucky you can free it yourself, if not you get a diver.
Today we are heading to Hydra, a small island with a small harbor and fouled anchor capital of the universe. Th harbor is so small and so popular that in the summer boats are not only stern-to but also two or three deep against the quay. This is not a concept I gladly endorse (or to be honest comprehend). But in one of sailing’s little ironies, we don’t have to wait until Hydra to get our first fouled anchor!
In Porto Heli (where we are), some boats spend the winter in the water. This means that they must be secure enough to withstand the stronger winds and generally worse weather of that season. When you’re anchoring, you usually have a single anchor straight out from the front of the boat. It is important to be aware of where the anchors of the boats on either side of you are. If you don’t, those are the anchor that can snag you up. We did that. The problem was the boat TWO over on our starboard side. He had two anchors out in a broad Y-shape going across the bow of the boat on our right and into our space. We must have snagged him on the way in.
So when we tried to leave, our anchor wouldn’t come up. The anchor of the other boat was bi enough to mean that we couldn’t lift his chain and get our anchor free. Boating people are so nice. They offered helpful suggestions but to no avail. So a diver was needed. He had to come from the neighboring island and so we sat awkwardly waiting for him for 45 minutes or so.
A very quick job and we were free to go on our way.
So we headed for Hydra. In another of sailing’s little ironies, it was full. We didn’t expect this at this time of the year. No-one had started row two yet and we didn’t feel much like being the newbies who get to start the next rank. Fortunately there is a little bay, Mandraki, just about three quarters of a mile from Hydra. It’s a nice bay but is fairly deep for anchoring. We looked around a bit at the spaces left by the two boats already there. We had a couple of options and chose one and anchored in almost no wind for what promised to be a peaceful night.
Snuggled in and fed, it is time to get back to the important things - Mothers Day. Lori got calls from Mere and Jess, text from Blake and had a good chat with her mom. Mothers Day is such a happy day.