Been busy! And offline for a bit. We had the time, wind and inclination to go to Vassiliki - windsurfing and dinghy centre for Lefkada. The wind there, for some reason that completely escapes me, is called "Eric". He blows a steady F6-F7 in the afternoon on the west side of the bay with katabatic gusts whistling down off the hills, at the same time as the tiny yacht and fishing harbour on the east side has a steadier Force 3-5. We liked Vassiliki a lot more than we expected to - a very nice little place - and we were glad we had ignored the cautions about its difficult winds. From there we took the opportunity to go around the point and a little way up the west coast to Sappho's Leap, a towering cliff from which Sappho (the ancient Greek poet from Lesvos) is said to have leapt to her death to escape her pursuers. True or not, criminals were apparently thrown from said cliff, and if they survived the bouncing and crashing on the way down and landed alive in the water below, they were subsequently pardoned and allowed to live. Tough stuff! We stopped for lunch and swim just off the beach near the cliff in the clearest, most turquoise water this side of the Caribbean.

And then, A Week with the Magats

Down to little Sami on Kefalonia to collect friends Margaret and Roger for a week's visit. They are preparing their own boat (bigger, steel world girdling vessel) for even more adventurous sailing. They will be setting off across the Atlantic next year, to the Caribbean, thence who knows - Pacific to New Zealand? Circumnavigation? Anyway, after a cooler stint in the Baltic this summer they wanted to see life on a small (albeit luxurious you understand) boat in the sunshine.

We had a wonderful week blessed with hot, sunny weather. Winds could have been a bit more challenging and exciting, but we did get a couple of decent sails in with Roger tweaking. But we had ample swimming several times a day, and sampled a mixture of coves, bays and town quays. Roger practised all the techniques of tying stern to rocks with anchor out, handled both ends of the boat (bow anchor and helm) berthing stern-to town quays. We had endless discussions on the merits and methods of rigging solar panels, the design of biminis, effectiveness of antifouling, passerelles (planks to you and me), water tank sizes, holding tanks, stern deck showers, more antifouling and all the other things that make life cruising in the sun possible and pleasurable.

Roger became known as "Scrubber Roger" and "Roger the Swot". He had a dual mission it seemed: to scrub the bottom of our hull clean as a whistle, and to swat every fly that dared to come into the boat. As it seems to be the mating season, there were a fair number of them to keep him occupied. Dead fly carpet is not a treat you want to get used to.

Margaret showed a flair for fossil hunting and, with her prior knowledge and help from a couple of our books, we all learned more about the local geology. And being classically educated, she cottoned on to more of the Greek language than any of us. Being very experienced sailors themselves, we could happily hand over various tasks to them - and W thereby also had a holiday too! And they treated us to dinners out and Champagne!

We had a list of things saved up for their visit for which we needed their expertise and/or additional muscle power. Checking why our radar had given up the ghost, going up the mast, fixing our liferaft straps, engine fumes, solar panel rig (see above), antifouling check (umpteen times), etc. Most done. Not on the list was the oven gimbal fixing pin shearing, the cooker falling off at an angle and unusable. The combined engineering skills of R2 (Roger and Richard) and the help of Vicki and her workshop in Sivota made it possible to rig not just a temporary lash-up, but a good and fixed solution. Hooray for the chaps. And replacing and tensioning the broken liferaft strap involved all four of us plus 2 sets of mole grips - beautifully done. And in case one thinks they had a miserable week of being put to work by Myrica, we also saw a giant turtle in Pera Pigadhi, Ithaka, garfish and a yellow and black unknown fish in One House Bay (now re-named Wet Bum Bay). This fish was christened the Yellow Finned Ionian Tuna (Species Chambersiensis).* (*now thought to have been a barracuda).

For the statistically minded (I was teased for my "nerdiness" at recording everything from water temperature to engine hours to max wind speed and minimum depths), here are a few pertinent notes about our week.

We visited 15 anchorages (incl lunch and overnight stops), 7 different islands, 5 towns. Max wind was 26 knots, max speed under sail 8.3 knots, max water temperature 28.5 deg C, max air temp (recorded 45deg, but difficult as sensor was in full sun in cockpit, so overstated) more like low 30's deg C.

We enjoyed their visit. R2 enjoyed the opportunity of swapping "techie" insights (I know very un-pc, but chaps really do yak more than women, don't they Margaret?), and M & I enjoyed leisurely down time in the sun and sea and taverna comfy chairs. As it should be.

They had their week of sun. We woke this morning to clouds, some rain and a rainbow! And wind! That's justice.