By sunrise, we were in more protected waters and the seas calmed down significantly, becoming a pleasant ride. At 0645, we rolled up 3,333 hours. We left San Diego with 333 hours, so we have done exactly 3,000 hours at sea since leaving home. We are at 17,875 miles, so our average speed has been 5.96 knots. We are averaging 1,375 miles a month. We have been seriously moving.

We neared our destination, the town of Agios Nikolaos on the island of Crete around 0700. From the distance, it looks just like all the photos you see of the Med, with blocky buildings nestled in tall hills along the shoreline.

We pulled into the marina, where someone was waiting to assist us. We backed into our spot and threw him two lines, which he tied to the sea wall. Then he handed us each a mooring line, which we pulled up to the front of the boat, securely fastening each side on a separate mooring. No dropping the anchor, which was good. We were snugly tied up between two very large yachts. Within a few minutes, the marina guy, Stratos, had wired up a plug for us and found us a wooden board to use as a makeshift pasarelle. Awesome service. BTW, a pasarelle is basically a walkway attached to the back of your boat that you lean up against the dock so you can easily walk on and off from the back of the boat. They are very typical in the Mediterranean, where you often back in to a concrete dock.

At 0800 we went to the marina office to check in. The woman behind the counter told us we needed to walk over to the Port Police office and gave us a map. The marina is basically in the heart of down town, and the Port Police is at the commercial wharf, a short walk along a hilly road. Agios Nikolas is absolutely adorable. The streets we walked down were all narrow and curvy, lined with cafes and assorted tourist shops. Most of the buildings are 2 5 stories, with a shop on the first floor and apartments above. They all have adjoining walls. The apartment windows had lots of brightly painted shutters and vibrant flowers in pots along the window sills.

We got to the commercial harbor and walked around to the outer edge of it. The building was easy to spot, since it is the only building on the far side of the wharf. We went in a waited for someone to acknowledge us. No one did. After a good ten minutes, Eric started asking people to help us. It turns out we were in the wrong place. We needed to go to Customs first, then the Tourist Police. The gentleman helping us pointed to the Customs office directly across the harbor, and vaguely pointed down the street beyond Customs for the Tourist Police. The photo is of part of the commercial harbor.

The customs office was easy to locate. We walked in to find that the staff didn’t really speak any English. The paperwork process was slow, not because there was a lot of paperwork, mostly because the staff seemed to be in no hurry. Fortunately a couple people waked in at various points that could translate for us, which helped a lot. When we were done, they told us to go back to the Port Police. Hmmm. We knew we needed to go to the tourist police. We walked a ways in the direction that the guy at the Port Police had pointed to, but no tourist police signs jumped out at us. We stopped at a store and asked for help and were told the police station was way outside of town. Hmmm.

We went back to the Port Police and asked for directions to the tourist police. Good thing, for two reasons. One, because we found out that you cannot complete check in with the Port Police without proof of insurance. We find that odd, since we think we know lots of cruisers who don’t carry insurance that have been to Greece. Second, we would have never found the Tourist Police. It was farther down the road than we had imagined, then up a very steep side street. It was a workout getting up the hill. Once in the station, we asked where to go and the guy pointed up. On the second floor, we were told to go up again. On the third floor, they stared at us blankly for a while until they figured out what we wanted. Once the mystery was solved, we had our visas in hand in literally five minutes.

Interestingly enough, every single office we had gone into featured Byzantine style artwork depicting Jesus, Mary and/or assorted saints. Other than the portraits of the icons, there was very little, if any at all, décor. We were sensing a theme.

We went back to the marina, where Eric picked up the insurance and went back to the Port Police. Christi waited at the marina for her half-brother, Costas, and his fiancé, Koralia, who were due at any moment. They live on Crete in a town called Bali, which is an hour and a half drive by car. Eric made it back before they arrived.

Seeing Costas again was very exciting; a happy reunion, indeed. We had never met Koralia before, so it was thrilling to meet the new sister-in-law. We all went to lunch at a restaurant on Lake Voulismeni , just off the commercial harbor. The lake was a small freshwater body of water once upon a time. In 1870, a canal was dug to attach the lake and the commercial harbor, so now the lake was filled with brackish water and adorable little fishing boats.

Lunch was awesome. We had a few unique dishes. One was a grilled octopus dish that was amazingly good. We also had a popular Cretan appetizer called dakos, which is a heavy brown barley bread topped with cheese (usually feta) and chopped tomatoes. One of Christi’s all time favorites is saganaki, which is breaded, pan fried cheese that tastes like a grilled cheese sandwich.

After lunch, we all went back to the boat, where we looked at family photos and continued catching up. The boat was in shambles, quite honestly looking the worst it has ever looked, which was kind of embarrassing. Poor Koralia must have gotten a bad impression of us. Hopefully, we can redeem ourselves soon.