After a leisurely breakfast and some more time spent looking at photos, we said our goodbyes and drove back to Agios Nikolaos. We made a stop for lunch, and were back at the boat by 1400 (2:00 pm)

It was finally time to pay attention to our poor, neglected boat. Between the beating she took in all the rough seas over the last few months, the constant hard running, the extra salty Red Sea, and the combination of extreme dust and no rain throughout the Middle East, Kosmos was in desperate need of some TLC in every single area. This is the ideal place to do it. Right now, the climate is temperate, making it easy to work outside and in the engine room (no, no air conditioning in the engine room. Actually, it gets hotter in the engine room when the air conditioning is on due to the generator). Bugs also aren’t much of a problem. The boat is securely tied and the water in the marina is flat, so we can do all the things you can’t do when it is rolly. There is a sufficiently stocked boat store literally at the edge of the marina, so it is easy to run and get that one little thing you need to finish a job. There is internet here, so we can look up on-line resources to help make the job easier. There is an oil drop off station here in the marina. We have our own hose connection with great water pressure. There is staff around to offer you pointers in the right direction for help and supplies. It just doesn’t get much better than where we are right now.

Once we got back, we got right to work. We also spent all day yesterday and today doing chores, too. In the last 2 ½ days, we have done a ton.

Eric has changed the Racor fuel pre-filter, the on-engine fuel filter, and the oil and oil filter on the generator. He changed the oil, oil filter, and fuel filter on the main engine. He changed the transmission oil and filter on the main, which is a messy job. Fortunately, it only needs to be done once every thousand hours. He changed the oil on the wing engine, as well as tightened the shaft packing since it was dripping too fast, which turned out to be tricky. He couldn’t get a wrench in the small space, and cleverly used some small clamps to get the job done. He changed the bilge pump intake valve (did we mention that a few days ago we noticed that the bilge pump wasn’t working right?). He put fuel conditioner in the tanks, polished the fuel in the tanks, and transferred fuel to the wing engine. He cleaned the engine room, which was dusty from the belt that disintegrated, and salty from the leak in the shaft packing on the wing engine. And last, but not least, he scrubbed out the bilge, which had been full of stabilizer oil, then laid down pads in the bilge to see if he can figure exactly which direction the stabilizer leak is coming from.

Christi, meanwhile, did lots of laundry, cleaned and organized inside, made quite a few meals that she froze for passages, and polished metal like crazy. The metal was by far the worst it has ever been. It was solid rust on the majority of the boat. Fortunately, it is shining up nicely overall. There are a quite a few spots she will have to go back over with a tougher polish later on, but for the most part, the metal is gleaming. Oh, and Christi managed to cut Eric’s hair in there somewhere, too.

Of course, we have been out to eat 6 times in the last three days, so we have lots of foods to report on.

At one restaurant, we got an appetizer of marinated, grilled bell peppers stuffed with cheese. It was awesome, but we haven’t seen it on any other menus. Almost all the restaurants offer cheese pies as an appetizer, which are little 2 bite pastries stuffed with cheese. They are similar to small empanadas, except they are baked instead of fried.

Stuffed tomatoes and stuffed bell peppers are usually on everyone’s menu, as well. They are filled with the same rice used for dolmades and baked in the oven. Tzatziki is also on all the menus. It is called a salad here, but it seems like a sauce to us. It is plain yogurt with chopped cucumber, lemon juice, dill, garlic and olive oil. It is a little bland on its own, but it makes a great topping for some meat dishes. In America, it is frequently served as a gyro topping. Speaking of gyros, at home in Southern California, gyro meat is always a beef/lamb mix. Here in Greece, you can get chicken or pork gyros. We haven’t seen a restaurant yet offer the lamb/beef combos we are used to at home.

Just about every main course is served with French fries. They love their potatoes here. Most restaurants offer plain yogurt with honey or fresh fruit as dessert choices. To get what we consider a “real” dessert (meaning something loaded to the hilt with sugar), you usually have to go to a bakery. The yogurt here is better than we have had anywhere else in the world. The texture is thick, almost like crème brulee. Adding just a little honey makes it sweet and yummy. Yogurt and honey is so popular here in Greece that it is even offered as a flavor at all the ice cream places.

A number of restaurants serve complimentary shots of Raki after a meal, which surprised us.