Category Archives: Cruising Life

Describes an experience regarding the boating lifestyle of our travel.

Welcome to Bali, Crete, Greece

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We were in bed early and slept soundly. We are always so darn tired after a passage. When we did finally get up, we got right to work scrubbing down the exterior of the boat. The salt was really caked on and we had a hard time getting it off. It took some serious scrubbing. We now have a renewed appreciation for the South Pacific, where it usually rained hard for an hour every day, washing away all the salt and dirt. We rarely washed the boat there — nature kept it clean for us. And when we did wash it, very little scrubbing was needed. We miss that.

When we were finally done, we got Kosmos situated so we could be gone a couple of days and we headed to Bali (not to be confused with Bali, Indonesia) along the main highway. The drive is beautiful. About a third of the road is inland, the other two thirds along the water. The highway is well maintained, with good signs. Crete is mountainous, with very little flat land anywhere that we could see. The road winds up and down the mountains, so you get incredible vistas from mountain peaks and close ups of the foliage in the troughs.

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The vast majority of cars on the road are Continue reading →

Passage from Port Said, Egypt to Crete, Greece

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Day 1

It felt good to be moving on the sea. By morning, the wave speed had slowed down. There was little wind chop, and it was an overall pleasant ride. Wind has varied from 8 knots to 16 knots. What makes it an even nicer ride is that we are running at a normal RPM and speed for a change. Kosmos is happier running in her sweet spot than she is running flat out, the ride is smoother for us, and fuel consumption is much, much better.

We crossed near the 31N by 31E line, which we thought was an interesting numerical moment. We had a beautiful sunset, with the sun especially red.

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It is much cooler here. We actually have to shut the windows at night and wear blankets when we sleep. We almost forgot what that was like aboard, since we have been so used to the heat of the tropics and desert.

There has been a ton of traffic on the radio ever since we left Egypt, mostly from warships calling every vessel that pops up on their radar. So far we have heard ships from Canada, NATO, and Israel. We have never heard so many military groups in one place before. The war ships will Continue reading →

Making Friends in Suez City

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We were up early and all ready to go when we found out that we weren’t allowed to leave today, after all. An American military ship was transiting the canal today, and anytime there is a military ship going through, small boats are prohibited from entering. The big boys can still go through, but not the little guys. We begged the agent, explaining that it should be OK for an American boat to pass an American military vessel, but it isn’t his decision. The worst news was that a British military vessel was transiting tomorrow, so we couldn’t go tomorrow, either.

Since we weren’t leaving ASAP, the yacht club asked us to move the boat from the dock to a near by mooring so other boats could access the hose. We were delighted to do this, because it would make it a little harder for Sayeed to harass us. BTW, he had been harassing us non-stop since very early in the morning.

Once situated, we decided to head into town to look around and have lunch. From what we saw last night, we thought Continue reading →

Port Ghalib to Suez City – Days 1 & 2

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Yesterday, we had breakfast with our French friends at the hotel, then quickly got Kosmos ready to go to sea. We headed over to the other side of the complex, where we pulled into the fuel dock near the harbor master’s office. Like everything in Port Ghalib, the fuel dock is new and modern. Fuel cost $1.15 a liter, which is pretty high, compared to other ports in Egypt, but overall a pretty good deal considering rising fuel costs. We don’t like leaving without polishing the fuel first, but we think it will be pretty good considering the amount of fuel the dive boats must go through. We’ll see how clean the filters are after we start running.

The attendant started fueling us up, and Eric went over to the harbor master and got us all checked out while the fueling was going on. Eric tried to tip the marina staff, and to our shock, they wouldn’t take the money. They said they weren’t allowed. This was very odd for Egypt, where tipping is always expected for everything.

We pulled out of Port Ghalib around noon. The weather forecast said conditions were going to be pretty good. The conditions were slightly worse than forecast, but overall not too bad. The wind was around 15 knots apparent, with small, but rapid interval head seas that had us bouncing. That night, the moon was full and bright, offering a lot of light, and the night visibility was excellent.

After 12 hours at sea, conditions drastically worsened. The wind Continue reading →

Diving Marsa Shoni Kebir and A Crazy Coincidence

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Today we were assigned to a smaller boat than the one we had gone out on the other day. It is also a very nice boat with a similar layout, and with only half as many people on board, it felt even more spacious than the first one. We went to a spot called Marsa Shoni Kebir, in the ocean just south of the Port Ghalib entrance, close to the shore. The site consists of two walls close to one another.

For the first dive, we went to the east wall. Once again, we lounged for quite a while before suiting up and jumping in. It is another nice spot, though once again, not spectacular. We saw more variety of coral, though there is still a lot of the fire and geranium looking soft corals. In one spot we saw some yellow waver coral. We also saw more fish, more variety of fish, and some new fish. Better still, we borrowed a “Red Sea” fish book and wrote down what we saw right away, while it was still fresh in our minds. The specific variety of unicorn fish that we mentioned the other day are called short nosed unicorn fish. The parrotfish with different colors we mentioned is called a rusty parrotfish. We saw both the rusty parrotfish and the short nosed unicorn fish on this dive, too.

One of the new fish is called a bird wrasse, a fish with a bird like beak. Another one is called a sailfin tang, a brown, cream and orange striped fish with a yellow tail shaped kind of like a batfish. We also saw a yellow tang, which is a similar shape but yellow color. Other new ones include hogfish and Arabian boxfish. We also saw Arabian Picasso triggerfish, which have the same markings as a regular Picasso triggerfish, but different colors.

In more familiar fish, we saw Continue reading →