Category Archives: Information

Information we discovered during our travels.

Food and More Food in Greece

Posted on by
1

Our flight back to Crete was at 0530, which meant we were up at 0245 and out the door by 0330. We were surprised that the bus to the airport was full. Early morning flights must be common. Flying with a sinus infection is not fun. We were back to Kosmos by 0800. Christi self-medicated and went to bed. It has been 4 days now, and except for occasionally rousing for food and restroom, she has stayed in bed pretty much the entire time.

While Christi slept, Eric worked on a few chores around the boat, including fixing some chips in the gel coat, more cleaning in the engine room, trying again to hunt down the exact spot of the starboard stabilizer leak (it is somewhere near, or at, the locking pin or the cylinder), and the never ending task of organizing. A Nordhavn 57 pulled into the marina the day we got back from Athens. It is always fun to find a fellow Nordhavn on our travels. Eric spent some time chatting with the owner and helping him with some boat maintenance and repair issues. But Eric spent the vast majority of his time on the most important task of all: complete the quest in his video game, Oblivion. He is pleased to report he finished his game and saved the world.

We figure now is a good time to get caught up on our food reporting. We tried a dish called seafood saganaki. We were expecting the battered, pan fried cheese topped with seafood. We were very surprised when out came something akin to a stew with a rich tomato sauce. It was really good.

seafood-saganaki-small.JPG

Another staple of Greece is souvlaki, which the rest of the world calls kebabs. Pictured here is a souvlaki sandwich, on pita bread, topped with tomato, onion and French fries.

souvlaki-close-small.JPG

We tried a dish that consisted of Continue reading →

Crew for Atlantic Crossing Wanted

Posted on by
1

Are you ready for some adventure? We are looking for one person to join us as crew on our Atlantic crossing passage from the Canary Islands to Barbados. Pending weather, we plan to depart the Canary Island’s the last week of November 2008. The 2,670 nautical mile passage will take approximately 18 days. One of the most important qualifications is experience in rough seas. We have to know you can handle it if the seas get rough and stay rough for the whole 18 days. Long periods in rough weather can be difficult on you physically and emotionally.

We do four hour watches, so you will be on watch for four hours, have eight hours off, and then back on watch. If you are interested, contact us and we will send you more information about what you can expect and your crew member responsibilities. We will also send you an application to fill out and return.

TLC for Kosmos and Lots of Greek Foods

Posted on by
Reply

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 Continue reading →

Welcome to Bali, Crete, Greece

Posted on by
1

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.

view-along-highway-to-bali-small.JPG

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

Kosmos in Sea Magazine July 2008 and Site Updates

Posted on by
1

On page 21 of the July 2008 Sea Magazine you will find a Nordhavn advertisement with a picture of a Nordhavn 43. It is Kosmos! The ad is about us. It even links to the blog, so hello to any new readers out there. They interviewed us for the ad when we were in Thailand. That picture of Kosmos was taken at Ko Muk. The ad mentions we are “working our way from Australia through Southeast Asia”. Well, print media can be a bit behind the times. That was many thousands of miles ago! See the new map on top of the Travel Summary page for an overview of our route so far. Also, we added a few more stories to the Highlights page, and some pictures.