OK, I finally managed to confirm a boat for Greece! Our home for 4 weeks in May will be a 2006 Bavaria 33. We will take her from Corfu, most likely from Gouvia Port/Marina. We will likely spend about a week around Corfu before moving on.
On May 2nd we receive the boat. I imagine we will spend a day or two there provisioning and visiting the area since we won’t be returning the boat here, so no return visits. Since most charters start on Saturday, we will probably hang out until Monday to get behind the milkrun and have a bit of quiet time. There are a couple of small islands up to the North that we may go visit before running down the inside between Corfu and Albania and heading down to Paxos and the rest of the Ionian Islands.
The weather conditions sound a bit more relaxed than what we experienced in the Cyclades. Calm mornings, breezy afternoons reaching up to Beaufort Force 6. From May to September the wind blows from North-West at Force 2-5. In Spring and Autumn the wind is less strong and blows usually from South-West. It arrives around noon, blows between force 3 to 6 (10 to 25 knots) and dies down at sunset. Perfect, sounds just like Howe Sound weather patterns. Hopefully no 8’s on this trip. May seems to have some unpredictabilities, but hopefully nothing major.
It also seems like there are many safe anchorages in the ionian…unlike the Cyclades. The area is ranked 4 out of 5 stars for easy sailing (where the Cyclades receive 1.5-2 out of 5)
We will end our trip on Lefkas and fly out of Preveza. If things get set up properly, we plan to fly into Gatwick and spend a couple of days in Southern England before flying home. it will be a nice break, and we may get to meet some Flickr people too if we are lucky!
Now we just have to find flights and start planning our route…