SV ICE BEAR

Vessel Name: ICE BEAR
Vessel Make/Model: Privilege 39
Hailing Port: Victoria Canada
Crew: Don and Cindy
About: From Vancouver Island British Columbia. Retired and enjoying relaxing Cruising.
Extra: we were hard core racers having sailed many many miles and loved the Long distance races with our previous three boats and friends boats but now we are pulling the throttles back. Even though ICE BEAR has a very nice turn of speed.
27 July 2019
12 July 2019 | Nydri marine
30 June 2019
07 May 2019
25 April 2019 | Temple of Zeus, Olympia
11 September 2018
03 August 2018
13 July 2018
27 June 2018 | Nafplio
11 June 2018
01 June 2018
19 May 2018
10 May 2018
06 May 2018
25 April 2018
20 January 2018
06 January 2018
19 December 2017
08 December 2017
Recent Blog Posts
27 July 2019

Paxos / Corfu

The next morning we paid the new Greek cruising tax said goodbye to the guys on Mangata and the lovely town of Preveza. Our next stop was Paxos. The island of Paxos was only a short hop up the Greek coast. It was a great place to wait for good conditions to cross the Adriatic sea to Italy. The harbour [...]

12 July 2019 | Nydri marine

The Bank

With our return to Vliho bay the weather cooled back down and the rain returned we spent the next few days doing more boat jobs.Found the rattle in the steering system there was wear in the linear drive and to fix it we needed new parts sigh one more job for Tunisia. Replaced the fresh water pump, fixed [...]

30 June 2019

The Aussie

We motored to the stern of Mangata and knocked. From inside we heard a hello woohoo he was home well we kinda knew he was home the dinghy was tied to the stern. We climbed aboard and went below for a quick tour and drink. I always forget how much room is inside a Bavaria. There must be at least [...]

07 May 2019

The next ten days were spent in the boat yard. Unlike last year there was no red dirt but it was cold and wet.Fortunately we had a heater and electricity. When it rained we went to the stores for parts and food when it dried for a few minutes we painted the bottoms, serviced the engines, repaired [...]

25 April 2019 | Temple of Zeus, Olympia

Adventure 2019 begins

The 2019 travel season started on April 2nd with a ferry ride to Vancouver where wonderful friends put us up for the night before the flight to Greece. Thank you so much. The flight was just the way we like flights uneventful. Once we passed through customs and satisfied the man at the exit that the [...]

24 April 2019

Wrap up of 2018 sailing season

When we left our intrepid traveler Emmet he was in Poros waiting for a weather system to pass. While waiting food was consumed and roads were walked. One of the boats near us had its anchor lifted and ended up side tied to the quay which wasn’t a great place to be. The surge from the storm and other [...]

Down the coast

06 January 2018
Even though it was early in the morning the route out from Venice was already busy with small boats fishing. We motored past the barrier islands out into the Adriatic
The Italian side was shallow around 40ft for most of the way. There were lots of fish farms mostly mussel and oysters and when we weren't passing a farm we were skirting oil
rigs and floats that marked strings of baskets. We are not sure what they were catching in the baskets. At one point we passed several larger fishing boats stuffed with crew
there were rods sticking out from everywhere. They looked like porcupines. At about 4 pm Ice Bear pulled into Ravenna a few minute earlier then expected. We called on the vhf no answer then we tried the cell phone still no answer. There was a long empty dock at the entrance to the marina so we turned around and side tied to it. There was a man and his son fishing on the dock he wished us luck finding anyone with the marina on the holiday. After a few more tries we gave up and turned our attention to the man and boy they had a bag of whatever they were catching. Its only polite to ask whats in the bag and they were more then happy to show us. They had 4 really nice size squid and they were not happy the squid had sprayed ink everywhere including Ice Bears bow. I hope that stuff comes off
by the time the duo left the dock they had added two more to the bag. I guess we know what they were having for dinner. We on the other hand were having whatever we could find stashed on board as the dock was behind a locked gate and we didn't have the codes to get back in. The next city was the town of Ancona we left early it was going to be a long day. The fish farms, oil wells, small fish boats and floats for the basket strings continued. We arrived around 4 pm the marina was to far from the town to walk so we were left to our own devices once again for food hmmm we didn't plan for two days of eating on board. Three cheers for pasta. The next hop was short so after a quick explore of the area around the marina we headed off to San Beneditto del Tronto. When we arrived the Polizia di Frontiera grabbed one of us. I think they thought we had just arrived from Croatia. I do know they looked bored. After a thorough look at our papers they were happy. Due to weather we spent a few days here exploring they had a really nice walking street and the large break water had carvings in its big blocks making it a really nice place to go for an afternoon walk
. We even found out that it was squid season on the Italian coast. Now we knew what the porcupine boats were catching. It also solved the mystery of all the big black stains we saw on the docks. Picking weather windows we continued to hop down the coast. The town of Pescara has a big walking bridge, Termoli has a house on the end of a long rickety pier, Vieste sat at the tip of the spur and Bari welcomed us with daytime fireworks. Brindisi would become home base for several days while we waited for a weather window to cross back into Greece. We rented a car and drove to the town of Monopoli to look at their town square that just happens to resemble a game board then to the Ikea in Bari where we bought new mattresses for the aft cabins that's when the big storm that caused us to pause in Brindisi hit high winds rain and lightning entertained us for the trip back to Ice Bear then for the rest of the night. The next day we went to Leroy Merlins a home improvement store and bought some lighting stuff and a new kitchen faucet. Across from the hardware store was a big Grocery store where we found smoked mozzarella and these little turkey roasts. omg I need more of the turkey roasts who knew boneless legs and pork products mixed so well.
Finally the weather report suggested the weather for the crossing to Greece had arrived and we went for it.
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ICE BEAR's Photos - Main
16 Photos
Created 24 April 2019
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Created 25 April 2018