Tell-Tales

Vessel Name: Skylax
Vessel Make/Model: Warwick Cardinal 46
Crew: Rod & Lu Heikell
About:
Before Lu and I got married I had to tell her that I would always spend more money on a mistress than a wife. The mistress at that time was a previous boat, seven tenths, a Cheoy Lee Pedrick 36. �Likewise�, she replied, �just as I will always spend money on my lover�. [...]
28 February 2008 | Greece to Antigua
28 February 2008 | Greece
Recent Blog Posts
07 March 2008

Updates before returning to Skylax

For the complete blog and supplement to Ocean Passages & Landfalls go to www.freewebs.com/seawrite

28 February 2008 | Greece to Antigua

October 07 to Jan 08

28 February 2008 | Greece

July to September 2007

For the complete blog go to www.freewebs.com/seawrite

July to September 2007

28 February 2008 | Greece
Rod
For the complete blog go to www.freewebs.com/seawrite
26-09-07

It's blowing a solid 30 knots as this system goes through and it has also slowed down a bit (bless you ugrib for internet weather) so we have delayed departure until Friday. Hold on, that's a Friday... OK we will leave Levkas on Thursday and potter down to Sivota for the start of the voyage and continue it on Friday. The weather will still be SW for a bit, but going south and then all over the place, generally 5-15 knots.

Skylax is provisioned up, fueled up, watered up, and stowed. The inner forestay is on and the staysail hanked on. The main and genny are back from the sailmakers (Waypoint Sails in Levkas Marina - prompt and good repairs) and we are opting out of any more leaving parties for quiet nights in.


25-09-07

Well, the final lot of proofs have gone and its looking moderately good for the off on Thursday heading for Sicily, probably Siracusa. It's late in the season to be heading west, but I'm counting on Lu's weather forecasts (don't talk to me about GRIB files and RTTY or I'll scream) to guide us through.

Most of the work on the boat is done and I'm out of here before anything else happens or any more paperwork arrives. Below is the preface for Mediterranean France & Corsica 4th edition.

MF&C Preface 2007



In many ways little has changed along the French Mediterranean coast. A few harbours and marinas have extended a breakwater to give better protection. Pontoon arrangements have been shuffled about. A few new marine reserves have been established. But topographically the coast looks much the same as it ever did.

What has changed is the numbers of yachts around. Europe is in the grip of yacht fever and yachts have been flying off the shelves. Everyone seems to want one or to want a bigger one. All these yachts have to go somewhere and consequently marinas along the French Mediterranean coast are bulging at the seams. Yacht berths are at a premium and this has meant fewer berths to go around for visiting yachts.

It has also pushed prices up on the old 'supply and demand' line so that marina prices have risen steeply in the last few years. Some French marinas have adopted a three tier pricing system with high season, mid-season, and low season. Mid-season prices are around twenty percent less than high season and given the recent hike in prices this makes it difficult to avoid shelling out a significant amount of the cruising kitty for stays in marinas.

In this edition I have included a section on 'shoestring cruising' at the beginning of each chapter where I detail anchorages and some harbours and marinas that are not in the higher price bracket so that those of us on lesser budgets can find our way around the coast without a second mortgage. I counsel caution using this guide as any inclement weather is going to mean a stay in a nearby marina and lets face it, when the weather turns nasty then a snug marina berth, even at a price, has a lot going for it. Some of the anchorages detailed do not afford the sort of all-round shelter you might wish for, but I've used all of them on numerous occasions and in settled weather they work tolerably well. It must also be remembered that some of the cheaper marina prices mentioned may change, invariably upwards, between re-working this new edition and publication.

I don't want this preface to be all negatives. The Mediterranean coast of France is one I have sailed often and have come to love. You need a different perspective on things to cruise this busy coast, but it is indelibly French from the capitaineries to the boulangeries, and all those wonderful sights, sounds and smells ashore. And that's before you get to the magic of Corsica.

Rod Heikell

Levkas 2007
25-09-07

A few days ago in Port Atheni Lu went up the mast to drop a mouse for a spinnaker halyard that had mysteriously decided to drop down the mast. While up there she spotted the pin for the genoa sheaves was working its way out - somehow the plate holding it in had dropped off.

Now I know why I carry around all those old bits of wood, stainless plate, screws, bolts, you name it, I've got a box full of it on board. And magically I did have a plate that fitted perfectly so up the mast I went with drill, loctite, plate and screws and now, heed this gods of wind and weather, hopefully the pin won't drop out and the sheaves and halyards go all awry.


24-09-07

Liferafts

Last time we came across the Atlantic we had just an old coastal 4 man liferaft in a valise. It was in date, but definitely past it's best. So in Levkas I ordered a new Seago 6 man offshore in a canister from Ionian Marine Safety. They seem to have come out well in the test in the yachting mags (both UK and French) and importantly are made of neoprene and not polyvinyl.

To go with it I ordered a canvas cover (that UV degradation again) and Joe here suggested pockets in the side. You can put odd bits of string, winch handles and in our case a knife and marlin spike with a shackle key on the end. The leather pouch is tied on with a bit of string and it sits snugly in the pocket. So we have a knife to hand on deck and, gods forbid, a knife to cut the lashings holding the liferaft in place.


24-09-07

Chart plotter

Chart plotters are a useful aid to navigation and previously we had a small Garmin 276 down at the chart table. For this trip I got a Garmin 3006 and a plastic nacelle from ebay so it could be mounted on the binnacle bar. The bar needed to be modified, as did the nacelle (it was for another unit), but overall it looks OK and importantly gives the helmsman something to look at. It was tempting to link it up with everything else, but I've had too many electronics go down in the past, even those mounted down below and in several cases only just out of the box. It's fine for the manufacturer to say he will replace it within warranty, but that's little help mid-Atlantic and all your waypoints have just disappeared. So I'm going for lots of standalone units without having the instruments, radar, other chart plotter, etc. all interfaced to one another.



A friend on another boat has been without his radar for months. It is piped to the chart plotter display but somehow his software for it has been corrupted . Now that's fine if you are in the UK near a dealer, but just try to get it fixed in southern Italy or Greece. He's taking the unit back with him. As for us, just makes me happy to have a standalone unit that is visible from the cockpit (it's mounted on the bulkhead where the chart table is) and not interfaced to everything else. The wetware we were all born with is pretty good at bringing together disparate bits of information and we all need to be aware of that warning that comes up before you are allowed into a display unit: This is an aid to navigation blah blah. And so it is. We need to combine all the information we have, from the plotter, depth sounder, the Mk I eyeball, the chart, the pilots, radar, and cautiously use it to make landfall or approach any of those hard bits above or below water. I've just plotted a position of an alleged uncharted rock. Well it's about 30 metres away from a charted rock and you are just plain foolish to believe your electronic chart or plotter is that accurate.

24 September 07

Boat jobs... and the South Ionian Regatta

There comes a point when boat jobs have to finish. Otherwise we would be here forever fixing that, making this better, ensuring that is more than strong enough, and having another cup of tea while the job list gets a few things crossed off and a lot of scribbled notes all around the margins.

What doesn't help is going racing just before the big off, even if it is a friendly informal race. Still we had to do the Ionian Regatta one more time before leaving the Med and so we did. It was a windy old race with the wind hitting 29 knots apparent at one stage and everyone struggling to hold on to all sail. Eventually up the side of Arkoudhi we put a reef in the main, but kept the full 140% genny. And did Skylax fly. Remember we are heavily loaded up with spares and food and all the paraphernalia to head west. Catching the boat in front we tacked over quickly and the genny got caught on the radar. There was a lot of adrenaline pumping and we didn't notice until the genny was half winched in and the radar was sitting at a jaunty angle. We tacked back over, went backwards while we pulled the genny out and then finally got going again after losing time and places. Shall we motor in Kerr said, he was on the wheel, no way I said, keep racing. So we did.

When we got in the next day we whipped the sails off and sent them to the sailmaker in Levkas Marina, then I started on the radar and bracket. Fortunately the cable was still intact and so I bundled the radar up in a bag hanging from a halyard and unbolted the bracket. It was a twisted mess that resembled some of the entries for the Turner Prize for art, but good old Pip had it down the workshop and back the next day, straightened and beautifully painted.

Oh the result... Well we were still 4th over the line, sixth on handicap and 2nd in Class I. 108 boats finished out of a fleet of 230, so we didn't do bad. On passage we rig the inner forestay for a staysail so the genny can't get anywhere close to the mast, but this was racing and adrenaline and a damn fine party at Sivota for the Ionian Regatta 2007.

06-09-07

Maybe theres a calm after the storm, maybe a light to guide you in, maybe a helpful soul waiting to help tie you up or point out a good place to anchor... and maybe theres an end in sight to all this refitting. I'll put a list up later, but the solar panels are fitted, a couple of halyards replaced, a lot more plumbing so the salt water pump works and the pressure tap in the galley doesn't leak, electrics and more electrics, the new Pactor modem is in place and the tablet PC more or less runs so we have email, GRIB files, RTTY, and we put our first Yotreps position report up. For those of you thinking of using Google earth to navigate with I'd suggest you look at our position firmly parked inland. Thats the actual position off the coast from the GPS (EGNOSS operating!).

So we have a bit more stuff to do but its looking good for leaving for Sicily at the end of September. Oh yesssss...

28-08-07

THE HEATHER CHRONICLES

These are letters written between 1994 and 1996, sent back by Eric and Robin Lambert from the good ship Heather, a 1964 Columbia 29. The letters are beautifully written, full of useful cruising information, and if you are sitting there thinking of how much money you need to earn before you set off cruising, then read on for a way of doing it with less than you might think. Eric is a gourmand after my own heart, but a lot better at diving for his fish suppers.

I met Eric and Robin on Heather in Cochin in 1995. We were going east against the prevailing winds, they were heading west to the Red sea and the Mediterranean. There were three boats at anchor off the Bolghatty Hotel. Dawn Treader was a 42ft steel boat out of NZ that AB had built himself. Heather pipped us for smallest boat in the anchorage by a couple of feet. I was on Tetra at 31ft with cousin Frank. While Heather was under American flag, Eric is a kiwi and as it turned out, we had both been to the same rough and tumble secondary school, Avondale College in Auckland. So on the three boats there were three kiwis taking in the delights of Cochin.

Sadly Heather was lost in 1997 off Saba in the Caribbean, an island I treat with trepidation when I pass it - the last time in Skylax we had 30 knots plus and a current kicking up horrendous seas. Oh, and the roller reefing jib, the only half decent foresail we had, was shredding all along the leach.

Eric and Robin have a new 36 footer now, Runaway, a kiwi boat they race locally on the west coast USA, though I'd wager even money they will be setting out on new adventures soon.

Go to www.freewebs.com/seawrite
and click the link for THE HEATHER CHRONICLES

RJH

New Zealand

Tonga

Fiji to Vanuatu

Australia

Christmas Island to Chagos

India

Oman and Yemen

Red Sea

Eastern Mediterranean: Israel, Turkey & Greece

Western Mediterranean: Italy, Balearics & Gib

Morocco and Canary Islands

28-08-07

Bows-to

In some of the harbours around Greece rock ballasting projects underwater from the face of the quay and going stern-to can ruin your day and possibly your season...so it makes good sense to go bows-to or take a long line ashore and use the dinghy to get back and forth.

28-08-07

Levkas Bridge

Just after we left the boat in Preveza at the end of June the Levkas Bridge, the F/B Santa Maura, a floating barge affair that swivels to let boat traffic through, suffered a major breakdown. Levkas town got one of the old landing barge type ferries up from Salamis that fitted exactly across the width of the canal. It opened only four times a day and boat traffic backed up massively. Lots of people elected to sail around the west side of Levkas and into the Inland Sea that way.

A week or so ago the repaired Santa Maura was back in place and opening more or less on the hour again. When I came through in Skylax I have to say it sounded very creaky and the bridge operator was gazing mournfully at the mechanics, so don't hold your breath, they may need to get the ferry back from Salamis. In the meantime the bridge (to the relief of lots of yachties) is up an running and opening again on the hour.

The F/B Santa Maura 'bridge' that swivels open at the north end of the Levkas Canal is opening again on the hour.

20-08-07

Well back in the water again after a week of antifouling, scrubbing, fixing, sanding and putting everything back on the girl. In August at 35 celcius plus. Now after nearly sinking the boat on the way down to Levkas (tell you later after I've had a beer or two), scraping the topsides getting out of the travel hoist bay (pig stubborn and stupid, I should have asked someone to give me a hand) and fighting the gearbox to Levkas (the engineer is looking at it now...), I'm still happy to be in the water, if a little dazed. Now it's time for a shower, a beer and just think positive, it's all going to work out in the end.

Yep, thats it for now, just sweat, antifouling, bruises and a puzzled boat owner wondering who gave him a day like this. Who is the Greek god of gearboxes anyway?
08-08-07
Yacht design

Yacht design has always had fads and fashions. Think of all those awful distorted IOR hulls that made it into production as cruiser/racers basically because they offered a lot more volume than older cruiser/racers. It's no wonder that a mantra could be heard all around the cruising community of 'long keel good/fin keel bad' when what was really meant was that IOR derived hulls were pigs downwind whereas long-keeled older boats were easier (and slower) to drive.

Now there are other fashions around that don't suit cruising in warmer climes, the Mediterranean and the Tropics, but which are flavour of the month if you cast your eye over new boat designs.

Pilot houses (Deck saloons)

A pilot house letting in lots of light and allowing a panoramic view outside must be wonderful in colder latitudes. But put one anywhere there is a bit of sun and the owner will be scampering off to get canvas covers made up to cover up all those windows which just turn the boat into a super-heated greenhouse below. The object in warmer climes is to keep out as much sun as possible while allowing maximum ventilation and that's why you put covers over all your perspex deck hatches. So if you are contemplating cruising anywhere warm discard the pilot house/deck saloon options and get a design which has a decent number of opening hatches to funnel air below. You will be spending most of your time outside in the cockpit (with a good bimini and an awning for shade) anyway and not inside the deck saloon.

Cover it up in the sun - OK this is on a motorboat but the same goes for deck saloons on sailing boats.


Fat arses

While there should always be a place for fat bottomed girls, as the song goes, it shouldn't be on production cruiser/racers. Crewed up racing boats and Open 50's and 60's with canting keels are not what I'm talking about, though you wouldn't want to go to windward for too long in one without ear-plugs. I'm talking about average production boats that are not overly wide at the stern, but wide enough, and into which the designer has tucked two quarter berth cabins which in turn push cockpit stowage even further aft. Imagine piling up a 100 metres of 10mm chain, a couple of big anchors, cans of fuel and water, maybe a generator and a watermaker as well at the back of the boat, and you have a boat which is arse heavy. Take a peek inside an older design (say 15 years ago) or in an Open 60 and you will find the back end is virtually empty. Boats don't like to have a lot of weight at the pointy end and the blunt end. OK we all carry anchor and chain forward, but an effort should be made to minimise this as much as possible and carry light stuff under the forepeak berth(s). But on boats with the weight of two quarter berth cabins and cockpit stowage right aft the weight distribution is all wrong.

Now I have a theory (amongst others) that this weight concentrated in the aft end of the boat has distorted keel design and position. Have keels moved further forward on modern production boats. I'm sure any yacht designer would shoot me down in flames, but I'm still wandering around boatyards and looking at these boats and some of them don't look right.

Less contentious is the fact that these designs are touted as off the wind flyers, but what happens when you need to go to windward, and lets face it, there is a lot more windward work involved even on a tradewind route than most people imagine. And what if you want to get somewhere interesting that lies upwind? Getting one of these fat arsed beauties going to windward is not easy because they like to be sailed flat or those stern quarters start digging in and the boat gripes awfully. Even worse they don't seem to be that stable downwind, at least on some of the common modern designs I've sailed. I won't name them but you should have a pretty good idea which ones I'm talking about from the biggest European boatbuilders.

Compare the stern sections of Skylax on the left and a pretty typical AWB on the right

Swept back spreaders

Yeah I know engineering-wise it works and it cuts down on weight aloft, but you can never sail directly downwind, at least with the main up. I remember on a trip from Antigua to the Azores a modern 46 footer came flying past our starboard quarter at around 110 degrees to the wind while we ambled downwind wing and wing. Two days later the same boat appeared on our port side after gybing over, again around 110 degrees, and just scraped past in front of us. Now this guy was putting a lot of effort into sailing his angles but it didn't seem to have paid off over a two day period (and we really were just ambling along) unless he had run out of wind or something else had happened.

A conventional rig with simple straight spreaders may be old fashioned, but you do get to go dead downwind and that works for me and lots of others.

Self-tacking jibs

Along with swept back spreaders there is the fashion for non-overlapping self-tacking jibs. The design imperative is a fairly large main so the boat is more main-driven than genny-driven and the convenience of a self-tacking jib. When the wind is light you put up an asymmetric the brochure blurb says. Come on, most cruising boats are handled by a couple and when the wind is light it's not often you go forward and hassle about with an asymmetric. Skylax is a pretty main driven boat, but we still go for a 145% genny because it covers 90% plus of the wind range we come across. In fact the asymmetric on Skylax is so old that I'm pretty sure the next time it goes up it's going to shred anyway. So go for a big genny and some decent deck gear to handle it.


Pirates

There is a lot of talk, a lot of forum threads, a lot of worry and much consternation over piracy on the high seas. Piracy is the most consulted web topic for cruisers setting off across an ocean and the talk is of 'whether to carry guns on board', 'whether to sail in a group or at least in an organised rally', 'whether to cruise XYZ route at all'. It's all such a worry.

Or is it. Take one of the most worrying areas in real terms, an area where piracy does occur in the Gulf of Aden. In the years between 1995 and 2006 there have been 14 piracy incidents on yachts off the Yemen coast. Given around 250-300 yachts do the northern Indian Ocean route and on and up through the Red Sea every year, this gives you less than 0.005% chance of being attacked by pirates. In all these cases only one person has died and that was in suspicious circumstances anyway. None of us wants to be the victim of a pirate attack. Apart from the loss of equipment and money in the middle of nowhere, the trauma inflicted by pirate attacks must be horrendous - the sort of thing that doubles the heart beat when someone raps on the hull or makes a sudden movement, that breeds nightmares and paranoia. The trouble is it seems the paranoia is infecting the vast majority who have not been attacked, but who see pirates lurking in every craft that floats.

Recently a note was posted on a web site of a piracy incident. A trawler off the Cape Verdes was acting suspiciously. It came close to a yacht, well it approached to within a mile. It never showed the name on the transom. It changed direction at odd times. It didn't answer calls on VHF Ch. 16. Now I'm not going to say there was no menace, but this sounds like typical behaviour for a trawler. They change course pretty erratically and it's unlikely anyone on board spoke English. Moreover if any of us were fishing offshore for weeks and a yacht came up over the horizon, well wouldn't it be fun and a break from routine to head in that direction for a bit out of innocent curiosity.

Most reports of suspected pirate activity are off this nature and to my mind they are nothing less than bored fishermen who are curious about this sailing yacht in the middle of nowhere. Perhaps they think we are acting suspiciously. There are of course real piracy incidents, but many reports are paranoia that should be put to one side. And are you really going to use a gun carried on board. I suggest you think about the tragic case of the great Peter Blake in Brazil. More than likely he would have lived, albeit minus some valuables and boat gear, if he had not gone below and brought out a rifle. Few yachtsmen have pointed a gun at another human being and pulled the trigger and the chances are that most of us would be just that hesitant moment too slow to take another life. We just aren't built that way. Most pirates just want to grab the loot and go... and that's what we should let them do if it ever, and the chances are remote, comes to that.

Last time we were coming eastwards from the Caribbean to the Azores I noticed a ship, pretty much a merchant ship in profile, steaming slowly across our stern at sunset. I called up on the VHF but got no response. The next morning there it was steaming slowly on a reciprocal course across our bows. I called up several times and eventually got a reply. 'This is the US Navy ship in position 34.30N 40.00W on a true course of 20�, speed 6 knots'. I asked for it's name, what it was doing out here going so slowly in the middle of nowhere (we still had 600 odd miles to run to the Azores), and whether it had picked us up on radar. To all questions I got a curt 'I'm sorry, that's classified information'.

Friends of mine, Wal and Barb had their own piracy scare in the Indian Ocean. On watch at night they saw a masthead light not far behind them. And it stayed there at a constant direction and speed right behind them. They changed heading several times to shake the pursuer off but he stuck right behind them every time they changed course. All through the night he followed, not getting any nearer, but not going away either. In the morning Barb discovered their pursuer was the man overboard light that had fallen off its bracket and followed them on its bit of string tied onto the boat at the same course and speed. 'Good on yer' Wal.

03-08-07

A few email letters with useful info from Greece on the Attic coast, Gulf of Corinth and Gulf of Patras. These are reproduced here for the cruising info and do not necessarily reflect my views.



Rod,

I thought you should be aware of the attitude of the
staff at Olympic Marina. Not only were they unhelpful
they were positively rude. We had previously tried to
get a berth for a night there and were very curtly
told that there was no room. It is clear that this is
their normal attitude to visiting yachts.


Regards,


Clive Probert



The General Manager
Olympic Marina
Panormos 19500
Lavrio
Attiki

Dear sir,

We live on a yacht and are currently cruising Greece.

Two days ago during a voyage we suffered total
steering failure. Using emergency steering procedures
we managed to work our way with difficulty into Porto
Rafti.

We now need a replacement part. Because we have no
address we needed somewhere for the relevant part to
be couriered to. As your marina was nearest we rang to
confirm that you would be willing to accept receipt on
our behalf so that we could pick it up either by yacht
or by road and thus be able to effect the necessary
repairs. We received from your staff a totally
negative response to our very reasonable request.

We have cruised for 10 years and have nearly completed
a circumnavigation. We have travelled to over 50
countries and logged over 50,000nm. We have never
anywhere been refused help when we have been in need
of it. This reflects very badly on your marina, your
town and your country. This in stark contrast to our
experiences of 3 years cruising in Turkey where we
have always been overwhelmed by kindness and offers of
help nothing ever being too much trouble.


Yours sincerely,


Clive Probert





Dear Rod,

Yes I realise that things can change just thought you
ought to get the input.

Problems now sorted with great help frpm Speedex the
local couriers. Well on our wayto the Ionian and in
the Gulf of Corinth now. Zero wind and temps in the
100s F.

One other piece of useful info. You can get diesel on
the dock at the east end of the Corinth Canal.

regards.

Clive Probert





Rod,

More info from Gulf of Corinth.

Page 154

Trizonia

Lizzie's YC is now closed. We were told that it was up for sale.

The key to the water is now obtained from the Trizonia restaurant and supermarket. Not sure what has happened to Christo. The tap is not where shown on the chartlet but is 50M to the west.

Page 158

Galaxidhi

The dock area to the south of for 100M and including the short mole is now cordoned of and a large floating crane is being used to dig out but harbour bed along this area. Apparently it is a new dock under constrution. We heard a rumour that this work had been going on for 3 years! The only option here at present is to anchor off.

Page 159

Itea Marina

There is now what appears to be an office building, unoccupied at present and also a toilet block,locked. There are electricity points on the docks but they are not functional and appear to be starting to rust. No water on docks, fire points are just empty metal boxes.

Page 161

Andikiron.

There is a new light structure on the end of the pier, extremely decorative and conspicuous. Illuminated at night but the light was not working!

We were getting short of water along this section. In Andikiron we rang the telephone number on the box on the dock. It was 1300hrs. We were told that they could not come then nor would they say when they would come. We rang again at 1730hrs. We then learnt that the tel. no. was that of a bar at the eastern end of town "Salonu". We went there and spoke to the barman who was very helpful. The man in charge of the water and electricity works there in the evenings, stays late and therfore has to sleep all day. It was arranged that they would ring on our mobile when he was available. We eventually got a call at 1945hrs. at which time we were dining so we abandoned our quest.

At Itea there is a very long hose at the toilet block which was administered by a little man who was also in charge of the mini tanker delivering diesel. The water point is about 50M to the west of where shown on the chartlet and one has to mor at the dock just east of the middle pontoon. It was very windy and difficult to get on and off that dock so we left it until the following day when of course the little man was nowhere to be seen and there were no signs of a telephone number.

At Galaxidhi of course the dock is not available.so we eventually filled one of our tanks using containers at Trizonia. The true joys of cruising.

Regards,

Clive Probert
Gulf of Corinth


Carbon footprints

Recently we had the Live Earth concert in London, an effort by Al Gore to get everyone thinking about Climate Change. It seems to me that this was yet another chance for fading pop stars to rejuvenate their careers (Madonna, Foo Fighters, James Blunt) and some committed, but other misguided pop divas, to promote their environmental credentials in public. The problem with all of this was the huge carbon footprint generated by pop stars flying in on private jets and a lot of people salving their conscience by going to a concert. The idiocy of it all has been pointed out by many and was dubbed by some other committed environmentalists 'Private jets for Climate Change'. One estimate of the carbon footprint for just the London concert was 31,500 tons, more than 3,000 times the annual footprint for the average Briton.

All this criticism, and it is justified, got me to thinking about what my average carbon footprint is and how it can be reduced. As it turns out after using several carbon footprint calculators, it is around the average for the UK at somewhere between 10 and 11 tons annually. And I reckon I have a pretty clean record. I've had green tariff electricity with Good Energy for eight years. Our mileage in the car is next to nothing as we both work at home and our average mileage in a year is around 2000 miles. We use the bus and train a lot to get around. At home we are just as mean with water and electricity (well, nearly) as we are on the boat. Our only real minus points are flying out to the boat and back, though as it turns out we are still about average on that anyway.

One of the things the carbon calculators don't really take into account is the fact we live on the boat for longer than we are back here in the house. So an average quarterly fuel bill is calculated for the year which distorts the overall figure. That said, neither does it take our energy use on the boat into account. And living on boat does consume energy and contribute to the overall carbon footprint we leave behind, so I'm a little worried that our footprint is average.

How do we get it down?

I have ranted on before about sailing boats that seem to motor everywhere, even when the sailing conditions are ideal. We do sail most places, even when the speed gets down to a couple of knots. It's a skill which seems to have been lost and as the old saw goes: any fool can sail when there is a lot of wind, but it takes skill to sail when the wind is light.

We do need to run the engine for around an hour a day to charge batteries, cool the fridge which has an engine driven compressor, and heat water in the calorifier. When day-sailing this usually corresponds with leaving and entering a harbour or anchorage. On passage it coincides with the radio net 'chat show' as the old SSB needs at least 13-13.1 volts to transmit well and given it uses 20-25A when transmitting, that means the engine needs to run to keep the voltage up and at the same time cool the fridge, heat the water, etc. Still that's a 55HP diesel using around 2-2.5 litres/hour and that comes to around 6 kgm. So if we use the engine for one hour a day for 3 months' that comes to just over half a ton of carbon. That's a lot and my estimate would be that we run it more often than that motoring when there is no wind at all.

To all of this we need to add the energy costs and carbon emissions from the original construction of the boat, the energy costs of boat equipment like sails and electronic gizmo's, bottled gas used for cooking, and any mods we have done like repairs to woodwork (invariably in teak) and old oil and filters from the engine service.

Below there are links to three of the calculators I used to calculate my carbon footprint. Suck it and see.



http://footprint.wwf.org.uk/



http://www.carbonfootprint.com/calculator.html



http://actonco2.direct.gov.uk/index.html





10-07-07

Indian Ocean Cruising Guide proof time .....!

I'm just reading through the page proofs for the new edition of Indian Ocean Cruising Guide (www.imray.com) and I'm amazed how SE Asia has bounced back after the Boxing Day Tsunami in 2004. When I got in contact with people I knew out there a decent interval after the tsunami their message was please, please don't write off the yachting scene here. We need people to keep coming.
09-07-07

Levkas Marina

Levkas Marina is rapidly filling up, so much so that the final pontoon on the north side extending out to the wavebreaker pontoon on the canal (left side of the marina in the picture) has been installed providing a lot more berths for the busy summer months. A lot of boats are basing themselves permanently in the marina which all works pretty well. Although there are lots of bars and cafes around the marina, most people wander over to Levkas town for a bite where there are a lot of good tavernas. Try Ev Zin in a little street just off the right side of the high street heading up into town AFTER the square.


04 July 2007, 14:27:00

Fish farms



Recently I had an email about the fish farms in the Gulf of Gulluk on the Turkish coast.



Dear Rod Heikell,



The reason we email is about the Gulf of Gulluk. We were taken by surprise by the large increase in the number of fish farms in this bay from last year to this. Nearly all of them are uncharted and most of them display no lights at night. As few sailors sail at night in these waters so we suppose the navigation hazard should not be overplayed. However, the effect these farms appear to have had on the water quality seems to be substantial. Last year for example the water in the bay at Iassos was clear and so too was the water in Paradise Bay. This year much of the water is very cloudy and unpleasant.



A fish farm expert told us that there are approx 12 million fish in farms in the Bay. This apparently equates to pollution from a town of 650,000 people. If this is correct it is hardly surprising that the water in this bay is fast becoming contaminated what with a west wind as normal and no tides to clean things out.



We wonder whether your next edition of your Guide should perhaps make more mention of all the above. Also do you know if the Turkish authorities are trying to do something about this or are the big businesses owning these farms winning the day? We are all in favour of sustainable fish farming as locals have to make a living and produce food but what is going on in the Bay of Gulluk seems rather excessive.



Hope you can spare a moment to reply to this.



Best wishes



Alison and John Epton





Fish farm in the Gulf of Gulluk off Salih Adasi (see home page on Slylax)



Everyone cruising around the Mediterranean has noticed an explosion in the number of fish farms around the coasts and islands. In the beginning the fish farms were just an annoyance as they destroyed the ambience of a deserted bay or actually took up the best space in a bay. Now concerns have moved on to the environmental impact of the farms.

� When you approach a fish farm the water turns to a cloudy green entirely different to the deeper water in the approaches and in bays where there are no fish farms. I suspect that this cloudy water is a form of eutrophication where uneaten fish food falls to the bottom and so enriches the water that it favours algal species which then deplete the amount of oxygen in the water and the diversity of marine life is drastically reduced. This cloudy green colour is typical of eutrophication and the water on inspection has lacked much in the way of marine life growing on the bottom or swimming in it. I have seen areas which are virtually bereft of weed cover.

� The debris around the shore from the farms (and I suspect on the sea bottom), the increased number of flies around the fish food stocks, and the awful smell, reminiscent of factory farmed chicken or intensively reared pigs, is environmentally damaging.

� It does not sustain wild fish stocks. As we point out below it takes 5 tons of fish feed to produce 1 ton of farmed fish.

� Fish farm operators should attend a course and train the workers who distribute the food which includes antibiotics and trace minerals and other chemicals to keep the fish healthy in an enclosed environment - much like antibiotics fed to intensively reared chickens and pigs. Having been to a fair number of these farms, often located in remote locations, I don't believe for a minute that the operatives here keep accurate records or accurately dispense the fish food and any additives fed to the fish. My guess is that badly paid workers are pretty much left to their own devices with the occasional visit from a 'qualified manager'.

� There is a danger that farmed fish escape into the wild fish stocks and breed with them, in so doing introducing the farmed fish gene pool to wild fish. How the two gene pools might differ is a matter of contention, but marine scientists have expressed concern over it.

� Fish farms are not confined to the Mediterranean and it is growing at a staggering rate with environmental fears expressed in many other countries. Farming prawns in SE Asia has led to fears of eutrophication and increasing the salinity of coastal land.





I for one always ask if fish has been farmed and if it has I won't eat it. Apart from anything else sea bass and bream from fish farms has an unpleasant muddy taste to it and god knows what else in the flesh.



Extract from Greek Waters Pilot 10th edition

Fish Farms in the EU



Aquaculture is the fastest growing sector of the world food economy, and represents 31% of the total value of EU fish production. Greece, Italy and Spain account for 75% of all EU sea bass and sea bream production; in all over 100,000 tonnes of farmed fish. Other aquaculture sectors account for 160,00 tonnes of salmon (mainly Scotland and Ireland), and 750,000 tonnes of molluscs (France and Italy).

It is the development of sea-cage fisheries for fin-fish such as salmon, trout, sea bass and sea bream in the Mediterranean that carries concerns based on environmental, health and sustainability issues. Greece produces 50% (60,000 tonnes) of all EU farmed sea bream and sea bass (Italy has a 14% share). The continued expansion of captive blue fin tuna fattening farms in Spain, Malta and Italy is also raising concerns for the viability of wild stocks. Farmed fish has been seen as a solution to the natural poverty in fish in the Mediterranean, but it is becoming evident that these systems are causing more problems than they solve. They threaten the sustainability of wild fish stocks; it takes over 5 tonnes of wild fish to produce 1 tonne of farmed sea bass or sea bream. Fish farms pollute the coastal waters with toxic chemicals, and some farmed fish have also been found to be carrying unacceptably high levels of toxic chemicals.

(Figures above have been taken from a paper presented at the European Parliament's Committee on Fisheries public hearing on 'Aquaculture in the EU: Present situation & Future Prospects' by Don Staniford (Oct 2002).

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