From Leros we had a short down wind sail to Emborios at the northern end of Kalymnos. We anchored out for two days, filling our time with swimming and fishing. And yes we caught a few fish!



Emborios is a stunningly beautiful anchorage surrounded by steep rocky mountains, you almost feel like you are in a fiord. As the sun goes down the hills change colour from grey to orange to purple, it is just magnificent. Photos do not seem to do it justice.



The weather is calm, which means we can BBQ. We got to christen the fish rack for the BBQ that we purchased last year, as well as cooking delicious pork souvlaki.



From Emborios we stayed two very hot days in Kalymnos harbour. The temperature was 36-37 degrees during the day with very little breeze and the overnight low did not get below 30 degrees. In one day the two of us consumed in excess of 7 litres of water and we still did not feel like we were drinking enough. Kalymnos harbour is not as pretty as some due to the excessive use of concrete. Once you get away from the harbour into the back streets, it has a lot more atmosphere with traditional old stone houses. At night the locals come out and sit in the street chatting to neighbours and keeping cool.


We ate at a taverna in the back streets both nights we were at Kalymnos. The first night we were lucky as they had two musicians playing traditional music. We enjoyed steamed muscles and prawns cooked with garlic. After eating we just sat and listened to the music with an ouzo.



On the second night at the taverna it was very quiet, with only a few customers. Suddenly there was a massive explosion, which sounded like we were in a war zone. Think of fireworks and multiply the volume by 10. As we, and other customers, were about to duck under the table the owner came running to explain that everything was all right. She explained that for weddings and Easter the locals have a tradition of throwing dynamite off the mountain. Apparently, there was a wedding, and we estimated that more than 20 sticks of dynamite were thrown off the mountain. One very loud explosion after another. We were both astonished by this tradition and were discussing it for a couple of days. Questions such as:
- Can anyone just purchase dynamite over the counter without a licence?
- How many injuries or limbs lost in this tradition?
- What is the risk of the dynamite causing a landslide down the mountain to the town below?
- etc

We are currently in the marina in Kos and it is very windy. Yesterday we had wind gusts above 30 knots, which is not good for the fires on Rhodes, which is about 40 nautical miles away. There is a bit of smoke haze around, but Rhodes is to the south east of Kos and the wind is coming from the north west, so most of the smoke is being blown away from us. We suspect the smoke haze we have here might be from the fires near Athens, even though they are much further away. But with the wind has come some cooler weather, today is 30 degrees.