Corfu and Paxos

Corfu is a long narrow island, over 30 miles long, and we checked into Greece at Gouvia Marina close to Corfu Town about half way down on the east coast.  This well sheltered marina has reasonable facilities, and most importantly a swimming pool that we made good use of. It is home to many ‘live aboard’ couples on their boats, many of them English. We were disappointed to find a shortage of  bays on the south east coast to anchor in, there were some on the north coast that we had passed by and a couple on the west coast,  a long sail away.  We took an  afternoon bus ride into Corfu old town and were delighted with its character and atmosphere. It is on the cruise liner circuit and there were 2 large liners in port disgorging their passengers into the town. We hoped they were spending in the many lovely shops as the restaurants did not have much chance of attracting custom from them.

We soon set sail to Paxos and arrived on the north of the island in Lukka Bay. Lovely but oh so busy with anchored yachts.  With little room left we anchored on the outside and suffered a rather rolly night. The village here though was charming, brimming with welcoming restaurants, bars and cafes and we took the dinghy ashore to enjoy a beer on the waterfront before retiring for the night.

A couple of miles down the coast was the main town on Paxos, Gaios, where we headed the next day. We anchored off to swim during the day and then went into the town for the night. Another delightful place. Paxos is renowned as the jewel in the North Ionian isles and it is clear to see why. Would love to go back again sometime.

Time to turn back on Friday June 22^nd, we headed north across to the mainland and anchored in Monastery Bay. It has been so hot, swimming is as much as we wanted to do, as often as possible!

Saturday June 23^rd sees us back in Gouvia Marina to provision the boat and check out of Greece, as we plan our journey back to Croatia.