At the end of the first week of July and we decided to head north to revisit some places we had got to know three or four years back. With a light wind we sailed and motored our way from Preveza and decided to stop over in Parga for the night. Parga is a pretty mainland holiday town, opposite the island of Paxos, set high on cliff tops with quaint houses and restaurants set into the cliff. The town straddles a headland with an old castle and fortification. We anchored off the busy umbrella clad beach and were royally rocked about all afternoon until gone 7pm with holidaymakers enjoying high speed thrills on inflatables, water skis and paragliders.
Off to Paxos for a nostalic visit to Lakka Bay on the northern tip of the island. It is still jaw droppingly beautiful with ice blue water and of course, still a magnet for every sailor to visit. We anchored for a couple of nights, enjoyed lots of swims, a walk and even the Euro Cup final late on the Sunday night in a Greek taverna where funnily enough most support seemed to be for the Italians! We had retreated before the bitter end of penalty shoot outs so did not have to contend with jubilant Italians. It was noticeable there are very few British sailors about and now European holiday season has arrived, there are lots of Italians, French, Dutch, Scandinavians and more. Thank goodness for our flag spotting book, we have used it extensively to identify more obscure flags; Bahrain even!
Next stop Petriti, a very good anchorage on the south west coast of Corfu which used to be very quiet. It has been discovered which is good for the on shore tavernas, but now a crowded anchorage; 50 boats instead of 10! We did visit an excellent new taverna, Limanaki, which also had accommodation and we got chatting to the owner. A tale of hard times and his quest to get a pontoon established to encourage yacht crews to visit his restaurant. He needed luck and about 10-20k euros!
We took the dinghy along the coast to the south and discovered a couple of holiday resorts, one of which, called Panorama, was a fascinating mix of wooded paths, tiny coves, sunbeds in the trees, hammocks along the way, occasional bars serving food and way up, the main building. It looked a bit hedonistic, everyone looking cool and chilled! We stopped for a beer and encountered a wide array of flying insects, so were quite glad to retreat back to the safety of the sea!
North past Corfu old town, still a stunning sight. There were cruise liners moored up in the commercial port busy going nowhere. We had booked a couple of nights in Gouvia marina and were disappointed to find the Marina suffering from a fairly large diesel spill. We insisted on relocating to minimize the smell, but it seems the marina has a problem that is is not actively dealing with. A chance to get the laundry done, but more importantly some electrical engineers came on board to replace the connectors on our solar panels. We had been unhappy for a while that we were not getting consistent power output from them and knew the connectors were unstable. We are determined to get more solar capacity for next season and will be investigating the various options available to us.
From Corfu we crossed to the mainland to revisit a quiet anchorage at Valtou, not so charming this time as the fish farming had encroached and tainted the water; it was a bit smelly and not inviting for swimming. On to Platarius where we found they were working on rebuilding the harbour wall so there was limited mooring capacity for boats. We fortunately took one of two berths and enjoyed a secure stay as the fresh sea breeze in the afternoon made the beach anchorage very bumpy. It was good to walk around the small seaside town and be recognised and welcomed by the couple of cafes and restaurant we had supported on our previous visits. They told us of hard times with few visitors so we had to stay for one more beer!
With more westerly winds forecast, our last night on Corfu had to be back in Petriti. Lovely swimming and a meal on board; off to an early start to go south, unfortunately in Southerly winds! We headed again for Parga, this time going ashore to re-aquaint with the superb Italian restaurant, Filomila, we had found in 2017. Still good, but we were uncomfortable in the crowds of this busy place and soon returned to the boat anchored off the beach.
South again to Preveza, we had a cracking sail once the afternoon breeze kicked in around 1pm. It was a beam reach, could not be better and we clocked up 8 knots surfing down the waves, reaching Preveza Quay by 4pm in time for a cup of tea.
That night we tried out a new restaurant in town, very Greek and most hospitable. Outside there was a profusion of flower baskets and pots along with a wide selection of good, home cooked Greek food.
With 10 days ahead before we return home, we went south to be ready to meet Peter in Lefkas. Peter is joining us for a week around the inland sea. More on that in the next blog.
Deja Vu 
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