We had an afternoon and night at a little
town called Petadhilion the next day – we did not go ashore both because the wind
was strong and also there was nothing special to see. We had read a few notes about it, and looking
through the binoculars had noticed very few people about and so just had a swim
and dinner and went to bed.
It was a short hop to Kalamata the following
morning, and we arrived at the marina shortly before noon. We were guided to a berth by ‘Thomas’ the
security guard, who also assisted us in mooring the boat. Fortunately there was only a light breeze and
we were quickly installed into our berth.
For the first time since Albania, we had a ‘proper’ mooring meaning that
we had ‘lazy lines’ forward and we tied up with our own lines at the
stern. The quay that we were moored to
was also of a reasonable height so that our simple wooden passerelle (gangplank)
worked wonderfully. We had noticed the
humidity slowly increasing as we headed north towards Kalamata and the clouds
were also gathering – it was a sweaty day!
Tad and I grabbed the relevant papers and walked to the marina office to
check in – we also decided to ‘check in’ with the Port Police (even though they
wouldn’t have known if we had or not) which made everything take that much
longer (you wouldn’t know that a stamp in a booklet could be so complicated or
take so much time!). We had a bite to
eat back at the boat and then Tad decided to have a siesta on Bisou while I
went for a walk to a nearby beach for a swim.
Bisou at the marina in Kalamata
We had a light dinner at a local tavern and
an early night as we wanted to be on the road in good time the next day.
Armed with my faithful smartphone and Maps
application, as well as a Kalamata city map and another of the Peloponnese, we
set off the next morning, bright and early to avoid the traffic. We skirted the city and headed east towards
the mountains and very quickly started our climb – the road was decent in that
it was well-paved and wide enough for two cars to pass comfortably, but the
hairpin turns up and down the mountainsides were enough to have me looking
straight ahead while Tad drove slowly to keep me happy! Luckily, due to the early hour of the day, we
encountered very little oncoming traffic, and thankfully no large buses or
trucks at any of the hairpin turns, and after about a 90 minute drive, arrived
in modern Sparta.
There are few remains of the ancient city
and if it were not for my Lonely Planet guide I am not sure we would have found
them. The pathway was signposted once
you were within 400m of the site, but otherwise there was no indication of
where to go. Modern Sparta also has an
olive museum which we did not have time to visit, but apparently it is very good and
informative! We did find our way to
ancient Sparta and probably the most impressive part of the site is the
partially excavated amphitheatre. There
was a crew of maintenance people on site using weed-eaters to cut the grass and
someone raking/sweeping the cuttings.
There were also some people working on the site with a crane hoisting
some of the blocks of the ancient walls back into place and doing restoration
work, otherwise we were the only visitors.
Disappointingly, there were no placards or any kind of information as to
what we could see and my Lonely Planet guide was equally uninformative. Needless to say, we didn’t spend long
here. It’s hard to believe that this ancient
site hasn’t been further excavated or better presented.
Tad on the 'seats' of the ancient amphitheatre in Sparta
View from the top of the ancient amphitheatre looking towards modern Sparta
From here, it was a short 10 minute drive
to Mystra, a UNESCO Heritage-Listed site – we hadn’t read much about it and
didn’t really know what to expect other than the fact that there was a
fortress, upper town and lower town and that we would be doing a fair bit of
walking and climbing. We drove to the
gate of the upper town and began our exploration here – the purchase of a EUR 5
ticket allows entry to the entire area – and we hiked up to the fortress. Not much remains here but the views were
spectacular (they always are from these fortresses!) and we could see over the
valley to modern Sparta. The fortress
was built in the 13th century by a Frankish ruler and then occupied
and improved over the centuries by Byzantine and then Ottoman rulers. Back down to the upper town, we discovered
that the majority of the buildings had been built by a despotic ruler in the 14th
century, and little of them remained.
The area had been successively raided and burned by the Russians and
then the Albanians in the 18th century although somehow many of the
churches and chapels had either been spared or restored (we never discovered
which). Here, the placards were
informative but not specific and my Lonely Planet Guide was even less so sadly. For a heritage-listed place one would have
thought that a little more information was warranted. One of the main attractions of the upper town
was the despot’s Palace building, which unfortunately, is being restored and
therefore closed to visitors.
The fortress of Mystra with modern Sparta in the background
One of the many churches of the Upper Town
We walked back to the car and drove down to
the lower town and spent the next two hours alternatively walking and climbing
around the town which once housed up to 40,000 people but of which only a
handful of chapels, churches and monasteries remain. Apparently the town, under the despotic rule
of a Byzantine Emperor’s son, became a centre of learning and the arts. It was
prolific in the production of illuminated manuscripts, which were created by
the monks in the monasteries, as well as beautiful icons and carvings in the
churches and chapels. It was interesting
but by the end Tad was ‘chapelled out’ and we were both tired and hot. We still had a drive back to Kalamata ahead
of us as well. The rain and winds that
had been predicted didn’t reach us in Mystra and we had an uneventful drive
back to Kalamata and returned the car before walking back to Bisou.
Taking a break at one of the many monasteries
A 14th century icon at Mystra
Part of the road between Kalamata and Sparta/Mystra
The next morning, having paid for the use
of 1000L of water (which we did not need), we decided to wash down the boat
before leaving. Once Bisou was back to
her sparkling self, we headed out into the bay and for our anchorage back off
Zanga Beach at Koroni. The winds were
light but there was a considerable leftover swell from the south as we motored
towards Koroni and for the last couple of miles we were able to use the rising
wind with our genoa, but within a short time of anchoring the southwesterlies
picked up and before an hour had gone by we were sitting in 25 knots of
westerly wind! It continued to increase throughout the day and by 4pm was
blowing steadily at 30 knots with gusts of 35 knots. As predicted, it did ease off at night
allowing us a good night’s sleep although it didn’t stop blowing.
The weather forecast was not favourable for
a westerly route the next day, so we had decided to remain where we were. We were joined by a couple of other boats,
including a Belgian man with whom we had made acquaintance back in Pylos. We had been visiting the same anchorages for
close to two weeks when Tad finally went over to his boat in the bay at Pylos
to chat with him – the encounter was a little awkward as Vince (the Belgian)
was a naturist and a solo sailor and obviously was not used to being approached
by random cruisers. Tad is such a
congenial person and he managed to have a short chat with Vince and at least
discover his name and where he was headed.
As it turned out, he followed us night after night all the way to
Kalamata where we finally invited him over to our boat for a drink. He was quite an interesting man in that he
had bought his boat 30 years previously with the purpose of racing it in
Belgium. Three years ago he started
cruising full time, and has been sailing through the Mediterranean since
then. I was impressed that he manages to
sail through the kinds of conditions and places on his own, but what is more
remarkable than a solo sailor (of which there are plenty) is the fact that he
is literally ‘single-handed’! By that I
mean that his left arm is completely withered and useless and hangs limply by
his side. Vince is probably in his
sixties, and obviously knows his boat inside out as well as having made
adaptations to enable him to handle her on his own, but when he came into
Kalamata marina and threw his lines out the stern of his boat for ‘Thomas’ to
tie up, poor Thomas did not know what to do!
He asked Vince if he needed assistance with the ‘lazy lines’ (which I
can attest are not easy to manage for someone with two hands and arms!) to
which Vince replied “No thank you”. Tad
stood by ready to help as well and I just stared in amazement. We take so much for granted having two strong
arms and two strong legs sometimes, that it takes watching a man like that move
around his boat and berth in a marina to make me feel so grateful!
Anyway, he showed up that afternoon in
Koroni after having left Kalamata the day we went to Sparta, saying he was
headed south and then east, but we suppose that the weather came up and he was
forced over to the west side of the Gulf for protection from the strong
prevailing winds.
The wind blew strongly (steady 30-35knots
with gusts of 40 knots) for the next day and finally, after two days and two
nights we were able to leave at the crack of dawn on the third morning and make
our way back to Pylos in one long hop.
We had an afternoon and overnight in our ‘old’ anchorage, and then had
another early start the next morning for another long haul to Katakolon,
basically retracing our steps. We had
hoped to be able to cross to Keri on Zykanthos again, but the winds were
against us (we would have ended up being somewhat stuck there for several days
due to the contrary wind) so we set out for Katelios on Cephalonia, and after
arriving here (for the fourth time this summer!) we called a halt for a couple
of days.
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