Wednesday 11 June 2008

The long awaited sailing holiday in Greece

So I am finally going to stick up some photos about my sailing holidays in Greece. About 15 years ago my family, (Mum, Dad and younger brother), and the family of my Mum and Dads closest friend from college (Mark) plus assorted hanger onners went to Greece for 2 weeks sailing. Mark has his yacht masters so can charter a yacht, somewhere I have a diary charting the 2nd of our voyages (we liked it so much we did it twice), but for the life of me I can't find it!
Anyway we went to an area of Greece known as the Ionian Sea, which if you look on a map if on the right, the little bit of blue between Greece and Albania. We actually stayed for one night in a bay which is in sight of the Albanian border, and this was at the time when we were all more nervous about Albania than we are now. My Mum was rather nervous about that, though as it turns out she should have been far more nervous about the thunderstorm that night. We ended up motoring around the bay navigating by lightning flashes as the wind was too strong for the anchor to hold. One boat did actually loose their anchor.
Most nights however were spent eating in Greek tavernas, the days spent sailing to our next destination, with some swimming in clear blue waters. We saw a Manta Ray and had dolphins swimming on our bow.

This is of a younger looking me, and a younger looking Mum on the first trip. 


Yes my hair really used to be that long! 
This is on the second trip, you can really see the difference. Note that only some of this redness is due to sunburn. When I'm hot I go a very attractive shade of red, means you can never work out how badly you've burnt until you manage to cool down!
Our boat!
I obviously found something hilarious, I have no idea what!
Somewhere in this blurriness is our boat!
Our only meal on the boat in the perviously mentioned Albanian bay which was lacking in tavernas!

My apologies for the photos, these are scans that have been emailed. My Mum has sworn that one day she will get round to scanning in all our old film pictures, and hopefully I will get a selection of better quality. 




And I have procrastinated so much today, I'm sewing some costumes for an outdoor science day of friday, one is done, two are still on the coffee table. I'm meant to be sorting some bits out for a presentation tomorrow, and have not done any of it! I have however used a reem of paper to print my final assignment, and cleaned up the mess from last nights Wii party. Everyone should play Mariocart using a projector to fill a wall of your house at least once!

7 comments:

  1. Such fun pictures from what sound like amazing trips. I was just telling my husband today that sometimes I get so accustomed to the many similarities and parallels between the US and the UK that I forget that you have the enviable position of being so close to the rest of the European continent that you have the ability to do such trips without spending a half year's salary and 3 days travel! Thanks for letting me live vicariously.

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  2. Thanks for the NaComLeavMo post! Love the pictures of your trip. I went to Greece for a school trip in 1997, which included a short cruise of the Greek Islands. It was amazing!!

    Interesting suggestion on playing Wii MarioKart on a projector. And I thought that game couldn't get any better. :)

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  3. Great pictures! You must have such wonderful memories! NCLM

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  4. Here from NCLM - thanks for a great moment of escape & daydreaming today. I've visited Athens but not much else in Greece (still want to make it to Santorini). And mmmm! the food!

    Best of luck in your teacher training - you must be wrapping up now so I hope the job search goes well for you!

    Andie

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  5. Your trip sounds amazing. I'm with Busted, and totally envious that you can travel to so many other places so easily.

    A Wii party is such a great idea!

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  6. Looks like amazing trips! I would love to visit Greece one day.

    From nlcm.

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  7. Looks like a fun trip!

    Great idea! I just found a reasonably priced projector so I'll have to borrow my nephew's Wii and give it a try.

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