Early morning in Katakolon.

                                                              Lush green. Katakolon.

                                                         The dogs at the railway station.  

                                                     Silfrania in the early morning sun.

Katakolon...built in 1875 for the then thriving currant trade. Now used by small cargo ships and cruise ships as their base for visiting Olympia. It is a bay backed by lush, almost tropical forest, below which the rusty and overgrown train track runs. A huge car park lies between the tracks and the sea,space for the many tour coaches waiting to pick up their cruise ship punters, and transport them to Olympia. I string of bars and restaurants runs off along the sea to the left as one looks at the bay, and a long sandy beach to the right. We have decided to visit Olympia tomorrow, as the weather is supposed to be better, then leave here for Kiparissia on Wednesday, apparently the train is supposed to arrive here around 12.00 or 12.30, or even 1.00pm, couldn't really find out what time, or even if it returns, as I haven't seen a train as yet!!

Jesse's Journey.
   She stirred and sniffed the air
   A thousand scents.
   Land, once more and somewhere new
   A thousand smells.
   Come on come on
   Impatient to run
   To explore and sniff some more.

Rain, Rain, go away, just come back another day! Well it's been non stop today. I haven't managed to get on line since Fiskardo, so a quick catch up.....left Fiskardo and headed south to a little port called Poros, although not so quiet, as two ferries come in on a fairly regular basis, and then the cars and truck are endless, I was constantly worried for the dogs with the road, mind you they are so good, and seem to be developing some road sense...funny really what we need in a port of call, quiet, plenty of green areas for the dogs to run, no cars, good wi fi signal...preferably that we can get on the boat, and a good cheap bar/taverna...not much to ask really!
 Met a fellow Amel, Supermaramou owner there, Johanne, he was going to be sailing to Sicily in company with two other yachts moored there, just as well really as he had had a fall on the quay and had his arm all bandaged up, and his leg too. There was a lovely bar there, that someone had used a lot of imagination on the design as it ran between existing rock outcrops, down to the sea, and with a stunning view.
  Next stop after Poros was the crossing to Zankinthos, or Zante, to what I believe is the main port there, I was not really looking forward to being in the port of a big town, but needed to find supplies...mainly dog food!! Anyway it turned out to be rather a nice town, with lots of pedestrian areas, and a couple of very buzzing bars full of young people in the evening....we avoided those...not because we are not young any more, but the dogs didn't like the music!
  Provisioned up this morning after waking to a grey and rainy day, typical when we had spent the previous afternoon in glorious sunshine washing the boat down. Anyway we set off around 10.00am in the rain, heading for Katakolon, which is across on the mainland. Even though it was a bit cold and rained continuously we had a perfect sail, 7.8 knots, and a friendly sea, we even thought we may head further South to Kiparissia, but the wind was due to change, and it would have been another 5 hours, even with the wind in the right direction, plus we thought it would be rather nice to get a train from Katakolon to Olympia, the dogs have never been on a train before!
  Moored safely,  still raining, and completely grey and misty, so we are having a beer while we consider what to do!!