Log #33p Summary of 2004 Sailing Season
Ostia, Rome, Italy Nov. 12, 2004

Veleda was on the hard in Fenerbahce from July 1, 2003 until we returned her March 26th 2004. We launched her March 30th, and took our first checkout sail over to the Princes' Islands April 4th. We started sailing from Istanbul's Atakoy Marina April 14th going up the Bosphorus into the Black Sea.

In the Black Sea, we visited Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine including the Crimean Peninsula, then back to Turkey at Zonguldak and along the coast to the Bosphorus and back to Istanbul by Aug. 2nd. We then traversed the Sea of Marmara, down the Dardanelles into the Aegean Sea, and south to Kusadasi (Turkey). From there we sailed through the Greek Aegean, stopping at several islands on our way to Crete. From Crete we intended to do a long single passage over to Sicily, but because of adverse winds we altered up to Kithira Island off the southern tip of Greece, and then to Methoni on the Peloponessos, before the 318 mile passage to Reggio di Calabria on the Strait of Messina in Italy, arriving Sept. 15th. We then went through the Straits of Messina into the Tyrrhanian Sea, among the volcanic Aeolian Islands, and up the Italian coast to arrive here in Porto Turistico di Roma in Ostia, beside the Tiber River, by October 10th.

Some statistics on our sailing this year and overall are listed below:

- Total distance covered since departure July 3, 1998 26,829 Nautical Miles (nm) - Total distance in the Med. since entering Dec. 27, 2000 9305 nm - Total distance in the Black Sea 2003 946 nm - Total distance in the Black Sea 2004 1523 nm - Total distance traveled in 2004 2795 nm - Total engine hours since 1998 (new engine) 4253 hours - Total engine hours 2004 526 hours - Farthest north in Veleda in 2004 was Nikolaev, Ukraine 46° 58.6'N, 031° 57.6'E - Farthest south in Veleda in 2004 was Spinalonga in Crete 35° 16.8'N, 025° 44.5'E - Farthest south since 1998 was Havana, Cuba 23° 08'N, 082° 24'W - Farthest north since 1998 was Stornoway in the Hebrides 58° 12'N, 006° 23'W - Farthest west since 1998 was St. Louis, Missouri 38° 42'N, 090° 28'W - Farthest east since 1998 was Iskenderun, Turkey 36° 34'N, 036° 10'E - Number of countries visited in Veleda 27

We have settled into marina routine now. There are 52 boats with liveaboards from 10 different countries, seven of whom we have met earlier in our travels. There is a VHF net at 0830 each morning except Sunday. We have volunteered to be net control for the Wednesday morning net. The 15 minute or so program asks for any emergencies, social events, help needed with boat customs or bureaucracy problems, items for sale, and discussions about marina life. Rod on Glenlyon, with whom we crossed the Atlantic in 1999, comes on at the end of the net most days with a joke or morning smile, some better than others. We have weekly potluck picnics, a Wednesday happy hour in a local restaurant, quiz nights, book and chart exchanges, and an updated list of all the boats with names of the liveaboards, country of registration, pontoon location, E-mail addresses, mobile phone numbers, and areas of interest.

Before we left to meet Judy's Dad in London on Oct. 24, we were joined by David Mulholland, who has sailed with us a few times before, and went up to Assisi to see the magnificent cathedral and shrine to St Francis of Assisi, and into Rome to tour the Appian Way, including one of the several catacombs in the area. En route to Assisi we stopped at the delightful mountain town of Perugia where we had lunch in an outdoor café in a town square. One of the other delights was a Chocolate Festival going on, with stalls throughout the old part of town displaying all kinds of mouthwatering chocolate confections, major weaknesses for Judy, although she just drooled more than ate. Actually all we had was some delicious thick hot chocolate. Unfortunately when we returned to the car we found a parking ticket for 35 Euros. I think there was a one hour maximum time, but saw no signs indicating such. Oh well!

Earlier Judy and I had gone into downtown Rome to explore the Forum and visited the Museo Ebraico, a synagogue and museum of the Jewish community in Rome. This Jewish community in Rome predates the Diaspora as they had a trading community here from about 161 BC, and where they later sought Roman protection from the Hellenistic Syrian Emperor Antiochus IV before the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem and the dispersion of the Jews about 70 AD.

We have found the bus, subway and train systems handy, easy and economical to use, although I have not seen so much graffiti since I was in New York City fifteen years ago. A ticket costs only one Euro, and is good for 75 minutes of travelling including any place in Rome and even out to the two airports. Actually many people do not bother with tickets as they should be cancelled in special meters on the buses, but nobody ever checks them, and so they just hop on board with everyone else. Tickets cannot be purchased on the buses, and must be obtained in advance from nearby kiosks. We are looking forward to exploring Rome at our leisure with one or two trips a week. Ostia, where the marina is, is a suburb of Rome on the coast just where the Tiber River enters the Tyrrhenian Sea and the Med, a half hour train ride from central Rome. In the spring I may take Sprite up the Tiber as far as I can into Rome.

Judy's dad came over to London to visit some friends in England then go to Paris to visit his youngest daughter and her family. Judy and I went to London to see him and help him in getting around. We rented a car and went down to visit Morgan near the town of Horsham where he has an exquisite home in a medieval barn completely renovated with modern facilities, but having kept all the wooden beams, with a couple of small open loft bedrooms and work room. On the way back we got caught in construction and missed our turn off, winding up going around Heathrow airport in rush hour traffic. We then went up to Nottingham with Leni for a couple of days. From there Judy and her dad flew to Paris for two weeks while I went back to London to visit some friends made when we lived in London for the winter of 1999/2000. I did some touring of Leeds Castle, Hampton Court Palace, and the Imperial War Museum, and enjoyed the companionship of Brian from Seraphina and Jaap who is between boats at present. I didn't have a chance to see Irene, Brian's wife, as she was in Liverpool on a family matter. Ken Bigley, who was murdered in Iraq by terrorists, was her cousin and of course the family was quite distraught. My condolences to Irene and her relatives. Thanks Brian and Jaap for your hospitality.

From London, I flew to Stockholm to spend a few enjoyable days in the Swedish archipelago with Brigitta and Anders of Cache Cache, last seen at Poyraz in the Black Sea as they headed back down the Bosphorus in 2003. This year they participated in the KAYRA, the Black Sea Rally, and we enjoyed exchanging experiences of their impressions of that part of the world. Anders and I went overnight to a friend's cottage fishing. My lack of luck in this endeavour held out, and we caught only two small fish. A day later Ulf went out by himself and caught several dozen! Oh well, we had a good time, including a Swedish sauna, complete with a jump in the water. The cottage and countryside was fantastically similar to what we have in cottage country north of Toronto. One difference was that there were large ferries plying the waters between the islands heading out into the Baltic to Finland, Russia, Latvia and up the coast of Sweden. I took one of the Viking Line ferries a couple of days later over to Helsinki just for the fun of it. The ferry was basically a cruise liner with excellent restaurants, night clubs, a casino, disco, and a variety of live entertainment. I had an inner cabin to myself, and enjoyed the luxury of a 15 hour overnight cruise to Finland, a tour around Helsinki and return. The buffet specialized in seafood, Mmmm! I took a bus tour around Helsinki, a clean neat Scandinavian city, did some shopping, and wandered through a couple of Protestant churches. Their exteriors were interesting in the architecture, but the interiors were very plain and unadorned in contrast to the Baroque Roman Catholic churches of France, Spain, or Italy, or the Greek Orthodox. The return trip was colder with a layer of ice on the upper decks.

Back in Stockholm, I caught the train to visit Dorothea and Wolfgang Klein of Utholm in Tonning in Schleswig-Holstein in northern Germany just south of the Danish border. We met Wolfgang on the East Mediterranean Yacht Rally in 2002. They showed me around the North Friesian Islands, a group of low lying sandy islands north of the Kiel Canal and up the Danish coast. We sailed around the southern Friesian Islands in 2000 from the Iselmeer in Holland into the Kiel Canal, and found that area of offshore islands quite intriguing, especially after having read The Riddle Of The Sands by Erskine Childers and the sequel, The Secret Of The Sands by Sam Llewellyn. We went out the Nordstrand beaches and over to the flood control barrier for the Eider River (which also links up to the Kiel Canal), then up across the Danish border and over to Rømø (Denmark) from which we took a car ferry to Sylt (Germany) and a flatbed train transport back to the mainland. Sylt has many thatch-roofed houses, modern and expensive, as the island has a few wealthy communities of summer homes. The miles and miles of smooth sandy beaches were amazing. I haven't seen such extensive beach areas since the island of Barra in the Hebrides where the local airport used the sandy beach at low tide for its landing strip. These long gradually sloping beaches are covered by 18 foot tides at high water!

They are quite a tourist attraction in the summer. I saw several people flying kites, and watched with interest larger parachutes attached to riders being pulled along on special skateboards. I have seen para-surfing, where surfboarders are linked to these chutes to skim across the waves, surfing up them, launching themselves into the air for a few seconds to do twists and somersaults before resuming their phenomenal parachute assisted surfing. These beach skateboards had wider rollerskate wheels, with flexible suspension and foot straps to keep the rider anchored to the board. The harness to the parachute had a heavy line to the chute with hand held control lines to manoeuvre it. With miles of hard packed sand at low tide, and a good onshore breeze, they were having a fantastic time.

Wolfgang drove me down to the airport in Hamburg where I caught the plane back to Rome a few days before Judy got back from Paris. Thanks Wolfgang and Dorothea for your hospitality and a most enjoyable time. I had wanted to visit some of the cruisers we have met in our travels while we were still in Europe, as next year we expect to be heading back across the Atlantic to the Caribbean. I wish Judy could have accompanied me on this pleasant visit with sailing friends. Perhaps we might get up to London again as there are some very economical flights available from Ryan Air and other discount airlines. Our flight to London cost only one British Pound each, plus taxes, for a total of less than 40 pounds for the two of us. Hopefully some of our friends may have a chance to come to Rome while we are here.

Judy has a skeptical definition of cruising - Cruising gives you the opportunity to do maintenance in exotic locations. I like the definition - Cruising gives you the opportunity to meet interesting people from all over the world. Thanks folks in England, Sweden, and Germany for your hospitality.

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