Chris, thanks for sharing those plans with us — what a trip!  You are an intrepid sailor to sail the Ionian sea solo.  It’s a fascinating way to spend the summer, and I am envious.  I’ll look forward to following your progress.

Hearing of your plans to include Turkey in your itinerary, I can’t help but ask this question (born of ignorance, I confess) about your boat’s name.  It is ?????? in Greek, right, meaning “union”?  Doesn’t that refer to the political union of Cyprus and Greece, and if so, does the name cause any raised eyebrows when you sail into a Turkish port?  I remember once going up to a stand in Turkey to buy ice cream and mistakenly handing the vendor a drachma in payment (this was before the Euro), and he indignantly slapped the coin down on the counter and pushed it back.  There seemed to be some pretty hard feelings between the Greeks and the Turks, at least back then.

Safe travels,

Frank

> On Jun 19, 2021, at 11:33 PM, Chris Geankoplis <chrisgeankoplis at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Well better late than never.  This year's cruise is almost exactly the same
> length as the one from Barcelona to Naples, 1050 nm.  I will be arriving in
> Greece at the boat on the 15th of July.  I'll spend a week by myself
> (unless someone wants to come along and help out) fixing up the boat and
> getting it in the water after 2 years on the hard. Then  I'll spend a week
> sailing around the northern Ionian by myself (unless someone wants to come
> along).  I'll end up in Corfu and pick up my wife on the 28th of July.
> From there it is south to the tip of Greece then east over to Rhodes (an
> island named after the boat?).  We will clear out of Greece about mid
> September and spend 10 days to two weeks in Turkey before putting it to bed
> in Marmaris. We plan to put it up for sale in the spring. (more details on
> that later)  I generally do a fair amount of prep on trips like this and
> enjoy going over the sailing guide books and charts and Google earth.  I
> created a rather long document  (13 pages) with a proposed itinerary and
> distances and an accompanying set of Google Earth pictures of each of the
> 50 odd places where we will be spending a night or two.  About half I've
> never been to so it is with great anticipation that I look forward to this
> year's adventure.  I've attached a Google Docs link to the itinerary if you
> are interested. One note, to really get the most out of it, the document
> should be viewed at 170% on a computer screen.   I should start posting
> stuff a couple of weeks behind the actual day's sail, say around the
> beginning of August or late July.  This trip will be the most challenging
> yet as the Meltemi is the strongest in August, right when we are crossing
> the Aegean.
> 
> Chris Geankoplis
> S/V Enosis
> 
> Google Link:
> https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jHbIyuhqlsCey5g1HWVmTsEXV-6MRFsC/view?usp=sharing