Cruising The Med - Sandy and Rob's Excellent Adventure: Meganisi - Vathy Bay - Bushwacking and Island Bike Tour

On Friday Sept 20, we departed Sivota Bay having had a great day and evening with all the Regatta festivities.

We sailed up the Meganisi Strait which is a channel between Lefkas and Meganisi to the main port, Vathy Bay.

We needed water ( Water Maker still on the Fritz) and fuel so we planned to stop here at the Odysseus Marina.

The Odysseus Marina is a small one although they run most of the sea wall in the bay. They have all the ammenities including electricity and water and a lovely greek woman who will do all you laundry for you. (She washes, you hang it on your boat to dry)

They also have a lovely cafe/bar called The Gimlet which has wonderful coffee and good drinks as well as groovy house music.

The owner, Yiannis Andriotis who is only 30, is a two time 470 World Champion which we thought was pretty cool!

We liked this place so we decided to relax and stay the night rather than rush off.

The following day, we decided to get some exercise and take the folding bikes to explore the island.

We rode around Vathy Bay past Pasoumaki Beach over to Balos Bay where the map showed that the road ended. When we got there it did end and there was a beach and a rough rocky road that climbed up like the kind on the off road mountain bike trails in Collingwood.

We walked up the rocky road with the bikes and soon determined this was not a good strategy so we doubled back. Rob crossed the beach with his bike and started bush wacking up the hill on the other side hoping to find a road.

About five minutes later, he called to me that he found a road and I too bush wacked through scrub and what appeared to be an old olive grove with lots of stone chunks. I think Rob was determined to do some mountain biking today!

We followed the road back to Vathy and then rode the other direction around several small bays to Spilia Bay which was both scenic and also a great work out!

We stopped for a much needed cold beer on the way back and finished with an early dinner/late lunch at Erriko's Taverna which was delightful. We sat on pale blue wooden chairs at the waterfront amongst the local fishing boats which was very picturesque. Errikos himself served us which was a bonus and as usual the greeks are very friendly and obliging.

We decided to stay yet another night having had a great day and no real need to push on. Sunday morning, we started to get ready to leave and after some discussions with Yiannis, decided to use him as our boat caretaker, leaving the boat up in Preveza for the winter.

We originally were going to leave the boat up in Montenegro but after a 40 hour sail to Corfu, it would be a lot of work to get back there and then in the spring we would have another 40 hour sail back to Greece to continue our 'Excellent Adventures'.

So.... We stayed another night so we could show Yiannis the boat, systems, and make arrangements for new flights, haul out, bottom cleaning, a winter boat cover, etc...

This morning we will head around the island to explore some of it's secluded bays.

Our Chart showing the Channel between Menganisi and Lefkas - You can see Sivota where we sailed from to Vathy Bay

The Lodge and Neighbors 'parked' at Odysseus Marina in Vathy Bay, Menganisi

Out for a Ride - Memorial Road Side

Our Map for Cycling - Around the 'G' in Panagia you can see the purple road which was the off road mountain bike one and the blank area near the head of the bay where Rob crossed and bushwacked up to the orange road around the 'A' in Panagia.