Summer 2021 – Southern Italy

After a pleasant night at anchor in Othonoi, Greece we left for Santa Maria di Leuca, Italy.  Our stops along Italy’s southern coast were the same as our trip to Albania except for a stop in Gallipoli.  We tried out the free mooring in the Gallipoli commercial harbour.  A few spots are reserved for transiting boats and we were able to snag one.  We med moored and stern tied (without assistance on the dock) to the high wharf wall beside the fishing boats, We had not done a Med mooring with anchor for sometime and with the not so helpful wind we provided a great source of entertainment as we settled into our spot for the night. We met Ralph on the cat Frida moored next to us. We were impressed with his repair skills. Their throttle cable broke while docking and he had to quickly jury rig a new one. His one-handed bowline hanging off the wharf wall with the other hand as he was helping in another boat impressed us further and made it clear we have a long way to go with our knot tying.

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We didn’t venture far from the wharf but from what we saw Gallipoli was a very vibrant spot with unexpected crowds in the streets which we hadn’t seen before.  It was a bit more of a tourist place that we were anticipating. We had dinner at a great restaurant, La Lampari, close to the marina where you picked out your raw seafood and they grilled it.  This turned out to be our best seafood dinner along our journey. 

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We had some good winds from Gallipoli to Crotone.  En route to Roccella we had strong winds and were entertained by pirate music along the way. As we approached Rocella, we could see there was a fire in the hills behind the marina we were going to stop at. We waited to see what the fire was going to do before we entered the marina. The weather had been extremely hot and dry this summer – this was not the first fire we had seen while sailing the coastline.  The Italian forestry department quickly responded to the fire. We saw for the first time the Canadair water bombers in action putting out the fire with very short turnaround times. We had a good dusting of ash on the deck of our boat by morning but fortunately it cleanly washed off.  

We stayed 3 nights in Roccella as we waited for the right  weather to pass through the Messina Strait.  It gave us time to do some boat chores including servicing the two stern winches, do laundry and walk into town (2km) for supplies. We had a light rain for the first time but it did not last long. We would not see rain for many days thereafter.

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