Tilos - Greece

Tilos, Greece

Most of the little islands in Greece ( the Aegean islands) do not have marinas.  They typically have a small town quay for the local fisherman but that is it.  Fortunately, they are nice enough to allow visitors to tie up at their harbor for free.  

Talaria tied up to the quay

 We did not really intend to tie up to this dock.  Our plan was to anchor in front of a "nudist" beach nearby.  Now before you start thinking kinky thoughts we were planning to anchor there only because it was supposed to be a safe anchorage and would shorten our distance the next day.  And there were supposed to be peacocks on the beach!  As it turned out we did not find it to be a great anchorage as the water was just too deep.  You really had to go very close to the beach in order to find shallow enough water to anchor in.  All in all it just did not feel comfortable.  So instead we went to the harbor.

Dinner at the taverna

 
 The harbor was also less than ideal.  Our chart showed the water depth at 11 feet but when we got in there it was only 7 feet (our keel extends down 6 feet).  Also, right by the harbor wall there were rocks - lots of rocks that were maybe 3 to 4 feet under the water.  Ouch!!  We did not hit them but it was nerve wracking going in there.  This time of year most of the Greek islands are very short on water.  The water marks in the harbor are a tell tale sign that the water depth is down from normal levels.  We had not really thought about the depths being off but we will from now on.  It does not rain all summer long in Greece (and Turkey) so everything is very dry.  Once we were all secured we went down the quay to the little taverna and had a great meal and watched the sunset.  Lovely night!  Our plan is to sail from Tilos to Astypalea tomorrow.  The wind should be in the right direction so we hopefully won't spend the day beating into a headwind and steep seas.  We will see!