Friday May 11. Paleochora, Crete. New Plans.

Written by Jack van Ommen on May 11th, 2012

The North wind blew like stink all night. It howled through the rigging and it woke me up a few times. But than it quit in the morning and now, in the late afternoon it looks like a repeat performance. The forecast for going from here N.W. into the Adriatic are not good for the next few days but on Sunday a westerly starts in that even turns into a mild southerly. So, I reserved a car for tomorrow afternoon and will return it here on Sunday and then take off. I plan to head for Hania/Xania/Chania on the North Coast. It is the next to, Iraklio, biggest town on Crete and it also has a good archaeological museum and a RC mass at 10 a.m. on Sunday.

I emptied the leaking water tank and patched it at the same time as the rubber duck’s punctures. I discovered that one of my running back stays is starting to fail. It attaches with a Gibb tang to the mast and I may have a challenge finding this in Greece. Fisheries Supplies has made it up for me before. I count on my good friend Matthias Klemm to read this. With two reefs in the main I can use both running back stays. And this might have to be my resort till I have found a way to replace it.

I heard from my oldest granddaughter yesterday and her plans for her studies in Amsterdam have been firmed up. She arrives in Amsterdam on May 28th and will stay as long as the end of January. So, I plan to come back to Amsterdam with the boat by way of the Rhone, Moselle and Rhine. This is a slow journey but I will most likely be in France by late August. This will be a unique opportunity to show her our roots and I expect that I’ll be able to coach her mother to spend time as well with us. I had wanted to sail to England when I was in Holland in 2009/2010 and this might be my last opportunity to sail the Baltic in the summer of 2013.

 

2 Comments so far ↓

  1. If you can give me the dimensions, I can make a new one for you and send it. I assume it has a Gibb hook on the the top and an eye on the bottom. I need the pin size on the bottom and depending on the size of the wire I also need the size of the hook. Some wire sizes allow two different size Gibb hooks. Anyway if you can figure everything out, including the length and diameter of the wire, i’d be glad to provide a new running backstay.

  2. jackvanommen says:

    Great, will send the measurement tomorrow.