Zakinthos Is. Maganos Bay Aug 23

Zakinthos Island, Laganos Bay. Aug 23.

Another perfect sail. We are savouring everyone of them as we count the days down to when we will have to be back on land.

Marg and I talked with the marina master last night. We paid for 2 nights at the harbour (30 euros). As he chatted with us he told us he had been to Montreal and, of course, really liked Canadians. After all the pleasantries he wished us a safe say and said he'd say a prayer for us. I told him we'd certainly appreciate that and we've had so many wonderful memories of Greece too.

Today we got away about 9:30 a.m. to sail WWN to the first of the Ionian Islands that we will visit. It was really sad to leave Peloponesse, we have such great memories of our time there.

We were about an hour out from our destination when I noticed dolphins in the water. They were coming to greet us and followed us for a few minutes. So wonderful, I had just about convinced myself that there were none left in the waters here.

The bay that we are in has loggerhead turtles here. They come in June to September to lay their eggs. There is some move to try and protect them but from what we've seen, it is not enough. Making our way to port we saw 5 or 6 large tour boats all congregating around one poor turtle they'd noticed in the water. It was more like they were torturing it than just showing hundreds of people what a turtle looks like. We decided we didn't ever want to be part of such a system and will probably leave without encountering one of the majestic old things.

We anchored for a while near the caves and Jim and I dinghied to them and then walked inside and swam around the outside and back to the dinghy. It was fun and most of the local visitors had left. They are brought there by the hundreds during the day.

Someday I'm going to have to go back to England and check out their harbours. We have seen the biggest, grandest, sleekest, classiest boats, all from England.

The one in our harbour tonight looks like something Queen E would use. Stunning, to say the least.