The Canal: Galaxidhi to Aegina

The next push was an overnight crossing to position us at the entrance to the Corinth Canal at 7 am (first real light). We left Galaxidhi at around 11pm, still taking advantage of a bright moon to navigate the gulf, and arrived at the canal at 6am so we watched the sunrise and radioed for passage at first light. Ships go in convoy each way through the canal and you have to wait for your turn along with ships of all shapes and sizes. We followed a huge cargo ship through and while we were docked at the other end, had an enormous tanker pass us by in the opposite direction – causing momentary panic until we realized he wasn’t under his own engines so wasn’t going to pulverize us with his wash. The journey through the canal was about 30 minutes and caused us to “breath in” from time to time.

The sea area on the east side of the canal is extremely busy with vast tankers, cargo ships and ferries. We made for Aegina, an island about 2 hours run from Athens where we were to meet the Porter family. It’s a noisy mooring – directly on the main road along the harbour front. On the positive side, it was about 10 metres to the nearest Mythos or milkshake and it had water and electricity – heaven.

Pictures: Moonset and Chris over Corinth, Sunrise over Corinth, Through the canal