The Ionian is a nice place! Lots of pictures.

[Solitaire]

A couple of weeks ago I went out to teach on a Falcon 80 based in Gouvia Marine. What a revelation! I have done a lot of work in the western Med, but apart from a delivery some years ago I had not done anything in this area.

Flying time from Gatwick was 2hrs 40 mins and a 20 minute taxi ride from the airport to the marina. It took me longer to get from Southampton to Gatwick with the time it takes to check in theses days - even with handbagage.

Well what a fantastic cruising area. Lots of lovely bays both on Corfu and with mainland Greece and Albania close by I could easily see this being a great cruising option. There were a lot of UK registered boats in the marina and I even came across a past forumite's boat - Englander - just 5 berths up. Unfortunately Colin was over in the UK at the time. so we did not get to touch base. The last time I was aboard Englander was in Barcelona.

Anyway a few pix of the boat and some of the scenery!

 

[Mr Googler]

Great pictures and agreed, a great spot. I've done 2 charters from lefkas. Loads of places to go. My favourite bay is off skorpios island. Had a swim under the gaze of security guards!!! Only issue is loads of group yacht charters but they always go the same route each week so I went the other Beautiful boat too :encouragement:

 

[pks1702]

A very nice area.

Spartochori on Meganissi and Fiscardo on Kefalonia were places I remember when I cruised the area; but is was 15 years ago.

Great images, thanks for posting.
​

 

[rafiki_]

Yep, lovely pics, many thanks. Looks a great place to cruise.

 

[MedMilo]

Looks perfect! Have been cruising in and around the Balearics for the last few years and the Ionian is definitely on the agenda, possibly for next season. Am considering Gouvia but limited winter access might be a problem; so possibly Croatia base and then cruise down to Corfu as and when. Thanks for posting.

 

[Greg2]

Lovely pics. Not cruised the Ionian unless you count a type 42 destroyer but sailed further south and had a great time. Superb cruising ground.Thanks for sharing

 

[BartW]

thanks for posting and the tip of sailing to Corfu,
which is actually a possible new destination for us, now we are based in Tivat Montenegro, (we have booked here for at least 2 more seasons )

and this Falcon, I've alway's admired these boat models many similarity's with Blue Angel, (Canados)

I never got to know more about that Falcon yard is that the same as Versilcraft ?
perhaps PowerYachtBlog can tell the history on that?

 

[Deleted User YDKXO]

Looks perfect! Have been cruising in and around the Balearics for the last few years and the Ionian is definitely on the agenda, possibly for next season. Am considering Gouvia but limited winter access might be a problem; so possibly Croatia base and then cruise down to Corfu as and when. Thanks for posting.

Croatia base won't help you if you're looking for all year round access as both Easyjet and Ryanair stop flying to Split and Zadar respectively during winter. The only all year round airport is Dubrovnik to where BA fly regularly. Trouble is that there is only one marina currently in Dubrovnik and that is the ACI one which I understand is pretty booked up unless you're lucky and is a bit grotty IMHO. If you want a good base between Croatia and the Ionian, then might be worth looking at the rather swish Porto Montenegro which is about 1hr's drive from Dubrovnik airport or less. Best thing is that you can buy duty free fuel there if you leave the country straightaway at a price which I understand is currently just over €0.60/litre. We are almost certainly heading for Porto Montenegro from Sardinia early next year ourselves

 

[Deleted User YDKXO]

Great pics Solitaire. Its been pretty windy in the W Med and N Adriatic on and off during August. I'd be interested to know if the weather was more settled in the Ionian because that in itself would be a draw for me. How was it?

 

[ccscott49]

Sorry I missed you!! The cruising is fantastic all around the Ionian I love it. Access is not quite as bad as some would have you believe in winter, plenty of flights to athens, including easyjet, then at least two a day from athens to corfu.

Gouvia marina is fine and reasonably priced (or I wouldnt be there) and theres plenty going on in the winter, if you know where to go.

August anywhere in the Ionian is to be avoided to be honest, too many Italians and too bloody hot for the main part, although at anchor, bearable with plenty of cold beer or wine! Next time let me know your imminent arrival!

 

[MedMilo]

Croatia base won't help you if you're looking for all year round access as both Easyjet and Ryanair stop flying to Split and Zadar respectively during winter. The only all year round airport is Dubrovnik to where BA fly regularly. Trouble is that there is only one marina currently in Dubrovnik and that is the ACI one which I understand is pretty booked up unless you're lucky and is a bit grotty IMHO. If you want a good base between Croatia and the Ionian, then might be worth looking at the rather swish Porto Montenegro which is about 1hr's drive from Dubrovnik airport or less. Best thing is that you can buy duty free fuel there if you leave the country straightaway at a price which I understand is currently just over €0.60/litre. We are almost certainly heading for Porto Montenegro from Sardinia early next year ourselves

Ah, I hadn't realised that there are no flights into Split through the winter, that's a shame. Over the last couple of months I've had a couple of email exchanges with Porto Montenegro and the marina looks impressive so that's definitely an option. I'm going out there to Croatia do a reccy in a couple of weeks and plan to visit PM too so will see what it's like and report back!

 

[BartW]

We are now on our 8th week boating from homeport Porte Montengro this season,
and we are that much pleased that we changed our reservation from one summer season to a 3 years booking !
I'll give later some more comments in another thread,

just want to confirm, that accessability is very good,
in summer we have 2 flights / week from Belgium from Thomas cook,
I believe there are also several flights / week from london, possibly daily,
Tivat airport is at 5 minutes from the marina,

as has been said, Dubrovnic / Cavtat is at approx 1h30 car/taxi drive, and has flights all year from /to many destinations,
and then there is Podgorica, 1h45 car drive, there is a Ryanair hub, and probably also other flight co's.
so you have several options, we have used all these options depending on what day we or our guests wanted to fly...

and yes we bought duty free fuel here, and lots of it ! ;-)

 

[AndieMac]

.........and this Falcon, I've alway's admired these boat models many similarity's with Blue Angel, (Canados)....

First thing I noticed was the similarity to BA.

Btw, MapisM has a Canados 70 two boats along from his, in his home port marina. At least I got to see an approximate version of Blue Angel in real life

It would be good to hear how your summer cruising adventures have been.