Katakolon, (The Greeks translated this into English as Katakolo) is located on the southwest side of the Peloponnesus and nicely tucked away on the inside of a mountain ridge; sort of in the same way as Sarande. Only here the natural bay it has created is much deeper and provides much more shelter. But because it is away from any major sea route it has never been a really important port. Only what was needed to reach Olympia from the sea would call here. And for a long long time it were only fishermen who used the harbor here while the town itself was focusing on tourism coming from the Athens and other larger cities. For Katakolon that resulted in being the end terminal of the first long distance railroad in Greece. Something they are very proud about and which has been running until the current day. The town itself is still small with no more than a 1000 real inhabitants but local tourism must provide work for many more. We were indeed the only cruise ship that came in this morning and thus we had the best spot in port, Berth 3, which causes us to in push our nose almost into the boulevard. With the port security that we have since 2001, there have to be fences and with that comes a large open area. If we would not have had that, then the restaurants would be been built up all the way to the gangway.

Sailing into Katakolon with the little port nicely tucked away behind a mountain ridge.

The port can take 3 ships alongside: Berth 1 is inside of the sea wall and a long way from downtown. The berth 2 is opposite of us, and the same pier but is slightly smaller than berth 3 where we are. Then you can have one or more large size ships at anchor. Which happens on occasion but as the town is so small and there are a lot of regular tourists as well, one ship is enough to keep all the shopkeepers happy.

It is amazing what you can find in the internet. Your own ship alongside. Note the pier construction. To save money it is made up of 4  platforms sticking out from the earlier pier. The south side, pier 2, can take a long ship as well, but it will be overhanging past the piers end.

Yesterday the focus was on the beach but today most of the guests went tour. I counted about 30 coaches lined up outside the gate and 30 x 50 guests mean 1500 on a roll and going somewhere. Most of them to Olympia, Delos and the Corinth Canal. When the ship does the East Med cruise to Piraeus, then we run the same tours from Nafplion located on the east side of the Peloponnesus. Now we are running the west Med. cruise to Barcelona and then we use Katakolon. For those who stayed behind, Katakolon offers a nice and intimate Greek experience with all the small restaurants along a boulevard which starts at the cruise terminal and ends at the marina. In between small fishing boats tie up to the water’s edge in front of the restaurants. It is very touristy but somehow not spoiled. Fishing is still a “one man happening” here and this morning around 09.30 we saw a whole slew of them coming back. I do not know if they catch much in the area here but the boats looked well maintained so there must be money in it.

Katakolon is very small. Basically only three streets. The boulevard, a street with shops and then the last street with a museum and some regular houses. No big hotels or anything else. So once the day tourists are gone it returns to being itself.

I mentioned yesterday the sulpher smell and yes it was there this morning. Very distinct and very nasty to inhale. Luckily the Oosterdam has its main gangway amidships where it is less prominent as the earth fault lies close to the shore line, there were our bow was. Katakolon Mountain is an ancient volcano nearby and its old volcanic ash has ensured that this is a very fertile area for farming. But the cracks in the earth crust which once let the lava through are still there. Only now it lets water in, which gets warmed up and which then returns to the surface with a lot of nutrients only they are acid nutrients. Among them sulpher gas which once released by the water gives the port of Katakolon its characteristic smell. But that is as dangerous as it will get here. The local pilot (You will find him mentioned in previous blogs since 2007) told me once that they did not want volcanic action here as it was bad for business. So I suppose the local chamber of commerce has outlawed this from happening.

. On the bridge he still tells the captain the same thing; if you go here and if you go not too close to there, you will be in good shape. For the rest of the day he runs his restaurant on the seafront but I should say it is operated by the family. As mother is in the kitchen and daughter and son are serving at the tables.

Tomorrow we are at sea, sailing north towards Naples were we are on the 17th. It means sailing south of Italy and then going through the Strait of Messina. The marine weather forecast predicts with 90% accuracy that it will be another warm and sunny day, with temperatures in the high 80’s or high 20oC and a moderate breeze. As we are moving back to Central European time, we will have an hour back, which is appreciated as Today was a 13 hrs. day, spent on teaching the cadets to supervise sailors and mooring ropes on arrival and departure and a regular day in between.