On Tuesday our agenda included an island cruise. This included three islands.
The weather had other plans however. The evening before after getting off the bus, I noticed I could hear the surf pounding after we got off the bus. The sea was not visible from the hotel. It was a short walk across the street. I walked down there and found a bunch of guys in wet suits packing up after a day of surfing ! I was thinking, “Uh oh, it is going to be a rough ride tomorrow !”.
We got on our cruise boat, and within the protected port it did not seem too bad. We finally got under way late after the boat was loaded up with other tourists. We took turns learning about island touring options, and there were sessions in English, Spanish, and Chinese.
We got going and after spending some time drinking coffee on the top deck I camped out at a table on the dining level. This was fully enclosed and protected from the wind. By this time we were on the open ocean and the cruiser was getting tossed around a bit. I was getting bored and decided to get out on the top deck again. Walking up to the bow, the wind was howling ! Marcela and Nancy were up there hanging onto the rail, but not too successfully ! I got the video camera going and watched them get blown around. It was really funny ! The boat hit some sort of swell and started rocking violently. Deck chairs starting sliding and falling over. Some of the people sitting in chairs on the top deck fall backwards out of their chairs. The boat made a hard turn out of the wind.
Not too long after, there was an announcement that we were turning back. We would skip the first two islands, and return to the third which we had already passed. Disappointing of course, but besides the rough weather I think we were getting behind schedule with the slow going into the wind.
According to reports from the dining level, there were two large crashes from the galley as a large number of plates crashed to the floor when the large swell hit.
We got back to the third island, and after a struggle got the boat docked. We got out and got on a bus for a short tour of the island. What a cool little island with rolling hills and great views. We stopped at a beautiful Greek Orthodox church and took a short tour inside. This church is also a tribute to Saint Niktorius. The woodwork inside was incredible !
We got back on the ship after a bit of touring the local town, and they served up lunch. It was good, but after they got some Karaoke type stuff going, it was back to the top deck. It was a much smoother cruise home and we got to watch the sun set as we made it back to port.
It was disappointing we missed the first two islands. It was still interesting, and I think it was well worth dealing with the initial bad weather. Here is an album of pictures from the cruise: