Koroni Castle

Written by Pieter Jan on Sep 30, 2019 — 2 min read

At: Koroni, Western Peloponnesos, Greece

Today we took another break from sailing. We have to wait here anyway until the wind turns in the right direction. The wind prediction for the coming days looks like there’s a massive giant lying asleep in the Adriatic sea. He will breathe in on Wednesday and Thursday, then out on Friday and Saturday. The current plan is to follow his breath north-east via Zakynthos and Kefalonia until Kerkyra (some 200 miles), then across to the heel of Italy’s boot on Friday (around 60 miles), then south-west until Sicily (another 200 miles).

I really hope we’ll make good progress. Judging from our current average 4 knot speed, 200 miles could take as long as 50 hours, which makes 25 hours per day. It would be doable on Mars.

I’m also hoping we don’t end up like this sad but photogenic sailboat, although whatever happened probably happened because it was too close to land.

I hope you will sail again someday
I hope you will sail again someday

So we visited Koroni castle today. This castle, together with the neighbouring Methoni castle, were the two ‘eyes’ the Venetians used to control all maritime routes between the West and the East.

I spy with my very big eye
I spy with my very big eye
That's some fortress
That's some fortress

Nowadays it’s slowly but very literally falling apart. Big chunks of the fortifications and bastions have fallen off into the sea.

Chunck of the fortress in the sea
Chunck of the fortress in the sea

Amazingly, the castle is still inhabited today by a few families. It occupies a fair bit of land, so there’s plenty of room inside for houses, several olive groves, some churches and a graveyard. There’s also a nunnery that you can’t enter when you’re dressed as if it’s summer outside. Fortunately, the nuns provide you with a fine choice of old clothes to avoid any indecency.

Inside the nunnery’s church, we lit some candles to wish ourselves a good voyage. Barbara’s candle promptly went out. That was a little disconcerting. Or it’s a gentle reminder not to be too superstitious. The nuns were nice though and gave our kids lots of candy (that I ate because they didn’t like it).

All in all, an agreeable little town and a pretty impressively sized fortress.

Kids on rocks
Kids on rocks
Climbing and swordfighting
Climbing and swordfighting
Feeling on top of things
Feeling on top of things
Open the gates
Open the gates
No enemy in sight here
No enemy in sight here
I can imagine worse places to take a rest
I can imagine worse places to take a rest
Barbara also being photogenic
Barbara also being photogenic
Little kittens on nets
Little kittens on nets
Little kids on the quay
Little kids on the quay