Arriving to Kalamata
Tuesday, 3 March, 2026. After an amazing month at anchor, we entered Kalamata Marina as per our plan, only 3 months late; since the boat suffered some issues with the engines' rubber mounts and steel rigging. We were welcomed by one of the nicest marinero we’ve met on our journey who helped us tie to boat to a pontoon right next to the road that passes through the marina. He told us that if there’s anything we need, we can give him a call, and gave us a heads-up that we might have to move from this pontoon to the next in the near future.
Why we decided to come here was purely decided by our wallets. We had previously decided to be back in Finland from the summer all the way to Christmas. Why we decided to do that? Well we had been given the opportunity to act in a fun play back home in Oulun Työväen Näyttämö, so we figured, might as well. I wasn’t too fond of the idea when we decided to do so in January, and I was not until a week ago, as I feel like the sailing journey has only begun now that we’re in Greece. The question about staying on the boat for the rest of the year was a matter of money. Should I find a low paying job somewhere in Greece and save money by anchoring 99% of the time and not be sure how much money I will earn, or pay money to leave the boat in Kalamata with a slightly higher chance of getting a job in Finland to pay for the mooring + repairs/maintenance when we get back.
The answer was clear and simple in my head: “Why on earth would I go back to Finland to earn money, if I can and have earned money on the boat before and finally would have a perfect opportunity to save money by anchoring?” that was until we met some other sailors over a barbecue, one of which was Stefan. He had been given the job of selling a beautiful 40-foot sailboat. We were definitely interested in this opportunity, so he showed us around. The bilge was clean, engine compartments spotless, wood beautifully varnished and the boat seemed to be well maintained. (Video of the boat below). So we told Stefan we have to do some calculations to see whether we could be able to buy this boat, and came to the conclusion that, it’s possible, but uncertain. We decided to sleep on it and check out the boat again the next morning.
We had a good chat together about the possibility of upgrading to a bigger boat that night, we made the classic list of pros and cons, and the biggest cons were teak deck with a sandwich structure and wooden masts. We could deal with one, not both. Biggest pros were: it’s super pretty and extremely spacious with all the stuff we were hoping to install in the future. I’m not going to list all the pros and cons, but you get the general idea. The next morning came, and we had the showing at 7:30 in the morning. We were handed the keys and were told to take our time with checking everything out. We stuck our noses to each and every compartment in search of our one true enemy: “The mold”, and for the first 15 minutes things were looking great, until we found what we were looking for. The bow sleeping area had (from what information I gathered, I’m not a surveyor, this is not a professional review) a black, moldy wooden structure near the mast. So the decision of whether or not we should be upgrading our boat was made for us. We already have Meri’s boat as a mold project, and we’re fighting off mold in my boat, we don’t need a third as of now, maybe later.
Struck by a feeling of relief and emptiness, we started chatting about seriously upgrading the boat, and what plans do we have for the future. The plan ( for now ) is to work in Finland until December, sail around in Greece for 2027 and finishing up the installations / prototypes I’ve added to the boat, after that, it’s time to find the next owner for Gipsy II, and search for a Nauticat 38 or some 40-footer with aluminum masts and/or full fiberglass deck. So, now the decision of heading back to Finland to earn a bit of extra money was the right choice. I hope to find a full-time job or part-time jobs in Finland in order to help these next steps.
At first glance, Kalamata didn’t seem anything out of the ordinary, cats running around everywhere, abandoned buildings and construction sites, and all in all, a quite basic city. For the first week we basically did what we always do; check the grocery stores, check the laundry options, find a good marine supply store, fix the boat and see if there’s a good cafe nearby to start going to regularly. The first week fly by fast, think of Groundhog day, every day the same, suffering from the post anchoring blues, which was eased by the stray cats begging for food and pets. Every trip outside got us reminiscing about our first winter in A Coruna and how that city, with it’s only downside being the lack of proper marine store, has been our favorite spots to be in, and how we slightly took it for granted while being there. We’ve missed Spanish grocery stores, prices, people and vibe in general. For example every Thursday I went for a coffee in La Celeste in A Coruna, and here in Kalamata I fail to find a coffee shop as lovely as that place was. If the owner of La Celeste ever finds this, know that we’ll be back!
The feeling of Kalamata being slightly disappointing passed, once we found out that there’s an old town and a market that happens twice a week only 40-minute walk from the marina. So last Saturday, (14th of March, 2026) we walked over there, and to our surprise it was packed with vegetables, olive oil, wine, tea and all sorts of things you actually need in a regular basis. Not one of those touristy t-shirt/ice cream markets. To our benefit, we noticed that the reason we found Kalamata and Greece in general to be quite expensive was that we had never been to one of these markets, and had instead bought everything from the grocery stores.
After a nice scouting of supplies in the market, we went for a cup of coffee in a place I will not mention, for a reason I will not mention. Ask me in person, it’s pretty funny. After walking the quick and comfortable 40-minutes back and forth, we spotted our very first bus in Kalamata, which of course happens to go from the marina to the market, how lucky are we! There was no question about whether we’d opt the easy way back next time or not, which we did last Wednesday, followed by our trademark move of going wrong way all the way to the last stop. Luckily the people here seem to be used to dumdums like us, and had no trouble about letting us use the same ticket to go back to our final destination.
As everyone who owns a boat knows, they’re a lot of work, especially if you forget/don’t know to do something before it’s “too late” or in my case, just a tad late. We’ve had leaky toerails in the boat for an x period of time can’t say for certain, but we thought we had it under control after rebedding the handrails. As it turns out I may have just trapped moisture inside the toerail, which has then given the decks core a slight flex under weight. It’s nothing too major, as the deck still feels stiff everywhere else except the edges. When I finally noticed something has to be done about this, it was already winter and raining every other day. I finally had the chance to fix this issue now, here in Kalamata.
The comfort of staying in one place for a longer period of time gave me the confidence to fire up the dremel and angle grinder to open up the toerail and see what’s inside it. Turns out there was roughly 1 cm worth of water in an area, which should be bone dry. So I removed all the moist and wet material, dried everything up, contacted a local carpenter to spare me some extra pieces of wood that they don’t need (Thanks Vagellis!) and filled the toerail with epoxy and wood. The structure doesn’t have to be stiff or very solid, as the previous material was foam, but I figured I might as well try to make it as tough to break as possible. Time will tell if that is a good practice or not. The project is still ongoing, I’ll keep you posted.
It’s hard to capture in writing everything that happens in our daily life, as most of it is quite dull for some. For example the glorious quest of figuring out which cat jumped on our boat the second night we were in the marina or the fact that I (without counting) cut precisely the right amount of cucumber slices for our lunch sandwiches. The latter being so exciting I told my friends about it. Slow boat life definitely changes the perspective of things.
Now for figuring out which cat hopped on our boat that one night. We had three suspects. The first suspect was: “Fuckface” a smiling cat you see on the photo above. Now don’t let the cute face fool you, that cat has been the only one of the strays that runs in excitement to beg for food, plays with you, lets you pet them, but in a matter of seconds decides that was enough and scratches you. The second suspect “Miisu“ A cat without a tail, very friendly and seemed agile or the third suspect "Cat of the Cats” which got the nickname for looking exactly like a cat.
The suspect was caught red handed on Wednesday 19th when we started cooking dumplings. I opened the hatch to let the air out and saw the suspect peeking behind the sprayhood. It was Cat of the Cats, the cat that looks like a cat. We opened the doors and gave her some treats to welcome her as our little friend.
The cat has been visiting us now ever so often and trying to be as cute as possible to get food all the time, but we made a decision to only give food once a day, as we can’t risk the cat thinking she’s welcome to live with us, since the fact that we’re leaving in three months would either kill the cat with sorrow, or the cat would kill me before that, as I’m allergic. However it is nice to have a little friend visiting the boat often. Today she was purring next to my shoulder on the counter as I was writing this blog. Cute little bastard.
