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Exploring the Ionian

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  After the long winter in Boston we are back on CoKeMa again and very happy to be here. We flew from New York to Heathrow on May 5th and then on to Athens from there. We rented a car for the drive across to Preveza. The boat was just as we had left it in Cleopatra Marina in Greece, a very professional organization to work with. We had some projects to complete before launching which we did on May 21st. Since then, we have been moving around the Ionian islands south of Preveza. The 3 main islands are Lefkada, Kefalonia and Zakynthos but we have also visited other great islands like Ithaki, Kalamos and Kastos. Picture of the White Cliffs on the south west tip of Lefkada Check out our  WEB PAGE for the best updates.  The web page has a link to Ita’s blog as well as videos from the trip including a  video from the drone in the picture above. Under the “ JOURNEY ” page you can see a history of our travels from Turkey last year and it is updated at a minimum once a month. If you click on
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Summer of 2020 in 2 minutes

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 This short video brings together a summary of our travels from leaving Boston in July until we returned at the end of October. My favorite picture of the boat is the one we took anchored just off the Old Town of Korcula in Croatia.  Summer video link. Watch for a preview of 2021 plans coming up soon.  
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CoKeMa final voyage for 2020.

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Our plan for the winter was to bring the boat back down to Greece to haul out for the off season and return to Boston for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Our last trip had us leaving Betina Marina on the island of Murter with Conor on board to help us get down to Dubrovnik. In Dubrovnik our friend Jim from Activity Yachting joined us to continue down to Corfu where he planned to get a flight back to the UK. We had additional crew join in Corfu for the remainder of the trip down to Preveza so despite the COVID restrictions we were delighted to welcome David, Orla and Helen for the final part of the trip. The trip went very well and you can see locations and photos in the  MAP . One of the great spots we visited was Lakka on Paxos and David flew his drone to capture some video which you can see  HERE. Once we were tied up at Preveza Marina we rented a car and drove to Athens for flights the next day. The timing allowed us to get in a visit to the Acropolis so this was a great way to finish t
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Croatia National Parks

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 The last post left off with us anchored in Zlarin sheltering from some strong southerly winds and from there we went across to the town of Sibenik on the mainland where we stayed at a Marina for a few nights. We used this as a base to do some exploring in the KRKA National Park. We took a taxi up to the town of Scradin where you can officially enter the park.  Park boat takes you up to the falls at Scradinski. The MAP  shows the boat journey with the connected lines and the places visited in the park as locations with pictures attached if you click on the location. Picture of us returning on the boat trip up to Roski buk. About 70% of Croatia GDP is from tourism and the country works hard to maintain all tourist attractions in perfect shape. After the land based outing at the park we took CoKeMa up to Scradin to spend a night at Konoba Vidrovaca a restaurant with docking facilities recommended by friends. Overall the KRKA NP was another must visit if in Croatia. Our next destination w
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Cruising in Croatia

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It is hard to believe that it was just last month that we left USA and saw the boat for the first time, so much has happened. After the trip up past Greece and Albania our first port of call in Croatia was Cavtat which is the southern most port where you can check in. The check in process was a bit convoluted visiting 3 different offices some two times but overall, very straight forward if not so efficient. Once complete and the cruising fee paid, we can now stay for up to 90 days in Croatia. That was almost 4 weeks ago and the country is amazing. There is a reason there are more super yachts here than any other part of the Mediterranean or the Caribbean. We stayed at anchor for a few days in the pretty fishing town of Cavtat swimming during the day and eating ashore in the evening. The next stop was Dubrovnik where we anchored outside the city walls on the first night and then docked at a marina for a few days to explore the town. It is a living medieval walled city that is absolute
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First Voyage of CoKeMa

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 Yesterday we checked in to Croatia which marked the end of our first trip. From here we will spend the next weeks enjoying the coastline of Croatia moving slowly north to meet with some people in Hvar towards the end of the month. After launching CoKeMa we did a few day trips around Marmaris getting ready to depart from Turkey. Our original plan was to move slowly through the Greek Island heading north and west through the Corinth canal towards Croatia but the  tension  between Turkey and Greece meant our first port of call after Turkey could not be Greece. We made the decision to go directly to Croatia about 800 miles without a landfall. On the second night out we got blasted by the  Meltemi  with gusts greater than 35 knots and the next morning we decided to stop and anchor at a Greek island to make some repairs - an unofficial stop but at a remote island and we did not go on shore. With repairs to the lazy jack system completed we left early the next morning and headed west towards
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CoKeMa launch July 25th

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Great progress since we left from JFK on Sunday last. We arrived Monday evening in Dalaman and traveled over to Marmaris on Tuesday morning. The view coming down the mountain into Marmaris is spectacular.  Overall Turkey is fantastic, Marmaris is a real resort town with all the tourist amenities but because of COVID it is really quiet so it is a snap to get a table at a restaurant and the people are really friendly. We saw our boat for the first time on Tuesday and thanks to a local guy Mehmet it was looking pristine. We spent a few days organizing things and we launched yesterday and went out for the first sail. So far everything we dreamed of. Launch video below.  
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