FAST LANE
The best 2025 cruiser-racers
PEACE IN GREECE
● Chartering in Corinth
● Sailing the Saronic
● Reading the Ionian weather
SYDNEY - HOBART RACE
Youngest ever skipper tells her story
BENTE 28 Pocket rocket on test
Tasmanian devilry
The Sydney Hobart Yacht Race has developed a reputation for exhilarating racing and sometimes wild conditions. Arriving o the striking coastline of Tasman Island means you are entering the finishing strait and this spectacular backdrop is the signpost that the finish line is within reach
Photo: Rolex
SOMETHING OLD SOMETHING NEW
Nic Compton takes a journey into the past as he sails through the Saronic Gulf where he had spent much of his youth
They say that familiarity breeds contempt, and it was for that reason that I didn’t originally want to revisit the Saronic Gulf in Greece. I had grown up on boats in that area in the 1970s and had worked as a journeyman shipwright there in the 1980s. I gured it was time to move on, and was excited to visit the neighbouring Cyclades instead. But when the weather apps showed a strong Meltemi (the local northerly wind) blasting through the Aegean for the middle week of our holiday, I realised the Saronic Gulf would be a much more family-friendly option.
It turned out that, while much had changed since I had last cruised here 35 years ago, the intrinsic beauty of the landscape and the natural friendliness of the people still remained. Not only that but, while much of what we saw was familiar to me, there were still plenty of surprises in store.
As regular readers will know, my wife Anna and I, along with our two children, took our 1982 Freedom 33 cat ketch Zelda from our home in Devon, UK, through the French canals to Greece in 2022. We’ve been based in the Ionian, on the west coast of Greece, ever since, doing longer trips with my friends and me (including a visit to Albania in Spring 2023) and gentle cruising with just the family on board. In Spring 2024 we moved the boat to Aegina, an island a few miles south of Athens, for a change of scene.
Mer Égée
Golfe Saronique
BENTE IN
Bente Yachts promised to offer something different when it came onto the scene. Has it succeeded with the Bente 28? Sam Jefferson finds out
SHAPE?
A CORINTHIAN CHALLENGE
Janet McMeekin embraces a charter holiday in Greece’s Gulf of Corinth
GREECE AND SUN OIL
Greece remains one of the most popular sailing holiday locations, with places like the Cyclades, Ionian, and Saronic Gulf offering some of the best cruising grounds in the world writes Sue Pelling