Kos - sailing in the greek dodecanese islands  Greece sailing report

Kos has one of the few "professional" Marinas in Greece, the Kosmarina

The Kosmarina made a big carreer since it´s opening some years ago, all the places are booked out, and reservation is necessary all season long!
The facilities are very nice, the cleaning is perfect. The organisation and cleaning of the Kosmarina is very well - they do a pretty good job there! All services for a boat are provided, and the Cafe/restaurant in the Kosmarina has a very nice atmosphere with young and older people from all over the world. The Kosmarina market offers fresh bread at 8 a.m. and all other provisionings. Prices are absolutely acceptable.
2 marina-shops offer technical equipments and several maintenance companies offer services for the boat. Beaches are on both sides of the marina (3 min walk), so a morning-swim can start your perfect day! Kos Marina is quite close to the town-harbour (10-15 minutes walk or a bus). The Kosmarina provides excellent showers in perfect clean condition and toilets, that are worth to be visited, even, when it´s a pretty long walk from some jetties to the central located lavatories.
Entering In Kos-Marina, it is important to "know the rules", because Stavros, managing the pilot boat, feels responsible to get you in the mooring-place without damages. And the reason are the strong winds: usually, the wind is coming strong from north, so it is indeed recommended to be carefull manoevering inside the Marina.
Call the Marina-office at your VHF Channel 77 and wait at the entrance for arrival of the yellow pilot boat. The pilot will check your boatsize and order a mooring-place for you.
Following the instructions of the pilot is helpfull, he stays with you and pushes the bow to position with his inflatable boat.
Note, that mooring alongside is charged double!

If the Kosmarina is full, but you want to visit the town and island of Kos, you can either take one of the ports presented below, or try to get a place in the old port of Kos.
Staying in a village´s port might be noisy, and the water in the harbouroften is dirty, occasionally swell might cause trouble or neighbourhood boats dropping or lifting their anchor might cause problems. Anyway we like staying in "normal" ports to take part of the "normal life" on the quais and being right in the middle of local scenery. However: sometimes, a Marina with it´s facilities can be a good alternative especially for a charter-crew with 6 or 8 on board, who need to have a shower. And for provisioning the boat with fuel and water, a Marina is a good place to stay. During the season, in the old port behind the castle of Kos there are some places for boats on the leftside area of the port, the ground is 4-5m and holds very good. Off-season, the space on the opposite side is open for guest-boats as well.

If you come from Turkey, immigration paperwork is unavoidable!

The Immigration Police´s office is inside the ferryboat´s arrival gate, which is the white building in the port-entrance, on the left side, some "sail-type tents" are seen, from seaside exactly left at the castle´s right corner. Go there first with crewlist and passports. After, you go to Customs next door (where they charge 15 €, sometimes) , and finally with stamped crewlist you go to the Port Police. The office is exactly on the opposite side of the harbour. Present your PPMD (Private Pleasure boat Document), and if you have none, you must buy one. You pay immigration-tax (15 €) and mooring-fee for the time you are there.

Kos itself is very nice to stay, visit the castle, see the old plant of Hypokrates, the ancient philosopher and doctor, who is still the mental guide for medical doctors all over the world, have a walk through the narrow shopping- and Bar-streets up the hill, take a cup of coffee on the place right below the old Mosque, maybe take a day and go for a daytrip to turkish Bodrum, which is 35 minutes by ferry twice a day in the summer season.

If you have the time to stay longer, you should, if you can ! Here some reasons:

The area around the village Zia and Evangelistria is very beautiful, and one should not miss to visit the area - rent a moto or a car!
Drive out of Kos-town direction airport and then make left at the corner to see the antique site of Aklepeion, an old holy area of ancient Greece.
If you follow that street further, you pass the horrible waste-area (always burning), or you drive back to mainroad and follow the airport direction for another 3-4 km, follow the indications 4-5 km to Evangelistria, Zia and Asfendiou or next Lagoudi. The road leads up to the mountains and offers breathtaking views over forested mountain areas! Very beautiful! In the north, you can see the islands of Kalymnos, Pserimos and the turkish coastline.

If you want to see more of Kos, take your time to sail around!

From Kos, mostly northerly winds might let you sail to the south-coast first.
Just behind the cape of Ag.Fokas you will be able to take a swim in hot vulcanic waters, the "Therme".
Another 15 nm further westwards you can stop in the big harbour of Kardamena, which is pretty touristic and offers all kinds of entertainments.

From here, the next day you can sail to Kefalos bay, and take a day on the beautiful beach, which is famous for it´s steady winds and no waves, so sometimes hundreds of windsurfers with all colours are in the bay.(famous Club Mediterranee has a Hotel here) Drop your anchor in the small bay behind the port (on the picture right area), go alongside the quai or (if you have a smaller boat) you can enter the little port (on the left).

If you want to sail westerly from here, the next destination could be Levitha or Astipalaiia, or south the island of Nisyros with it´s vulcano-crater.

Maybe, you want to sail to the north, or you come from there, you can enter the port of Mastichari. If you want to take or leave someone for the airport that is a good port, because it is only 8-10 km from Kos airport!

Do you want to charter a boat in Greece?
Please go to www.greece.charterpartner.com

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