13th – 20th August –Sciacca to Port Empedocle

High Point: Arrival of the family from Devon to have a week’s holiday onboard. We collect Catherine’s sister Fiona and her kids Tommy and Rosie from Palermo airport on the 13th, stopping off to see the temple at Segesta on the way back to Sciacca.

Makarma has turned into a swimming platform for the week. The swell prevented us from anchoring off the beach at Sciacca, so we walked to it instead for the first couple of afternoons while our visitors acclimatised. Although Sciacca to Port Empedocle is a mere 25 miles, we plan a halfway stop at Eraclea Minoa to split it into two short passages. We have a gentle closehauled sail most of the way from Sciacca to Eraclea Minoa – Fiona enjoying the helming.

Low Point: Anchoring for the night off the beach at Eraclea Minoa. Despite almost no wind, a persistent southeasterly swell caused by winds somewhere off the Tunisian coast make a misery of what should have been an idyllic anchorage. The boat pitched and rolled all night. We all needed lee cloths, our visitors needed stugeron to quell their seasickness, and no-one got much sleep. We left with relief at first light the next morning to anchor in the more sheltered waters of Port Empedocle harbour.

Port Empedocle is a commercial harbour, not exactly scenic. Our anchorage is in the western harbour between the ferry terminal and the power station. At least there’s a small beach just beyond the sea wall, and the kids are happy swimming off the boat in the harbour. The shops are conveniently close ashore. We take the boat out every day from the harbour to anchor off the beach somewhere. The awning is still over the boom and the sail cover on – towels and swimming gear on the rails. The light winds means there’s little point in getting it all down to do some sailing, so we make no pretence of being seamanlike. One day we visit Scala dei Turchi, a brilliant white limestone outcrop which juts out beyond the beach just west of Port Empedocle. It is swarming with people who are climbing up the well worn paths around the structure, stretching out to sun themselves on its blinding brightness, or diving off into the sea below.
The kids have an insatiable appetite for diving, swimming and snorkelling. Keeping everyone fed, watered and de-salted occupies much of the day, whilst still leaving plenty of time to enjoy their lively company, to catch up on the news from home and to show our gratitude for all the shore liaison that Fiona does for us at home.

There’s one more Greek colony we want to visit while we’re here, and the kids reluctantly give up a morning’s swim to come along as well. It is a short bus ride from Port Empedocle to the Valley of the Temples at Agrigento. The three temples built along the ridge – the Temple of Hercules; the Temple of Concord and the Temple of Hera are no less impressive a second time around for Catherine. We see them again from the sea as we daysail out to the Lido San Leone the next day.

The highlight for us both is the Archeological Museum – and not just because we could get out of the searing heat. It has a scale model of the massive Temple of Zeus which would have been the largest Doric temple every built, but was never completed as it was destroyed when the city was sacked by the Carthaginians. Also on display is a telamon, a sculpted stone Atlas nearly 8 metres high, one of dozens which supported the roof of the temple. Until you see the model and the Atlas together, you just don’t get a sense of the colossal scale of the building. Later, in an act of utter disregard for the value of their own heritage, many of the huge stone blocks were taken from the ruined temple to construct the port at Empedocle.

Visiting Selinunte and Agrigento - these ancient cities of Magna Graecia - is a reminder to us that we’re getting closer to journey’s end for this summer’s cruising. Our goal is Greece, and specifically the Ionian islands this year. We have sailed over 1500 miles since leaving Ayamonte in May, and there’s not far to go now. We can’t wait to get on and find ourselves there.