It is getting summer here. My first searches for the mosquito net have not turned it up. The nights are getting too warm to sleep even under a cotton sheet and I need that mosquito net. This morning I went to clear out of Greece with the police and customs but I have to come back Monday morning and be read the riot act and pay fines. Apparently the police in Chios did not stamp my transit log. I know for certain that I visited them on several occasions. And then I was supposed to check in with every police station along the way. But I was never told or asked to do this. And how would I have found them?

I spent a couple hours in the Byzantine Museum of Antivouniotissa. A church built in the early 16th century. It contains some beautiful icons. One of them depicts scenes in the life of Saint Nicholas. This should be of interest to the parishioners of my home parish, St. Nicholas church in Gig Harbor, Washington. When I celebrated Easter, a week later than the Roman calendar, in Chios, last April, it was in a Saint Nicholas church. I brought this, and the photographs, to the attention of the web master of the parish and school at St. Nicholas in Gig Harbor. I suggested that the students might want to follow my journey on the web site and this way appreciate some of the discoveries I make along the way of the geography and history. It fell on deaf ears.

I had a similar experience when I came back to Gig Harbor in 2007 after nearly completing a circumnavigation and suggested to my fellow Gig Harbor Yacht Club members to give a slide show of the voyage.They allowed me 5 minutes at the end of the monthly club meeting to give the details, most  of the members walked out while I talked and a handful showed up for the slide show. When I gave the same presentation in Amsterdam, it was standing room only. For many of my home town folks the world ends at Spokane, Portland and Vancouver.

“Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown” Luke 4:24.

I plan to explore the roots, in the next weeks, of the Croatian founders, the fishermen of the town of Gig Harbor and the St. Nicholas parish, which will celebrate it’s first centennial in 2014. It will be interesting to see their relatives, left behind, react when they see a 30 foot sail boat with Gig Harbor as home port, painted on her transom.

My Swedish neighbor has turned out to be an o.k. kind of guy. I just have to excuse myself when he gets in to his detailed explanations. His Siamese cat has to be chased out of the boat and his 10 day old puppy squeals for an hour or so in the early morning.

I saw the Dutch lose from the Danes in the early European Soccer championships, on t.v. in town. Then the Germans played a dull game against the Portuguese and it was o-o at half time. The Dutch can take some consolation that they have a decent chance against the German team.