Oh Fiskardo. Everyone raves about this tiny former fishing village. It’s certainly where you go to see and be seen. But this town is one and done for us, we’ve seen it and can tick it off our list, no need to come back.

A haven for megas

The harbor is tiny, and deep, which means most boats anchor with lines ashore. We have not done this yet and I don’t look forward to it as we are hard to back into a space (heavy boat, small engine, long keel, no thrusters, back up like a drunk elephant). We had read that there were a few areas where you could free anchor (not tie to shore), but found those areas were restricted by boats already tied with lines ashore. Luckily, the one boat free anchored left, and we snagged their spot. Deeper than I would have liked at 50 feet but we could manage. The only problem was that we were facing a restaurant that offered docking with lines ashore, and one of the last spots was taken after we had anchored (I just prayed that they anchored parallel to our anchor and chain, not over it).

Wondering if the boat in the middle fouled our anchor or chain….

Fiskardo is a cute town and we dinghied in and walked around. The one thing I found very unappealing were all the public quay spots covered with restaurant tables the moment you stepped off the boat. If you’re having dinner at one of these tables, you’re looking into the cockpit of a charter boat, with sunscreen-covered, sunburned, often-drunk, messy holiday goers. Yuck.

Pretty town but………..

We came back to the boat to find that even mega yachts were in the line-ashore business, and we were completely surrounded by an obscene amount of floating wealth…..one yacht cost $900,000 a week to charter! The worst was when one big motor boat backed up to shore past two small sailboats at anchor, completely fouling the anchor of one. The crew of the mega was completely stone-faced and unresponsive to the sailor’s shouts and pleas. (The sailboat had to wait hours the next morning till that crew of the big boat felt like it was time to leave and free up the anchor chain).

Money might buy a big boat but it does not buy good manners

The next morning it was time for us to move on and the dreaded happened. I noticed alot of resistance on the windlass as we were upping anchor…..yup, our anchor had hooked the other boats chain. Trip put on his snorkeling gear, the owner of the other boat came over, and with several lines and a lot of sweating, we managed to free his chain and make our escape. So long, Fiskardo!