A Mykonos yacht cruise is a sea outing on a motor or sailing yacht around Mykonos, the Cycladic island in the central Aegean. The cruise is one of the Greece Tours on Greece Ville.
This post covers Mykonos in numbers, how a motor yacht moves, what size makes a superyacht, the pirates who raided the island, the rules for wastewater at sea, the island name, and the questions that come up on board: prescription medicines, loud music, the Schengen rule, power banks, engine fumes and Saharan dust.
What is a Mykonos yacht cruise?
A Mykonos yacht cruise centres on Mykonos, an island in the Cyclades. The municipality of Mykonos is split into two community districts. Together they hold 20 villages, settlements and islands in all. Delos and Rineia sit in the Mykonos town district, one of those two parts.
On a Mykonos yacht cruise, distances at sea count in nautical miles, a measure used for sea travel. Delos lies 17 nautical miles east of Syros. Syros lies 12 miles south-west of Tinos.
Syros lies 83 nautical miles from Piraeus and 62 nautical miles from Rafina. That makes Syros much closer to the port of Rafina. The people of Tinos live in 62 separate settlements.
Any Mykonos yacht cruise happens among islands with narrow gaps between them. A strait, which is a narrow channel of water, only half a mile wide separates Tinos from Andros.
Only four Cyclades islands have more residents than Mykonos. They are Syros (21,507), Naxos (20,578), Santorini (15,480) and Paros (14,520). Mykonos ranks 21st among Greek islands by population, just behind Aegina (12,911) and Thasos (13,104).
- Town district: The Mykonos town district counted 7,929 people in 2001 and 8,397 in 2011.
- Area: The Mykonos town district, which also holds Delos and Rineia, covers 64.168 square kilometres.
- Ano Mera: The Ano Mera district of the municipality counted 1,391 people in 2001.
The Cyclades had 119,549 people in 2005. The former prefecture, an old regional unit, ranked 29th in Greece by population.
How does a motor yacht move on a Mykonos yacht cruise?
A Mykonos yacht cruise can use a diesel engine. This engine lights its fuel by squeezing air until the air gets hot. It needs no spark plug. Large propellers that turn slowly are the efficient kind of propeller.
On a Mykonos yacht cruise, a diesel engine squeezes the air in each cylinder. The squeeze is normally between 15:1 and 23:1, a number called the compression ratio of the engine.
Small propellers that turn fast are the least efficient kind. Cavitation means vapour bubbles forming near a fast propeller blade. It wastes power, causes vibration and can damage the blade.
On a Mykonos yacht cruise, hull speed depends on the waterline, the line where the hull meets water. A 30 m waterline gives a hull speed of 13.3 knots. A 40 m waterline gives 15.4 knots.
Pushing past hull speed takes the greatest power. Wave-making resistance is highest in the transition stage, then rises more slowly. On a full-displacement hull, added horsepower cannot raise the top speed.
- Hull shape: A semi-displacement hull rises partly out of the water and makes smaller waves than planing hulls.
- Bow thruster: It pushes the bow, the front, sideways, so the captain can turn the boat.
- Stabilizer fins: They sit below the waterline, and a gyroscope tilts them to fight roll, the sideways rocking.
Fin stabilizers work better at higher speed and lose effect below a minimum speed. Yachts use fixed fins, while large cruise ships retract their fins.
What size makes a yacht a superyacht on a Mykonos yacht cruise?
A Mykonos yacht cruise raises the question of size, because the word superyacht has no official definition. People use the term for yachts from 24 metres to more than 180 metres long. Large, professionally crewed motor or sailing yachts fit the idea.
On a Mykonos yacht cruise, talk about size can get big. As superyachts grew, the informal size words grew too. These words are megayacht and gigayacht. Terayacht is only a guess.
Length overall, or LOA, is the maximum length of the hull, measured parallel to the waterline. This is the way used more than any other to give a ship’s size.
On a Mykonos yacht cruise, the length of a yacht depends on how it is measured. Waterline length is where the hull sits in the water. It is shorter than the length overall.
Length between perpendiculars is another way to measure a ship. The sailing yacht A is 144.03 metres long overall but 118.63 metres by this method. So the measuring method changes the number.
- Gross tonnage: It measures a ship’s overall internal volume, and it is not a measure of weight.
- Azzam: This yacht is 180 metres long and is the longest private motor yacht in the world.
- UK rule: The United Kingdom’s code calls a yacht large from 24 metres at the waterline.
The sailing yacht A has space for 20 guests and a crew of 54. Eclipse needs about 70 crew members to run her.
Which pirates raided the island of a Mykonos yacht cruise?
A Mykonos yacht cruise sails seas with a long pirate history. Italian pirates attacked Aegean settlements in the 12th century. Barbary pirates raided Greek seaside towns from at least 1500. Piracy was still a steady threat to Aegean shipping in the 18th century.
On a Mykonos yacht cruise, one name from Aegean history stands out: Barbarossa. In August 1537, Barbarossa and Lütfi Pasha led an Ottoman force. It took Venetian islands such as Syros, Paros, Tinos and Naxos.
Sultan Suleiman made Barbarossa grand admiral of the Ottoman Navy. He also made him governor of Rhodes, Euboea and Chios. A British naval historian called Barbarossa “the greatest pirate that has ever lived”.
On a Mykonos yacht cruise, another group of raiders is worth a mention. Corsairs from Tunis mainly raided the sea and coasts of Italy and Greece. A corsair was a sea pirate.
On Sifnos, the oldest potteries stood inland, in Artemon and Ano Petali, to avoid pirate attacks. On 27 July 1826, boats of HMS Cambrian captured a pirate vessel on Tinos. Five pirates were killed.
- Manto Mavrogenous: She sold jewellery to equip 200 men as the Ottoman fleet entered the Cyclades.
- Fire ship: A fire ship under Dimitrios Papanikolis destroyed an Ottoman frigate at Eresos in 1821.
- Folklore museum: The Mykonos Folklore Museum shows models of 19th-century Mykonian ships, plus an anchor and cannons.
In the 1821 war, each fleet island equipped, manned and maintained its own squadron under its own admiral.
How is wastewater handled on a Mykonos yacht cruise?
A Mykonos yacht cruise produces wastewater like any other vessel. Greywater, blackwater and bilge water are all kinds of wastewater on a boat. A marine sanitation device is machinery that treats, processes or stores raw sewage on a vessel.
On a Mykonos yacht cruise, bilge water gathers in the lowest compartment. It can hold oil, urine, detergents, solvents and chemicals. MARPOL Annex 1 covers engine-room bilge water on all large commercial vessels.
Greywater is wastewater from sinks, showers, galleys, laundry and cleaning aboard a ship. A galley is a ship’s kitchen. On large cruise ships, greywater makes up 90 to 95 percent of the liquid waste.
During a Mykonos yacht cruise, blackwater is sewage from toilets. It can carry bacteria and viruses. A ship’s toilet is called the head. On sailing ships, the crew’s toilets sat at the bow.
In a Type II system, aerobic bacteria break the sewage down. An air pump or fan feeds the tank oxygen. A macerator crushes sewage but leaves a large share of bacteria alive.
- Scrubbers: Open loop scrubbers wash exhaust with seawater and release the polluted washwater straight into the sea.
- Incinerators: MARPOL Annex VI forbids burning sewage sludge and sludge oil in onboard incinerators, which are furnaces.
- Blue Flag: Blue Flag marinas must offer toilet pumping facilities and bilge water pumping facilities.
Blue Flag boat operators must treat bilge water correctly. They must also provide sanitary facilities with correct sewage disposal.
Where does the name Mykonos come from?
A Mykonos yacht cruise takes its name from the island, and that name is very old. Ancient writers named the island in their books. The spelling changed from one language to the next. Even today, languages write it in different ways.
Before a Mykonos yacht cruise, a reader can meet a man named Mycon in a Roman myth collection. His daughter Xanthippe fed him with her own milk in prison. Valerius Maximus names her Pero.
Hyginus lists nine Cyclades islands, and Myconos stands second after Andros. Pliny places Myconos with a mountain called Dimastus, fifteen miles from Delos. A note says Dimastus was named for looking like two breasts.
The island of a Mykonos yacht cruise has other names in other languages. Italian atlases and dictionaries give the island name as Micono. Turkish has Mukene and a second form, Mokene.
Virgil says the god Apollo tied the drifting Delos to Mycono and high Gyaros. Ovid calls the island humilis Myconos, meaning a low island. The Latin form, Myconos, was borrowed from ancient Greek.
- Stephanus: For the island Mykonos, he cites Thucydides in his third book and Strabo in his tenth.
- Lexicon: Hesychius of Alexandria compiled a Greek word list with more than 50,000 entries.
- Sons: King Anius of Delos had three sons named Andros, Mykonos and Thasos.
That word list survives in one badly damaged 15th-century manuscript. It is kept in the Library of Saint Mark in Venice.
What do visitors ask about a Mykonos yacht cruise?
A Mykonos yacht cruise involves health and travel rules for medicines, noise, visas, batteries and gases. WHO warns that loud music can damage hearing. Carbon monoxide from engine exhaust is colourless and has no smell. Power banks must travel in carry-on baggage.
Which medicine papers matter on a Mykonos yacht cruise?
Schengen residents who carry prescribed narcotic or psychotropic medicines to another Schengen state need the Schengen certificate. It lasts up to 30 days, and each medicine needs its own certificate. Countries ask for a prescription from a licensed doctor.
How loud is too loud on a Mykonos yacht cruise?
WHO sets a maximum average sound level of 100 decibels for venues. It advises earplugs at noisy venues and earphones for audio devices. Over 1 billion people aged 12 to 35 risk hearing loss from loud music.
Which visa limits matter for a Mykonos yacht cruise?
A stay over 90 days in the Schengen Area needs a long-stay visa or residence permit. The European Commission provides a short-stay calculator. The Brazil visa waiver counts 3 months within 6 months after first entry.
Why do power banks matter before a Mykonos yacht cruise?
EASA says batteries and power banks must travel in carry-on baggage, never checked baggage. Each must be protected against short circuits. A lithium-ion cell in thermal runaway can stay above 500 °C. Its smoke is flammable and toxic.
Why is exhaust gas a risk on a Mykonos yacht cruise?
Carbon monoxide is colourless and has no smell, so people cannot detect it. Carbon monoxide combines with hemoglobin to form carboxyhemoglobin, which stops the blood carrying oxygen. Its symptoms can be mistaken for influenza, food poisoning or gastroenteritis.
Why does calima dust matter for a Mykonos yacht cruise?
Settled calima dust can cause breathing problems, especially for people with respiratory conditions. People who must go outdoors are advised to wear a respiratory mask. WHO calls dust episodes a growing public health concern, mainly for respiratory diseases.