Kostas Gouzelis' Kapetaneïka - Year 9
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Attention! Change of day!
Due to adverse weather conditions that will prevail throughout the week.
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Eight years have passed since September 2017, when more than 30 crews gathered to honour their friend Kostas Gouzelis, filling his beloved Limanaki of Naoussa with their wooden boats, and us, with tears of emotion from images of a forgotten maritime Greece.
Eight years, but only six Kapetaneïka, since for two years we were banned from gathering. People, customs, tourism - we squeeze everything to fit into time... and yet, everything has changed.
The carefree attitude, the concern, and the excitement are gone.
Forgive us, but Kapetaneïka is a celebration at sea.
For the boat owners, it is a gathering, and for us, it is a chance to admire their boats.
All these years, there has been a lot of pressure for the celebration to be a success, and we have devoted very little time to our guests, for which we owe them an apology. This year, we will take a different approach, modifying the program and putting them at the centre.
So, we will welcome the boats as usual on Friday at the Naoussa Marina and shortly before dark, we will screen the film "Shipwrecked on Amorgos" by Nikos Karakostas (his boat "Alkmini" is the one on the poster), a friend of Kostas and a pioneer of the Kapetaneïka.
The celebration will follow in the same venue after the screening.
This year, we will not be serving food. It is customary at such celebrations for everyone to bring their own food. We meet, we treat, and we are treated.
The reason the celebration is held on Friday is so that:
On Saturday, weather permitting, the boats can set sail without pressure early in the afternoon and enjoy as much time as they want in the bay of Naoussa before heading to the evening celebration. It's their day! They will sail freely, visible from Naoussa.
This decision is a conscious one, and we hope that more boats will honour us with their presence, as preserving the institution is more important than adding yet another festival to the list of dozens already held on our island.
As long as there are wooden boats, there will be "Kostas Gouzelis' Kapetanika"!