Phorcys Bay
Odysseus comes home to Ithaca at Phorcys Bay. It is described in Book 13:
There is in the land of Ithaca a certain harbour of Phorcys, the old man of the sea, and at its mouth two projecting headlands, sheer to seaward, but sloping down on the side toward the harbour. These keep back the great waves raised by heavy winds outside, but inside the benched ships lie unmoored when they have reached the point of anchorage. (13.96-103)
Odysseus Unbound identifies this as Atheras Bay.
Atheras Bay, and beyond it, Cape Atheras, from the slopes of Mt Lachties.
Atheras Bay viewed from the road from Atheras.
Although Cape Atheras could conceivably be “a projecting headland” at the “mouth” of Phorcys Bay, it is less clear on the other side, where there is only a minor headland. Cape Katergaki is further round towards the east.
What really “keep[s] back the great waves raised by heavy winds outside” is something else: an island.
The island from the beach at Atheras Bay.
If Atheras Bay was Phorcys Bay, why did Homer, so scrupulous otherwise in his descriptions of landscape, not mention the island at its mouth, a feature that clearly plays a crucial role in providing shelter to the harbour within?
The island is called Averonisi in Odysseus Unbound.
Perhaps Phorcys Bay was somewhere else?