The Ruins, the Crab, the Turtles, the Royal Tombs and the Mud

The next day we anchor out in a quiet bay just north of Dallion. A small flatbottom boat picks us up right from the boat and takes us through the reeds that wind past an old Lycian ruin of a town. The boat continues up river to the town of Dallion. Across from the town are the royal Lycean tombs of once great kings carved in the solid rock cliffs. They look like monumental building with strong Corinthian columns and pendentive doorways. It is a very nice resting place. I am reconsidering a simple grave marker for when I die.

We stop for a nice traditional lunch and relax to enjoy the crowds and shops of the local merchants. Then we board the boat again to continue up river to the healing mudbaths. If you are feeling that you have read this before, it is because we were here two years ago. It is a fun outing and we wanted to share it with our traveling guests. We all had fun coating our bodies with thick gray mud and then letting it dry in the sun. The healing powers speak of taking twenty years off of your life. Since today is my birthday, I feel like it would be a perfect time to look 20 years younger. I might even try coating my body twice.

We get back to the boat and I cook a thai dinner of vegetables and chicken. The guys surprise me with a little birthday celebration along with a tart pie lit with the traditional birthday candle. We all got silly and ended up deciding to have an underwear night. So we are all running around in our underwear. Steve and I spin a little poi out at the front of the boat and the guys each give it a try with some more successful than others. Thanks, it was fun celebrating with you.

Go, Go, Go to Gocek

Gocek bay is really one of the most beautiful bays anywhere on earth. It is a very large bay with a raggedy edge that makes it ideal for tucking a yacht here and there for a private piece of paradise. To the east of the bay is the large town of Fethiye. It has a nice new marina with all the amenities of a 4 star resort hotel. The town is not anything special, but the food and the welcoming people make up for the lackluster architecture. We anchor out right by the marina one night and the next day go into the marina to pick up 4 fun Canadian guys who will be sailing with us for the next couple of days.

Repeat Performance

We pick up our friend, Robert who lives in Munich, and Andrea, an Italian living in Switzerland who is chartering with us for the next 10 days. Robert has sailed with us for the past 3 summers. He is a fun guy and we always enjoy having him along. They travel with us, visiting some of the special spots we discovered on the way down and exploring some new spots along the way back up north. We are headed to Feteya where we will pick up some Canadians who will sail with us as well. We have both enjoyed meeting new people and sharing this adventure with them.

Our Last Stop

We would like to keep going further east, but Syria is not that stable right now and we are running out of time. Antalya is the furthest we will get this season. It is a city like many others in this area that has been around since the first century and has a pedigree that includes the Romans, Byzantines, Ottomans, Italians and finally the Turks. There is a fairly new harbor that handles all the commercial shipping, ferries and most of the visiting yachts. But it is at the far end of town, miles from the city center. We really want to stay in the tiny old fortified Roman port. It is a long shot but we roll the dice and head to the old port. And in typical can-do Turkish attitude, they find a place for us, help us with the mooring lines and make sure we have everything we need. So we find ourselves surrounded by small brightly painted fishing boats, traditional Turkish gullets and a stoned wall fortification rising a couple hundred feet around us. The call to prayer echoes every couple of hours as young kids cool off by swimming in the harbor water.

It’s father’s day so Steve and I treat ourselves by visiting the local Haman that is over 600 years old. We get a rough body scrub, followed by a soap down a drenching from the marble carved basins and finishing up with an oil massage that is more like a oil beating. The guy giving the massage takes his fist and pounds the stress away. Is all I can think about besides the pain is what color my legs are going to be when this is over. It is a bit tense, but I do feel incredibly better. Afterwards we relax at a little restaurant for a soft drink and home made apple tart made by the hostess’s mother. It is Turkey at its finest.

This Coast Just Keeps Getting Better

We head for a quiet little bay further up the coast. The pilot books tell us where it is but from the sea, you would never even see it. It is tucked away behind a majestic mountain. When we sail into this bay, the only thing I can think of is Yosemite. Yeah that is what it feels like. The walls around us are sheer cliffs towering around us. And deep in the bottom is this little bay with a small sandy beach. I could hang out here for a week.

Total Eclipse

We are anchored out in a large lagoon. Boats are scattered around the water with their mooring lights on. It looks like a lit forest of skinny trees all topped with a Christmas star. The moon rises over the horizon early in the evening just as the sun had set. It was one of those spectacular blood-red moons so brilliant that I had to take a picture of it. Later that night I am looking up at the sky and the moon had completely changed. It was very faint in the sky, almost like I was looking at it through a veil of clouds. But the evening sky was crystal clear with stars cut like diamonds shimmering all around. I checked on the moon a half hour later, and finally it all made sense. Because this time, half the moon was glowing brightly and the other half was still dull. Yeah, I didn't realize it, but I was watching a spectacular eclipse.

Since we are not so connected to the news, the event took us totally by surprise. It made me feel like an ancient Greek who was unaware of the predictability of such things. I just finished a very interesting book on Greek naval power during the Hellenistic period and was already feeling a bit of a connection as we visit many of the ancient islands where these historic battles took place. This experience was just another nudge in understanding what life must have been like a thousand and a half years ago.

Ho Ho Home of Saint Nicholas

As we sail up the coast, the sea literally turns turquoise and the beaches a creamy sandy color. We sail a 7-mile stretch of sandy Patara beach. At the end is the ancient town of Patera itself, the home of the kind 4th century Byzantine bishop Nicholas, who slipped into legend and finally myth as Santa Clause. It is an ancient Lyceum turned Roman city with many of the stone remnants of past greatness. Sarcogus built on towers rise up 15 feet in the air to punctuate the landscape. Well preserved arches attest to the grandeur of this once prosperous city. It is here also where St. Paul and St. Luke stopped on their gospel spreading missions to change boats. Is there something ironical about a guy that grew up in a beach town being sent to the North Pole forever?

We rented a motor scooter so we could visit all these historical sights. It was just as small scooter, but the handlebars and headlamp looked iike it came right off a Harley Davidson. Just as we were climbing the hill outside of the town of Kalcan, out of nowhere a dog snuck up behinds us and bit Steve on the ankle. It scared the heck out of us, and Steve received a pretty bad puncture bite. I took him to the town hospital but it was closed. So we decided to continue on our visit of the other quite large Roman towns of Letoon and Xanthos.

In between the ancient sites, we stopped at a small local restaurant in an equally small town. There are no tourists here. But everyone makes us feel more than welcome. You don’t order from the menu, you just go into the kitchen and point to the traditional dishes that are simmering in pots. Sooo good. The table next to us tells us we have to try the special desert of the region. You can only get it here. So we are game and out comes two little cakes. One is brown with some kind of dusting of bright green. The other piece looks like shredded wheat. They are both soaked in so much honey that you can’t really taste anything else. It is like you are eating honey with different textures. The desserts are so sweet in Turkey we rarely order them.

Towards the end of the day, Steve’s ankle starts to swell and become painful to walk on. So we head back to town and stop at a local pharmacy. You gotta love the treatment pharmacies are able to give. Two young assistants in white lab coats wash the wounds and disinfect it. Then they put a salve on it and wrap it all in a gauze band-aid. They are also able to sell him antibiotics and a pain killer/anti inflammatory. The next day he goes to the hospital and the doctor gives him a tetanus shot as well. Steve asks about rabies and the doctor tells him he doesn’t have the rabies shots. Not to worry. They haven’t ever seen a case of rabies around here. So Steve asks what signs to at least look for. The doctor tells him, don’t worry. If you notice any signs of rabies, you are going to die by then anyway. Yikes.

The Turquoise of Turkey

We head southeast to the Turquoise coast of Turkey. It is spectacular. Wait, more than that. It is a showstopper. Humm, I am just not giving this part of the world it due. The coast seems like it was created specifically for sailing. Steep plunging cliffs, sandy beaches, verdant green pine forests and bays that look like they are carved out specifically to shelter sailboats from the rolling waves of the cobalt Mediterranean Sea.

The Turkey is Not Quite Done Yet

Like a boomerang we keep returning to Marmaris Turkey this summer. This time we are there for only a couple of days. This is just such a great place to get things done for the boat. I have been thinking that it was time to replace the cushions I had since I first got the boat. They could have lasted a couple of years more, but we would never been in such a great place to have new ones made. So we contacted a well recommended upholsterer to redo the cushions. And I didn’t stop there. We had a new sunshade structure fabricated as well as a new bike cover to protect our bikes on the back of the boat. I also designed a system that we can change the cushions in the cockpit of the boat to make a big sunbed. There was one more thing I wanted to do. The helm seat really needed to be designed differently to make it more comfortable. So I redesigned it and had the shop build a new seat. And what a difference these changes made. It all really turned out fantastic. We can now snap the cushions in place and not worry about them being blown off the boat. The helm seat is so much more comfortable which is important given the number of hours I spend sitting up there. And the sunshade makes the space back there so much more comfortable when the hot sun is melting us. So for all those that have been on the boat before, you are going to have to come back and enjoy our new décor.

Creeping Along the Northern Coast of Crete One More Time

I am always underestimating the distances along the Crete coast. It is much bigger than it seems. And while its history is one of domination of other countries for centuries, it still has strong Greek roots that date back literally centuries ago when the city of Athens dominated this part of the Mediterranean. The people think of themselves as Cretans first and Greeks second. While we were there, a big political rally was held in the center of the capital. It is actually the first signs of political activism I have seen since being in Greece. Everyone is yelling about the austerity program imposed by the EU. But in reality, this is a government that needs a bit of a reality check. The locals tell us there are far too many people employed by the government through political connections, but actually do very little work.

We spend the next couple of weeks retracing our steps back along the northern coast of Crete, and retracing our steps all the way back to Rhodes. We visit the friends we met on Kapathos who were delighted to see us again.