Pardon, wrong airport!?!

Do you have a bus to Istanbul…Istanbul, no. There were no empty buses to Istanbul because of a Turkish holiday. That was mom and Kris’s fate. It took a lot of fiddling and half a morning to get Footprints anchored and tied up to shore correctly.

Mom used the night to look for rental cars and found a Fiat Albea from Oscar. After an episode of Kris wading from Footprints and heading for the car at 1am, mom and I said goodbye to Footprints. I stayed awake up until we left Fethiye and at eleven in the morning, after ten loooooooooong hours of driving, we arrived in Istanbul.

We saw some amazing things in Turkey, including the Blue Mosque. The ceiling was massive and light blue lines in the tiles stunning. We went to many world war burial sites as well. The Topkapi Palace is a grand place with gold and diamonds beyond your imagination.

Kris gave us a tour through the Grand Bazaar, quite possibly the world’s biggest bazaar. After LOTS of bargaining we came out with presents for home, all on the last day of course. We stayed in a small, friendly guest house. Mom and Kris had a wedding anniversary dinner with a flaming clay pot.Two nights along, we were packed to go home.

We left the next afternoon for the airport. We left plenty of spare time, just in case. We left for the anonymous Istanbul airport. After the mission of parking the car we had to find a trolley, we were on our way. The problem was that at the entrance to the airport we had to go through security. Two items wrung up. One was a long circular object with two pointy ends on the x ray machine: a part of my J-board! The other a gas cylinder that inflates my PFD (life jacket). It took mom ages to put the bags back together. We got into the airport – no Emirates desk. When we asked information, we were told “Not this airport ma’am”. We quickly pre-weighed our luggage and found we were thirty kilograms over weight. We had to dump all my sports equipment. We then crossed back to Europe, arrived at the other airport and flew home. Only then did it hit me, this is the end of my adventure.

Cheers
A

Three, two, one

The last week on board has finally come. We left Bodrum at the start of our “hot day.” First we took a little jaunt to Black Island, where there was a warm cave. It was not too amazing but it was quite fun to spread mud on ourselves and paddle with our hands into a dark cave. I collected rocks in the shallow pool and we managed to grab a “lawn” for free from their scrap roof. We tugged the dinghy off the beach, went to Footprints, and headed for Kos, the secluded hot springs 2.

Kos was amazing. Kris anchored in sand at 7 meters depth, while I got the dinghy down. Mom made us a snack, had drinky poos, and then we set off. It was an amazing place, 45 degree water was streaming and steaming out of 6 little tunnels into the sea. Kris simply sat down in the water, mom went “gorgeous, amazing, so different” all while turning lobster red. It was quiet a spectacle. Most of the time I was running to the significantly cooler water outside the makeshift dam. Mom and I went to bring the dinghy closer when Kris turned “so much older”.

When we got back I saw Kris point down, so I went to have a look. I climbed onto the slippery stones which as it turns out, claimed Kris. He was stuck in a nook and when mom got to the situation, he said in a very faint voice he had fallen hard on his knees and had passed out twice briefly from shock. We didn’t spend much more time at the pool.

Kris’s reward was that after a hard night on passage to Symi, we met up with friends for a dinner on board. I had a great time as Nick is EXTREMELY funny. Five wine bottles later Kris was claimed by the bed. My head was claimed by the pillow two seconds after our guests were gone. Nick, a rabbit farmer, gave Kris a rabbit that was followed by the most amazing rabbit stew. The next morning, we were gone.

Cheers
A

Pamukkale 101

This week was thrilling! It also had snow delusions… Mom had booked us a car and that was it. In true tradition (mom really doesn’t like this saying) I said: “We’re going on an adventure!” This time we are going somewhere really weird. After driving in our little Fiat rental car for a while we arrived at Aydin. Said: Aidan. I kept on having to remind mom and Kris that we DO NOT drive through Aydin, we drive past it, and we arrive at Aydin NOT in Aydin. My town was nice. But still, I had not uttered the words: You have arrived at your destination. I have really practised those and can now give a great TomTom impersonation.

Finally, what had been a white dot in the distance is now a hulking mass of calcium in front of me. We had driven 250 km to get to Pamukkale. This is the most amazing place. It is made of calcium deposits piled up on the mountain side. It is a famous tourist destination in Turkey. These days the people who run the place are using slabs of metal that can block the water of with so they can continuously let some calcium build up and then cut off the water and wait for it to go hard. It has to be some of the stickiest stuff in the world. You have to climb barefoot on the sticky, hard, and smooth substance so as not to leave scuff marks.

After you have gazed at the shallow pools on the path and walked through the shallow water slide (that is all I can come up with) you arrive at the top. Then you put your shoes back on and walk on normal gravel looking at archaeological sites. Amazing.

We went into the giant pool for an extra 120 rand for mom and 40 rand for me. It was expensive, but mom cracked when she saw you swim with ancient columns and lids for graves that are in such good nick they should be in a museum. Add the fact that it is gigantic and has water perfectly clear because it is constantly replaced by a 35c degree natural spring, it is the world’s best pool.

Kris took pictures.

What is amazing is we came at the time of the year when it is nearly perfect. In spring, the 260 litres of water a SECOND come cascading down the mountain from 36 degree springs. It used to be 390 litres a second. That’s a lot of water. When we came down it was positively freezing. After nearly shouting down the persistent guide book salesman in the parking lot, we were on our way back. I managed to stay awake when Kris got out of the car to get pictures of the scenery, and back to Aydin. We had dinner in a kebab restaurant, the food turned out to be really weird, though.  My pizza was slices of pita with a funny spice that made it taste…err…different. The food was ok though, but did not provide me with enough food to stay awake on the way home. Thanks for reading my version of ‘Pamukkale 101’.

Cheers
A

In transit

Finally. We have arrived in Cesme. After a total of 15 hours on the water from Ayvalik, we are here. Kris managed to bargain the marina into giving us two nights for one, and he got them into taking him into the port police and offices needed to get our passports stamped. Mom and I came with Kris to the offices, by car, but that turned out to be a mistake. Kris had to go to health, the spot where they make sure we aren’t sick, and they held him there for a looonng time. For us, that meant we had to sit at the harbour master for two hours, a total waste of the day. Eventually though, Kris had us officially in Turkey.

The marina we where at was joined to a big hotel called Altin Yunus. That meant that there was a bus stop, just up the road, to Izmir. Izmir is the third biggest city in Turkey, and it had everything. We found things like spotlights to archeological sights and more. There was an enormous souk in Izmir that we spent most of our time in. The souk took hours to wander through and left us with only just enough time to have a look at an archeological site. The place was amazing. We imagined what the roof looked like, how the arches were built and I had great fun running around in what was the old town’s basement. When we got back to the boat that night I had a jacket, Kris and I had presents for mom’s birthday, and it really felt like mom’s camera was heavier than usual.

After even more bouts of sea sickness, we were back in Greece again… Mom’s birthday was great. In the morning we handed out presents, from Kris, expensive turquoise earrings, from me, a silver cashmere scarf. Kris made us great omelets for breakfast. Then we went and explored caves and had a look at the town in the bay next to us. Soon we had cold meats and salad for lunch. After that mom and Kris had a nap in preparation for the mountain. When they got up we went and got punctured on a thorn ridden mountain climb. We made our own path up and then took a path down. Mom then had a frappe and watched the sun go down while I made fillet steak and potatoes with rosemary and garlic and olive oil. I even added roasted onions in soy sauce. Mom said it was the best meal on the boat. I was thrilled.

Cheers
A

Big EYES in Turkey!

It happened so quickly. We let the lines go, stopped and checked out, and that was it, the next I knew we were in Turkey. We anchored in a bay near Ayvalik and hunkered down for the night. Sadly mom forgot to make us the chicken, so we had salad instead – no worries though because it was still relatively warm. The next day we arrived at the town and anchored as close to the marina as we could, so we could use their wifi. We did exactly what we did Albania, buy drinking yogurt instead of milk. Yuk! Kris and I went to the marina supermarket and after a bit of a fuss we got someone to show us where the milk was. Whew!

We went to town again the next day and while mom and I took the laundry to the laundrette, Kris tried to get us checked in at customs. We now had time to spend as Kris was going to take a while. We did a thorough search through the town and found loads of leather shops and mom declined on fake True Religion jeans. We looked for an electrics shop because we still need to buy a spotlight for Footprints. We discussed if it was worth it and when I was not looking the old lady owner of the shop came up from behind me. She tickled my stomach while lifting my shirt. Her old fingers felt really weird and the fright made my eyes the size of sauce pans! I rectified the size of my eyes and looked at her with a terrible fake smile. I was still in too much shock. I quickly led mom out!

Later on I tried a donar (I think that’s what it’s called), a gyro in Turkey, and mom had a dondurma, an ice cream. Soon enough though, Kris came to pick us up. Kris told us the man with the paper we needed for entry to the country did not have any papers today. They said it would be a better idea for us to travel two days south to Çesme. We decided to take his advice so we went to the supermarket and stocked up on milk and necessities.

We tried the famous Ayvalik Tostu and found it to be very nice. It consisted of diced sausage, tomato sauce, mayonnaise and gherkin in some toast. We also tried the tea, but I was not too fond of that! We anchored next at Alibey which was not far from Ayvalik, then we left in the dinghy to go to dog island! We had a little picnic there and as Kris was with us we promptly found two dogs on the uninhabited island. One was even a puppy. They were in good condition and took a liking to all of us.

I stumbled around the island with a stick I have now decided to keep. It’s perfect for exploring. I found a great piece of glass. It was broken but still had the most amazing patterns and it was an enchanting purple colour. It’s probably worthless but I still liked it. Kris then found a well and after a great pump found it worked. I raced up to try it myself. After some time it was even spitting out clean water, but I was not willing to taste it! Sadly we had to leave the island and the dogs. We dropped our stuff on the boat and then explored town. It was really nice but did look remarkably like a tourist trap. We stayed in the bay for the night and had great braaied fish for dinner. Yum!

Cheers
A