Waiting for the tide to come in.......

Well, the title is not technically true as there is very little tidal movement in the Med.  The reality is that we are waiting for some work to be finished on the boat and for some replacement parts to arrive and so are sitting patiently in the marina enjoying the social life and catching up with friends.  Life can be very frustrating here as far as maintenance etc is concerned.  The Turks are extremely industrious however the old Mediterranean attitude to time is alive and well.  As the maintenance companies do not want to disappoint you and have you trot off somewhere else to get your work done, they will promise you the world, creating impossible work schedules that they cannot hope to uphold.  It is, of course, all done with a smile and that imperceptible Mediterranean shrug which we have come to know and love.  I go to sleep and wake up with the Turkish word 'malasef' (meaning: unfortunately) ringing in my ears. 


Like anything mechanical / electronic, a boat can be kept in harbour by a tiny little part that seems to have to travel from half way around the world to reach you.  Turkish mail is notoriously slow which adds to the problem.  Our particular tiny little part in question is a little rubber cap which enables us to rev our motor in neutral (not a massive problem in itself if it can't be done, but without the rubber cap the little button falls off etc etc, you get my drift!).  This was ordered over two weeks ago and has to come from Sweden via Istanbul.  The part only costs 3 euros!  Our dinghy is also a bit sick so the skipper is working on that today.

ShirleyValentine on her berth on India pontoon with her trusty skipper on board (after a trip to his Turkish barber)

India pontoon, Yacht Marina, Marmaris

Also of concern is a crack that we found in our rigging during a routine inspection.  Forgive my lack of knowledge of boat anatomy while I explain the problem;


Where the first spreader is joined to the shroud there is an eye bolt joining the pieces together.  This is cracked.  Apparently the worst case scenario is that we could lose our rig (the mast and everything associated with it, better known as the pointy bits that the sails are attached to) so we thought it better to get it repaired.  Our trusty friends from Moss rigging are supposed to turn up tomorrow, so watch this space.

Moss marine at the top of Shirley's mast

Swarming with tradies.....  Moss marine diagnosing our rigging problems and Ali and workers from Aldo marine refitting our cockpit table

Seems like a difficult way to polish a hull to me!

Living in the marina is a bit like living in a boatyard.  I think I have alluded to this in previous blogs however it seems magnified this season.  Every trip to the toilet or any other location in the marina is fraught with danger as you duck and weave under boats propped up on their stands, dodge cars, bicycles, motor bikes, boat transporters with (quite often) extremely large boats on board, tractors pulling said boat transporters and assorted other types of transport.  Anything goes here.  I once hitched a lift to the laundry in a trailer being pulled by a motor bike!  Work health and safety is not quite as evident as in Australia but miraculously most of us seem to survive intact.

The 330 tonne crane for the big boys!  It is quite acceptable to wander around underneath this monster while it is in operation!

A Turkish worker, cigarette in hand, pondering his task.... 

We duck and weave under and amongst boats on any trip through the marina......

It also makes a difference who you know.  Everyone in Turkey has a 'friend' who can do anything that your little heart desires.  We have experience of a shop keeper who didn't have a flag of the type that we wanted to buy so he left the shop and ducked next door to his 'friend's', leaving us drinking a cup of cay, and returned with the required flag.  Not sure how they distribute the profits but not my problem.


More recently we had an interesting encounter with our iPad which had decided to throw a bit of a wobbly.  This entailed the screen refusing to respond to my silk like touch.  As I am addicted to my iPad I had a fairly major melt down.  We couldn't find an Apple store listed anywhere in Turkey and a Google search on apple stores in Marmaris brought up the local fruit shop.  But of course, we have a friend too, and our friend has a friend.  We placed a call to our friend Ashleigh (an English gentleman who lives in Beldibi) who called his friend Ozgur (a Turkish gentleman who is married to an English lady).  We met Ashleigh in a café and his friend Ozgur arrived on his motor bike.  I passed over my beloved iPad (access codes and all) to this virtual stranger and off he rode promising to call us when the repairs were done.  A tiny little smidge of doubt (what have we done!) crept in at some stage but we brushed it aside.  That very afternoon we received a call from Ozgur to say that the repairs were done.  We met him the next morning at the fountain in Marmaris (all sounds very clandestine, doesn't it?) and paid him 30TL (about $15 Australian) plus a hefty tip ('cos we felt guilty at paying so little) and toddled off.  So if you ever need your iPad fixed.......  I have a friend!

We have had a bit of work done to Shirley and we now have a lovely shiny cockpit table and cabin doors which I lovingly polish every day.  I have had a chance to throw out a heap of junk and to reorganise everything inside, so apart from the day to day jumble that seems to appear when you are living in a small space everything is fairly organised.  We spend our days working on the boat, socialising, passage planning, keeping in touch with friends and family and have also being doing a lot of walking.  Our friend Doreen from Beldibi knows the walking tracks around here like the back of her hand and we have done a nice walk up to a cave near the marina and also from Asparan to Marmaris.

Passage planning with Phil and Pam from Maranatha

Lunch break during our walk from Asparan to Marmaris with Doreen, Anne and Wendy

Marmaris is slowly coming alive after its usual winter siesta when it has a break from the tens of thousands of scantily clad tourists which visit every year.  The beaches are being created (yes created!) for the upcoming season.  Sand (normally of the builders variety) is trucked in from St Elsewhere's and laid in preparation for the sun bed occupation.  Restaurants and bars are being painted and tarpaulins unpeeled from ageing sun beds and tourists are slowly starting to reappear on the streets.  Manky green swimming pools are being drained and refilled with shining clear water, still not particularly appealing due to the still relatively cool weather.  It reminds me of a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis and is a scene that we see repeated year after year whichever country we are in.

This restaurant owner obviously has the funds to do things the easy way.  His beach is being smoothed out by a tractor

These guys are not so lucky!

Beach umbrellas, a hooker and Turkish gullets.......  what more could you possibly want in Turkey!

We also visited the local markets on Thursday and I was racking my brain to dredge up the few Turkish words that I know.  It is such fun interacting with the locals and I love the buzz in the pazar (market).  I have learned that it is much easier to cook with what is in season locally rather than attempt to find particular ingredients, although there is a bit of imported stuff available in the marina supermarket (very expensive!) and also an import shop and a pork shop in town (also very expensive!).  I occasionally indulge in an English breakfast just to get a bacon fix!

Dried herbs and vegetables.  My new favourite drink is sage tea....  It is extremely refreshing

One of the plethora of fruit and vegetable stalls.  Tomatoes actually taste like tomatoes here!

The fish stalls (balik)...

A happy face...  One of the farmers wives manning their market stall.  It is common to see unlabelled soft drink bottles containing nondescript fluids. These are usually home made olive oil, raki, red pepper sauce or ayran (a Turkish yogurt drink)

And of course....  the spice stall.

A Turkish fisherman mending his nets in the sea of local fishing boats near Netsel Marina

Craig with our faithful 'Granny' trolley.  Good old Ikea!

The infamous bar street, a scene of much revelry in the peak of the tourist season, sans tourists....

Australian wattle trees are everywhere.  The pollen is so thick that it looks like an oil slick on the water in places.

There are local elections being held today all over Turkey.  I went into town on the dolmus yesterday and stumbled across the last minute campaigning being done by all the major parties.  It was amazing!  Puts our dull politicians to shame.  There was a massive stage set up adjacent to the Ataturk statue in Marmaris and I joined the throng of one of the events which had a Turkish pop group on stage.  The group whipped the crowd into a frenzy before the throng parted like the red sea to let the party officials onto the stage.  Then followed a long emotional speech which contained lots of words such as new, hospital, new, children's playgrounds, new, schools, year round tourism and so on.  Much like a political rally anywhere I guess.  Being the only yabanci (foreigner) who seemed to be in the crowd I wondered at one stage if I should be worried.  There was a fairly intense police presence and people were being patted down at the many barriers erected around the political arena. I found out later that all four major parties were getting their turn on stage and when Craig and I returned to town later in the day the crowd had increased six fold. I felt a sense of unease and disquiet intertwined with the excitement of the day however the Turks seemed to be having a ball.  I was handed a whistle by one of the officials and dutifully blew along with the locals. It will be interesting to see how things turn out. 

I want to vote for this guy. He drags his advertising campaign behind him on his bike....

Ataturk keeping an eye on the procedings

The crowds gathering for the first campaigners of the day....  I must admit, the rock group were pretty good.

Watching the world go by.....

An enthusiastic young supporter of the MHP

There have been a few strange things happening politically during the lead up to the election.  Twitter was banned in Turkey a few weeks ago and although a court case apparently indicated that the ban should be lifted it is still not available.  You-tube has been the latest victim and it is currently being blocked.  We cannot access any videos at all.  Tensions along the Syrian border seems to rise and dwindle periodically and there are over 700,000 Syrian refugees in Turkey.  The Turkish lira is also falling fairly rapidly in value at the moment.


All in all though, we feel safe in Turkey and find the Turkish people delightful, helpful and hard working.  They find our attempts to speak their language extremely amusing and will go out of their way to attempt to communicate.  English is spoken widely in Marmaris.


Anyhoo...... nearly done with my ramblings for today.  I would just like to finish with a local story that I find delightful.  Our marina is set in the south of Marmaris Bay about 10kms by road from Marmaris town.  The name of the area is Yalancibogaz which means 'narrow neck' in Turkish.  The reason for this is that the mainland is separated by a narrow strip of land from an island called Paradise Island.  Yacht Marina is built on reclaimed land in this area.  In ancient times this area was a false passage and ships attempting to pass between the mainland and the island would often come to grief.  There is a tomb in the middle of the road outside the marina of 'Ermis Dede' and the inscription reads:


"Here lies Ermis Dede who during his lifetime prevented many shipwrecks by lighting a fire here every night.  Eternally he goes on protecting sailors and their ships so that they don't ground on this false passage.  1412."


At night the tomb is lit by two port and two starboard markers.  The multitudes of vehicles coming to the marina each day skirt around this tomb and it is lovingly kept clean and tidy by the locals.  I love this story.....

Yacht marina as seen from the approach road.  Yalancibogaz (narrow neck) is the strip of land on the left of the picture

The tomb of Ermis Dede at Yalancibogaz

Talk soon.  Take care in the meantime.

Craig and Lesley

S/Y Shirley Valentine

Currently in Marmaris, Turkey