Crew member Marcus arrives and so does the wind!!
 
You remember the bad weather I told you about. Well it arrived just a couple of hours before Crewman Painters (that’s Marcus to his chums) plane touched down. Now some might accuse him of having brought it with him, he arrived about midnight just as the wind was at the height of doing that thing that it does so well. He came bearing gifts (always a good start). We are now Ketchup, Branstoned, Curried, Horseradished and muselied up. Merci beaucoup shipmate. The next day things were pretty much back to normal, the sun shone and the sky was blue. We decided to stay the day in Fethiye to allow our new crew member to recover from his jet lag (it’s a four hour flight from Blighty to Dalaman). That night we went for drinks on Voukali (very lovely French Canadians) with friends Moli (Ian & Mandy) then all toddled off to the marina restaurant for a good feed. Lunchtime the next day we left to go to a small bay about 15 miles away it’s called ‘Seagull Bay’. There was a bit of wind so we managed to sail most of the way there, although our speed got slower and slower as the afternoon went on. We arrived late afternoon in this beautiful bay that has a huge seagull painting on the shore (so we knew we were in the right place). We tied up on the rickety pontoon and were greeted by a man several cats and a dog (friendly bunch). Now I use the term restaurant loosely it’s basically a few tables and chairs scattered around outside,there is no inside. All the cooking is done on a BBQ and the bread is made in an oven that is a hole in a slope in the ground. The captain was straight in the water giving the prop and log a bit of a scrub, he’s like a man possessed when he gets going. The sun was going down so myself and crewman Marcus declined his kind offer of coming in for a quick dip. Later that night we ate in the restaurant and had a traditional Turkish meal. The man working there came and sat with us, he explained that he didn’t usually run the restaurant but his family were away at his sisters wedding in Dalaman so he was on his own running things. We all felt he’d done a jolly good job greeting, cooking and serving. Crew member Marcus earned his ‘Night in a bay on a restaurant pontoon’ badge. 10.00am the next day we dropped the lines and headed for our next stop Ekincik. It was a mixed bag of a day with a bit of sailing, a bit of motoring and a bit of motor sailing. Our night in Ekincik was spent at anchor no getting off the boat unless you swam or blew up the dinghy. This proved to be a bit of a surprise to our guest crew member. Ekincik is quite a roly anchorage, luckily I’d made a chilli (heavy on the chillies) to take our mind off things. Chilli is my new signature dish, Tuna pasta is just so last year!! ‘Night at anchor’ badge in the bag for shipmate Marcus. Next stop Marmaris, once again we’d heard there was bad weather coming, so we thought if we could get to Marmaris and the weather turned, we could hold up there for a couple of days (lots of bars and Sky sports, oh joy!!). Very little wind on our journey there, so a lot of motor off motor on action. As we approached the marina it was very busy there was a huge cruise ship tied up outside. Lots of yachts were racing across the marina entrance. Then to cap it all we looked behind us to see a big ferry and a coast-guard boat bearing down on us. Don’t remember it being like this last time we visited. We managed to tie up in the marina just before all the boats that had been racing came in. It got pretty chaotic and we saw one boat just floor it into another boat that was moored up. We all had our opinions on what went wrong there!! The bad weather did arrive as predicted unfortunately it wasn’t just high winds there was a whole lot of rain with it. We ended up spending 4 nights in Marmaris (not what crewman Marcus ordered at all). But you can’t keep a good shipmate down Marcus made us a currytastic curry one night that earned him his ‘Curry on a boat’ badge!! Our spot in the marina was quite a walk from the town so we had to time it right or we’d get stuck in a major downpour and I’m talking with a capital ‘D’. It was getting to the end of the season and Marmaris was slowly closing down for the Winter. Our weather window arrived and we decided to make up for the time we’d had to spend in the marina by giving Crewmen Marcus a fifty miler. We would do the journey back to the Fethiye bay area in one hop. This would mean an early start but we felt with a bit of encouragement (Threw our alarm clock in his cabin) our guest crewman would be able to drag himself from his bunk. We got up at 7.00am and were getting ready to leave when we noticed that there were a number of lines tied from boats right across the marina, an extra precaution against the high winds. This proved a bit of a problem as they were blocking our exit. We felt 7.00am was a bit early to go knocking on boats to ask them to take lines off, so we had a coffee (a ships crew needs caffeine). Caffeine levels increased the captain went and spoke to the owners of said lines. Within minutes we were fired up and ready to leave. It was a bit of a tight squeeze to get out and I for one was a little nervous. But all went well. Now we could finally get on our way, no not just yet as we were leaving the marina, one of the staff came chasing after us in his dinghy saying that we hadn’t paid. After a bit of shouting across the marina a call to the marina office, it turned out we’d only paid for 3 nights when we’d in fact stayed 4. Thought it was cheap when we paid!! Our debt cleared we were allowed to leave, it was now about 9.00am - so much for an early start!! After motoring for the first hour, we had a jolly good sail back to Fethiye, unfortunately the sea was a bit roly and our new crew member looked a bit green around the gills at one point. The clouds were once again gathering and looking rather menacing, so we abandoned the idea of going to another bay and made straight for Fethiye marina the extra distance meant that we arrived in the dark (something we seem to be making a habit of). We decided that the next day we’d go out for a day sail. 8.00am the next morning it was raining so we all stayed in bed. By lunchtime it had stopped and we decided to go out for a couple of hours sailing as it was shipmate Marcus’s last day. The wind played ball and we had a nice little sail around. We got back in just before the rain started. I’m so so glad we did because it didn’t just rain cats and dogs, we had the whole farmyard coming down. It did this for a good couple of hours. Thought we were going to be boat-bound for the night. Luckily it stopped for just long enough for us to leave the boat and get to a restaurant. About 10 minutes after we sat down it started again and then carried on throughout the night. The time came for our shipmate to leave us, just to add insult to injury the sun decided to show it’s bright sunny face on his last morning. Talk about harsh, where had it been all week? Despite the bad weather Shipmate Marcus managed to clock up a cool 131.8nm over 5 days sailing. You have definitely earned your ‘staying on a boat in bad weather’ badge shipmate. We’ll see if we can arrange better weather for your next visit. Right that’s me done over & well and truly out. Love & curry The Captain & the first mate XX
Thursday, 1 November 2007