Winds were light for our sail to Datça in Turkey. We tried the spinnaker briefly but in the end we motored most of the 35miles, arriving to anchor in the harbour outside the marina. Our first visit to Asia aboard Toodle-oo! and our first Muslim country – and we arrived on Friday afternoon…
Before we’d even checked in, a coast guard vessel came alongside – which looked rather ominous – but in the end they were keen to get us to lower the Q Flag and raise the Turkish courtesy flag as the following day was Turkey Day – celebrating the formation of Turkey. Then they proceeded to take staged photos of us – for their own publicity! All very friendly!
Fortunately, our check-in agent wasn’t too worried about prayer time and managed to get us checked in without any problems.
We wandered Datça and the following morning watched the Turkey Day celebrations – with lots of flag waving and formation dancing. Everyone was very up beat – and we were thankful that we could actually sit and enjoy a beer without repurcusion!
We moved on from Datça by way of a couple of very nice and quiet anchorages, the second having a ruined Citadel and a small family run restaurant that we tried. Food was excellent – wine, not so much!
We were ready to deploy shore lines from Toodle-oo! To enable us to anchor safely in deeper water, keep the boat facing any swell and limit the space we were taking up – but in the end found no need as the anchorages were large and empty and the depth not so terrible.
We arrived in Marmaris which is a large tourist spot and has a big marina that used to sport a very lively liveaboard community. No longer the case as I think prices there have sky-rocketed. Marmaris is somewhat renowned for it selection of chandleries – there are blocks and blocks of very good chandleries! It’s a boater’s dream (nightmare?) – and I managed to take advantage, getting some rather difficult to find items…
The anchorage at Marmaris isn’t so nice – very bouncy and open, so after a couple of nights and some weather approaching, we moved across the bay to another anchorage with better protection. I was about to drop the anchor when Laurie asked if I really wanted to drop it on top of the wreck shown on the chart… No I didn’t! So we moved off and found a better spot.
Unfortunately, a superyacht came in and decided to drop anchor where we’d moved from – and when the wind and rain came howling through that night, the superyacht dragged and was heading straight for us! Fortunately their crew was alert and dealt with the situation – but it took them 45 minutes to retrieve a fouled anchor. I felt for them. We managed to survive the storm which had winds to 40 knots and included a severe 180 degree wind shift.
We carried on East along the south coast of Turkey which doesn’t have many places to stop – but we found a neat little anchorage sandwiched between the island of Baba Adasi and the mainland. The following couple of days we made our way to Kalkan (great sail!) and then motored on to Kas.
We’d hoped to meet up with Rockhopper in Kas, but they were away in the UK…
Our last trip of the year took us through narrow channels between Turkey and a couple of Greek islands you could easily swim to and then on to an idyllic group of superbly sheltered anchorages at Keckova.
Our source of anchorage information, the app ‘Navily’ heralded the Sicak Koyu anchorage as having a restaurant with the best meatballs and chips – so that was where we settled for the first of several days at Kekova. Dinner was interesting – the only items on the menu were Tomato salad, meatballs, beer, stale bread and finally chips. Served in that order! No matter, we had a good evening, sharing a table with a young Aussie couple who were hiking and camping the Lycian Way – she spoke Turkish which made things easier!
In the morning we dinghied back to the restaurant and went for a walk to find the Lycian ruins (and underwater city) taking a packed lunch with us. All fascinating stuff and after the non-strenuous walk we found ourselves back at the restaurant from some well deserved beer!
The following day we moved the short distance to Kale Koy which sports an interesting castle and old port below – so we hiked over and up.
We enjoyed a couple more of the well protected Kekova anchorages and then made our way to our winter home, Finike where we’ll stay for 4 months and hopefully get the rudder attended to. Finike is know for a very active winter cruising community – which we were looking forward to.