An unexpected return to UK.

Awaiting joiners at Kalkan

Ray Ale and Julien all joined at Kalkan as expected. The plan was to move round into the inland sea at Kekova and then spend a week cruising the various anchorages in that area before a planned departure from Ugacik and my move along the coast to Finike.

We managed to cruise the inland sea from end to end including the beautiful anchorage at Karaloz on the south-east side of Kekova Adasi, my favourite from last year at Gokkaya Limani and the now traditional night at the Yoruk Ramazan restaurant at Polemos Buku

The anchorage at Karaloz, south-east side of Kekova Adasi

followed by the tour and snorkel trip round the ancient city of Aperlae. Indeed we achieved most of our planned itinerary but as the week went on the news from home on the health of my 98 year old father grew more grave; he had been relatively fine only three weeks before when I had last been in UK.

Yoruk Ramazan restaurant at Polemos Buku

Finally on the Saturday, the day of departure of the three friends, I received the call that I needed to return to the UK as my father was not expected to last more than a few days. The friends departed as planned from Ucagiz on the Saturday as I debated where to leave the boat. My initial intention was to take it to the marina at Finike, 20 miles east; but the local harbour master, on hearing my plight, offered to take care of the boat where it was. The local travel agent provided the taxi to the airport (three hours away) and Monarch provided a short notice (but very expensive) flight back to the UK. Sadly, despite all the efforts of those involved, I was not to get back in time. My father passed away on the Saturday night and I got the message whilst waiting for the flight at Antalya airport on the Sunday morning. C'est la vie; 98 is a good innings!

The next two weeks were spent in the UK arranging the funeral and dealing with my father's affairs; fortunately, I also have an elder brother with whom to share the task. The result was that I was able to keep my time away from the boat down to just two weeks and on return all was well. Good to his word, the harbourmaster had moved her to one of the most protected berths in the small marina and had taken good care of her.

On my return I was accompanied by Christoph Herren, a friend of mine who had been due to fly out to Finike via Antalia but changed his flight to accompany me out some days after his planned date.

The waterfront at Ucagiz

We arrived together in Ucagiz at 0400 on the Sunday morning, spent Monday re-victualling and recovering and then set off late in the day to try to catch up a bit of the programme as Christoph was keen to see some of the fantastic historic sites along the Turkish south coast. That evening we spent in Gokkaya Limani again, to give us time to sort ourselves out, and again accompanied by a gullet load of Australian backpackers, Oh joy! Disco music until 0300! Next day we headed for Finike Marina to get fresh provisions and fuel and then headed onwards, in a blustery wind, to Cavus Limani where we anchored in the Southern corner for the night.

Christoph had kindly brought out with him the replacement Autopilot, (aka George II). I decided that, as we wanted to do a night crossing the next night, across to Alanya, it would be sensible to fit George II before attempting this.

View north in Cavus Limani

Hence the next day was spent cable running and installing the new kit. By 1600 were were ready for sea trials, by 1630 we had become bored with weaving our way all over the sea whilst trying to prevent “George II” from steering a sinuous course all over the ocean. Try as I might I could not tune out the instability. We decided to postpone our crossing for 24 hours, spend the night in Cineviz Limani, and to consult the company representative in UK. This was all to no avail, their advice was only that which we had already tried; hence we sailed the following afternoon, without autopilot, across to Alanya whilst I racked my brains for the cause. After a relatively pleasant crossing, if in variable conditions, we arrived in Alanya at 0500 the following day; where we anchored under the “Red Tower” in front of the ancient dockyard.

Ancient dockyard and Red Tower at Alanya

By 1000 we were surrounded by noisy tourist boats, mostly disguised (badly) as pirate galleons! Thus at 1030 we sailed for another trials period. After a day of checking connections, testing, reading and re-reading the manual, in temperatures of 40 deg C, I decided to try a different basic setting for the drive type, adopting the one for “Mechanically propelled vessels”; not quite a description of a sailing boat but “eureka” George now worked stably and effectively! (For some reason there is no Sailing vessel setting listed in the manual!). The problem was a missing comma in the handbook....... Where they intended to say “Linear, rotary and sterndrive, with a rudder reference unit” they had actually written “Linear, rotary and sterndrive with a rudder reference unit” thus it was that I discovered that for the initial setting used all three required a rudder reference unit and not just for the sterndrive application! Kurukulla has a Linear drive....... Hmmm.

By mid afternoon we were ready to move into the harbour and I tried to berth where I had been so warmly received last year, on the Coast Guard jetty. Not so this year. It has been totally taken over by local fishermen and, unlike the fisherman who was so welcoming and helpful last year, these guys were anything but welcoming, even stringing ropes across between boats to prevent us entering empty berths! It is a public jetty, available to all, but they were having none of it! In disgust we headed over to the other side of the harbour where there is also public berthing and where we were able to go stern to; here we were welcomed by the locals! Strange how two groups of local people can be so different.

A night ashore in Alanya was followed by a day of sightseeing for Christoph and a day of finishing the job for me; that is after I had been to Alanya marina on the back of a motorcycle taxi to collect a new gas cylinder. An experience not to be missed...... up pavements (sidewalks), one way streets the wrong way, and finally out on a dual carriageway at speed. Paragliding last year had nothing on this!

Successful operation having been achieved, it was now time to re run, in permanent fashion, all the temporary cable runs; all this again in the same soaring temperatures! I think I lost several kilos'!

Alanya by night

That done, we set off to the supermarket to re-victual the boat and then spent another pleasant evening in Alanya before moving out into the anchorage again, late in the evening, in preparation for an early departure next day; and to get away from the discotheques! Even there we were plagued by “Pirate Galleons”, masquerading as floating discotheques, for most of the night. The Marchioness disaster on the river Thames, some years back, would pale into insignificance if two of these collided!

With an 0600 start we set off for Anemurium, the ancient Roman city on the most southerly tip of the Turkish mainland, 60 miles away. We stopped over night, en route, in Yackacik Koyu; a bay on the west coast 15 miles short of Anamur Burnu.

Banana plantation on the water's edge, Yackacik Koyu

Fortunately, by tucking ourselves right into the small cove on the north-western side of the bay (known for a small hut perched on the rocks on the right hand side) we were able to get a reasonable nights sleep; as did three fishing boats who later anchored very near us during the night! We were all trying to get as far in as possible and out of the swell.

The Roman Hammam at Anemurium

Next morning, after two hours of motor sailing we arrived, just in time for the wind to get up. Fortunately we were again able to tuck in to the bay and get out of the worst of the seas, even despite the wind gusting into the bay at 20 knots at it's maximum.

As I write this, looking at the ancient settlement of Anemurium, the wind is abating, the sun shining, the warm seas calling and a G&T is in the offing; hence more in a few days time after we have turned west again.