Turkey...the return

March 31, 2008

Because last year's cruise had been a little stressful, we began this season by making a vow to each other that we would enjoy everything and would not sweat the small stuff. We arrived at Delta Airlines in Albuquerque to board the first leg of our flight back to Turkey. We were in the first group to board and were first in line. The gate agent glanced at our boarding passes and asked us to stand to one side. "What's going on?" I asked. He hummed and hahed for a minute before saying, "Well, I am not exactly sure of the seat numbers but I think someone vomited in your seats". When we did board, we squirmed in the seats and wondered whether the smell of puke was coming from our seats or just emanating from the ventilation system. Were the seats slightly damp or was that our imagination at work? Why did the previous
passengers vomit? Motaba strain Ebola? Bird flu? Andromeda strain? We watch all the horror flicks.
We bailed out of the puke-mobile in Cincinnati and dined on a balanced supper of beer, chicken tenders and chocolate cake in the airport before boarding the plane to London. I had checked out our seats online and found that they were to be on the port side, two seats together on a window and aisle and three rows ahead of the toilets. Not bad. We boarded the plane and sought our seats. The row numbers did not climb as high as our boarding passes indicated but stopped a row short. Then I realized that there was an extra
row of three seats jammed up against the rear bulkhead in the center. Where were our window seats? Our seats did not recline because of the bulkhead and because they were conveniently next to the toilet, this meant that every staggering bozo would bump into us as we attempted to sleep in our upright and non-reclined position. Our seats were also next to the galley and when the cabin crew were not ramming drink carts into each other, they were loudly discussing their pension plans. We looked to see if we could move but
although our row of three seats was the only completely occupied row on the plane, the balance of the passengers were occupying all available space by lying across their empty rows, sound asleep and dreaming of fluffy little lambs. No surrender! We gritted our collective teeth and waited for dawn and the release from our confinement.

We had a great visit with family in England and saw my niece's 10 year old son Joseph acting out his lead role as Willy Wonka in a children's drama society play. A new star appeared in the

firmament that night. We did enjoy meeting with the new generation and reluctantly took our leave to board an EasyJet flight at Gatwick for the final leg to Dalaman, Turkey. We had booked our flights with British Airways but the latter had sub-contracted to GB Airways, who had then conveniently gone out of business. B. A. sent us an e-mail informing us that we had just been screwed about a month after we were notified by EasyJet that they were willing to rescue us. Naturally EasyJet does not have the same baggage allowance as B.A. and this meant an excess baggage charge that was almost equal to our original ticket price for our two bags that Delta had carried for free; probably out of guilt and remorse on their part. EasyJet also wanted us to check our carry-on bags but just one of these would have tripled the ticket price so we demurred. It is interesting what Europeans will accept as "customer service". Most Americans are willing to exercise their Second Amendment rights when treated thus.

When we arrived in Dalaman, the flight was met with dozens of photographers, TV cameras and crowds of people dressed a whole lot better than us. There were pretty girls handing out flowers and Turkish Delight candy to each deplaning passenger. The airport was otherwise deserted and we thus assumed that the public display was indeed intended for the likes of us. It seems that this was EasyJet's inaugural flight to Dalaman and one of the first flights of the tourist season. What was amusing to us was that as we waited for our luggage, we discerned that most of the passengers had been similarly booted off British Airways and were grumbling about being raped by EasyJet's baggage policies, or about the meal that they had paid B.A. for and did not receive. It was perhaps fortunate that the TV crews were not seeking interviews. Better to wait a week guys! We grabbed our bags and headed to the nearby hotel for a Turkish cheese sandwich and Efes beer. Great! We are back in Turkey.

April 1, 2008

This morning we were picked up by our taxi for the two hour ride from Dalaman to Marmaris. Turkey is very mountainous and the road weaved up and over a series of ridges. Winter is just about gone from here, as we could see orange trees heavily laden with fruit, whilst other trees were covered in an explosion of blossoms. We passed four or five police checkpoints during the drive but blonde or red hair does not fit the profile of the local terrorists. After a cursory glance we were waved through.

DoodleBug was as we left her, with just a layer of dust on the decking. We arranged for a power hook-up and swayed

the luggage aboard with jury rigged blocks and tackles. As Annette began putting her boat back together and making beds, I reconnected the house batteries and began updating the on-board laptop, so that it was capable of talking to the outside world again. Mundane stuff and the real work begins tomorrow.

April 2, 2008

Yesterday's inspection showed that the sonic speed sensor in the hull had been broken off at some time since we were lifted last year. This can only be repaired with the vessel out of the water, so this became a high priority job to accomplish before our scheduled launch date on 4/15/08. I began the tedious task of disconnecting the wiring harnesses from the interior of the boat and soldering a retrieval wire to the extremity of the cable. On the outside it was necessary to drill a fine hole in the remains of the sensor, insert a self tapping screw and then extract the decayed remains with a pair of pliers like a reluctant molar. I had on board what is probably the last remaining spare sensor that exists on planet earth. The reason for this happy state of affairs dates back to 2003 when we purchased DoodleBug. After keeping DoodleBug at the repair yard for nearly four months, the day or so before we left, the Amel dealer handed me a letter from the Autoprop propeller manufacturer stating that there was a recall on my prop. I had to remove this and return it to the factory in England for repair. Of course this might have been convenient to take care of while the vessel was in the repair yard but hey, think of all the starving families of boat lift operators.......
We arrived at Seabrook boat yard in September of 2003 and lifted DB to remove the Autoprop. I watched with intensity as the yard mechanic removed the prop and when Annette interrupted me to look at something, I asked her to wait a minute. She repeated her request with some urgency and when I looked up at her, a picture of complete misery presented itself. She was wearing shorts, sandals and a halter top and was holding a giant steel chisel that was bigger than herself. She had found a small mollusk attached to the hull that she could not remove with her fingernail. A huge trawler was being worked on nearby, so she had "borrowed" the chisel to shift her unwanted passenger. She is a very determined lady and soon accomplished her chosen task. Unfortunately this action also took out one of the two sonic speed sensors. They are sold as a pair of sensors, hence her inadvertent foray into the realm of marine mechanics had the unintended fallout that I had the necessary spare on board! 

By noon the replacement sensor was installed and wired into place. I won't be able to test it until DB is back in the water of course but it all looks good. The remaining two items were to grease the folding propeller and service the bow thruster. The marina crew had meanwhile arrived to apply the first coat of antifouling paint to the hull and Annette had disappeared to work on the mysteries of the marina launderette. I removed all but one retaining bolt of the bow thruster foot and we thought we had completed a pretty good work day.

April 3, 2008

Last night an electronic alarm went off in the wee hours. I sleepily tracked it down to an electronic barometer that had a gale warning set. This triggers if there is a sudden fast drop of air pressure and sure enough there was a frontal passage, the temperature dropped way down and it bucketed with rain for the remainder of the night. This morning Annette was bundled up in her warmest clothing and dispatched to stand under the bow thruster and catch the foot when I removed the remaining bolt. I removed the bolt and nothing happened. I too descended beneath the freshly painted hull and tugged on the recalcitrant device. It remained firmly attached. I tried running the prop in both directions, soaking the junction with WD40, hammering with a rubber mallet and block of wood, raising the unit with a block of wood to prevent the foot from retracting. Even swearing at the gosh darned thing in both English and French had no effect. Nothing worked. It behaved as though the propeller drive shaft was welded to the motor drive shaft. Now what? I e-mailed a request for advice to Amel and also posted a query on the Amel owners website. Nothing left but to take my bride to supper and feed her an oven baked lamb shank, her favorite dish from the marina restaurant.

Later that evening I checked e-mails and had a response from Amel owner David Miller. He had owned Super Maramu hull number 325. DoodleBug is hull number 331. He had experienced exactly the same problem and had resorted to dismantling the lower gearbox of the bow thruster foot in-situ. This allowed the units to finally separate and he then extracted the big electric motor from inside the boat, with the long steel drive shaft still attached. At the same time I received a second e-mail from "Latitudes and Attitudes" sailing magazine saying that they were going to publish a feature article I wrote titled, "Guns, Coconuts and Pirates". They did not say what month this will happen but we were nevertheless very excited with the news.

April 4, 2008

Bow thruster day! We have been having late starts due to the 9 hour time difference between Santa Fe and Marmaris but tore into the unit as our main task of the day. By evening the unit was disassembled and sitting on the upper deck. The drive shafts are indeed solidly joined by whatever mechanism and we will have to find a machine shop to see if they can separate the two units. The good news is that if push comes to shove, the unit can be replaced with DoodleBug in the water, albeit without the use of the bow thruster for docking. Somewhere in the middle of this chaos we have managed to rent a car and also found an ATM that would dispense cash to us. Annette has reorganized her boat and has updated all of the family photographs with newer versions. It has finally stopped raining and seems slightly warmer. This is a welcome development!

April 5, 2008

Another cold and rainy day as winter still clings on. The big happening today was that we finally achieved the separation of the bow thruster drive shaft from it's motor. This took four mechanics and a 100 ton hydraulic
press. It was impressive to watch as the device groaned as it broke various supporting beams under the motor. Finally the fitting separated from the splined drive shaft. It had been held in place by corrosion. No amount of tugging from underneath the boat would have moved that puppy! The drive motor bearings were also corroded and we have ordered new replacements. Since there is little we can accomplish doing out-of-water chores, Annette and I now plan a road trip to visit Istanbul. When we return we will have 48 hours to install the rebuilt motor and bow thruster foot before launch date. Such optimism!

Someone at the marina was celebrating a wedding and the restaurant was closed for the reception. There is also a cafeteria buried deep behind a corridor of stored catamarans. As we huddled under a single umbrella,  we weaved and squeezed between the narrow gaps and support timbers of some of the 1,000 boats stored here and found the place. It did not open for another hour. Fudge! We reluctantly set off for town in our rental car. Rental vehicles in this part of the world are usually delivered spluttering on the last fumes in the gas tank and you contemplate how far it will be to push the blasted thing to the gas station. Yesterday we "added"  fuel to the tank and I put in 50 Turkish Lira - US$40. I was surprised when I saw that the gas gauge had increased by less than a quarter of a tank. I now paid attention to the fuel cost and saw that it is running US$10 per gallon for "regular". Premium is extra.

We found a Pizza restaurant open and shared a very respectable "Turkish Super" model. The waiter told us that he was from the north of Turkey near the Russian / Georgian border. He said that he has made the trip to Marmaris for the last seven summers to seek work in whatever he could find. He must have been about 12 years old on his first visit.

Since we were already downtown and we already had the empty propane tank in the car, we searched for the one establishment that reputedly could fill a tank with an American fitting. Other cruisers have reported that they were unsuccessful at their previous stops in Portugal, Spain, France, Greece etc. The gas company we found charges US$60 to fill the tank and it takes a week before you get the tank back. We have never had a problem refilling anywhere else we have been and the last time we filled this particular tank, it cost US$5 in Oman. Welcome to the Med!

Last night the wind howled and the rain poured. Even though all 18 tons of DoodleBug are sitting on the hard ground and supported by a steel cradle and timber beams, she still shook and groaned with the gusts. The stern cabin is some 10 foot above the ground and it seemed to shake back and forth by almost one inch. Just the right amount of movement to keep us awake but better here than at sea! This morning the decks were muddy instead of washed clean. The rain was had been carrying sand from North Africa. Libyan sand or Egyptian?

April 6, 2008

We reluctantly loaded up our rental car with a weeks worth of goodies before setting off on our planned road trip north. I say reluctantly, 'cos it is still raining and cold enough to need the boat heaters - not to mention the heater in the car. The weather forecast indicates clearing this afternoon and we are always optimistic when it comes to weather forecasting. To begin, the car would not start. Did I leave the lights on? Two friendly yachties helped us bump start it and we were on our way at last. The road out of Marmaris climbs a series of steep switchbacks and the mist shrouded trees on the rocky mountainsides were very beautiful despite the rain. We stopped to fill up with gas and Annette indicated to one of the two filling station attendants that she wanted to wash the windshield. The man jumped into the driver's seat and the car started immediately. We watched with hanging jaws as he then drove away in the car that contained all of our belongings. Fortunately he came to a halt some 50 yards away, produced a power washer and proceeded to wash the whole car - in the pouring rain of course. He could not be dissuaded from this task and we let him continue, as there really isn't a whole lot to do on a rainy morning in Turkey anyway. Finally the car was cleaned to his satisfaction and we climbed back aboard. It would not start. The two pump attendants helped us bump start it again and off we went. When we stopped for lunch, we parked the car so that it was facing a slight down slope. The rain came down even heavier and parts of the restaurant we were in were blowing away down the highway. Lunch was disappointing; we were the only customers and the roof of the restaurant leaked in several places, including the area directly above our body parts.

Time to move on again. Again the car would not start and by now we had run out of slope, so that I (Ed) was standing in 5 inches of freezing water in a drainage channel. Four big guys from the nearby gas station helped push us out of the low spot and with the power of five people pushing, the engine once more "bump" started. Enough of this! Back to Marmaris! The mechanic from the rental company dropped us off at DoodleBug and promised to return the repaired vehicle tomorrow. As we hung up our sopping clothing to dry, it stopped raining.

April 7, 2008

Our "repaired" rental was delivered this morning and the driver explained that the battery had been replaced. This is what I had diagnosed as yesterday's problem, so heartened with the news, we again loaded up our goodies and set off north. The car washers from the yesterday's gas station were again pleased to see us and seemed almost disappointed that on this occasion we did not want the car either washed or pushed.

What a difference a little sunshine makes to the driving experience! We passed over the coastal mountain range and found 

evidence of larger scale agriculture in the central plains. The rolling hills, distant snow capped mountains, fields and forests formed a pleasant prospect and we debated as to which part of planet earth was resembled. Often the only agriculture we see amongst the coastal mountains is of the desperate subsistence type. The broken down cottages make for very quaint photographs but the level of abject poverty must be appalling.

The roads we traveled were two lane paved for the most part but the surface was sometimes rippled, patched and in need of repair. Traffic was very light except in the towns and villages. Here, signage seemed to stop and the roads petered out into narrow cobbled passages, with vehicles parked everywhere reducing the transit-way to a single lane. We did waste a lot of time getting through these towns as we often needed to guess the direction the highway lay on the far side of the urban congestion.

When we stopped for gas again the car would not start. WTF! We opened the hood and gazed in horror at the original crummy battery. It had not been swapped out! Another bump start and we decided to spend the night in Usak, a provincial town of about 140,000 population. We stopped at a downtown hotel on the main square and noted suspiciously that the minaret of the ancient mosque lay just yards from our bedroom window.

April 8, 2008

When I arose to greet the dawn, my bride swore at me and cursed my ability to have slept through the 0530 call to prayer from the mosque. Its hereditary. My father once slept through a WWII air-raid. The first business of the day was to call the local Fiat dealer. Within a few minutes a service truck pulled up at the hotel and further ten minutes had a new battery installed. We then followed the service truck back to the dealership, where the payment procedure was to take another hour and half. I had expected to hand the van driver cash and set off on our way but this is unacceptable in the computer age. As we approached Istanbul the traffic became much denser but our final 100 km. was via a very modern toll road. It too deteriorated into a mess of snarled city traffic and we exited the main drag to be dumped unceremoniously into a suburban neighborhood. The population of Istanbul is over 12,000,000 souls and navigation is a challenge. We stopped to ask a taxi driver for directions to the "old city" but he wanted 55 lira (US$44) to show us the way. We declined his offer and somehow found ourselves on a suspension bridge over the Bosporus strait. Thus we passed from Asia into Europe and managed to navigate our way to our destination hotel. The latter did not have vacancies for our

intended stay but referred us to an associate hotel called the Naz Wooden House Inn. The Inn was located on a very narrow street amongst tumbledown wooden homes. It had been refurbished and was a cool place to stay but apart from a hotel "room" in a Tokyo business hotel, this was the smallest room we have ever been in. Our room was in fact smaller than the cabin on DoodleBug.

April 9, 2008

This morning we ate our breakfast with a rooftop view over the old city of Istanbul, formerly Constantinople. A few 

hundred yards away was the Bosporus strait and we watched dolphins gamboling in the seas between Europe and Asia. This is a heavily trafficked waterway and a continuous stream of freighters and chemical tankers passed by. To the west, the view was of the roof of the Blue Mosque, our next destination.

The Blue Mosque was just a short walk from the hotel and an amazing structure. It was completed in 1616 and seems enormous from within and without. I have always been struck by the emptiness of mosques versus
Christian churches. You remove your shoes to visit and are then walking on carpets but there is no furniture or seating.

The faithful pray in a kneeling position on the floor. Even the Imam's pulpit lacks the elaborate ornamentation of cathedrals of like vintage. One side of the mosque had a small section set aside for women, in the form of a wooden partition with latticed windows. I peered inside, ignoring the "women only" sign but their space was just as spartan as the facilities for us guys.

Our next stop was a few hundred yards away and is a now secular building called the Aya Sofya. It was built by Emperor Justinian as a Christian church in 537 AD and was claimed the greatest church in Christendom. It retained this title until captured by "Mehmet the Conqueror" in 1435. He converted it on the cheap into a mosque, using plaster, paint and a chisel to modify some of the more abhorrent symbols from the stonework. It remained a mosque until proclaimed a museum by Turkish Premier Ataturk in 1935. The building is currently undergoing restoration work funded by Unesco. The interior dome loses a little of it's grandeur with the entire center of the building occupied by scaffolding. The Unesco boys have set themselves up for a 1,000 year sinecure by the looks of the progress made to date. It seems that they are removing the Moslem plaster to reveal the elaborate Christian mosaics beneath. Of course by doing this they are destroying the later artwork. Still the mosaics were really spectacular and the building overall was in amazingly good condition - an advantage I suppose of not having a half dozen warring Christian sects living inside for the past 600 years or so.

We next worked out the Istanbul tram system and rode across town to the Grand Bazaar. Annette was on a quest for some very specific items and we roamed the 4,000 shops inside it's labyrinth until she determined that they did not have what she was searching for.

That evening we attended a traditional Turkish dance of the "Whirling Dervishes". In my opinion, this should not be attended more than once in a lifetime . The performance was located in a large waiting room at the main railway station and the audience of a couple of hundred gullible western tourists was herded into plastic chairs set on three sides of a square. The chairs were jammed in so tightly, it was impossible to sit shoulder to shoulder between the adjacent chairs and we had to either twist or shuffle the chairs around to make room for the action of breathing. The performance was scheduled to last one hour and began with the orchestra filing in and sitting on the fourth side of the square. Their opening number I timed at 35 minutes of Arabic music with male vocals. The music seems very simplistic to my untrained ears, with no harmonies amongst the singers. At one point there was a flute solo but the flute player seemed to be having a problem and brought back reminiscences of our kids practicing for the school marching band. Finally the five dancers walked slowly in and sat down on the floor. Then they got up and walked in a circle with great deliberation and with little synchronization. They sat down again. I glanced at my watch. Fifteen minutes to go! They got up; marched  into a rough circle; did a lot of bowing to each other and the audience and then one by one began to spin in a counter clockwise direction with arms raised and head tilted to one side. Okay, we have five guys spinning around on the spot, to the accompaniment of music that would have had Manuel Noriega capitulating inside three minutes. They stopped. Then they did the exact same thing again. They stopped. Then they did the exact same thing again. Four times no less. The exact same routine. At the end of the performance the audience began to politely applaud and were shushed into extinction. Sort of like not applauding the National Anthem. I had seen a similar dance in Egypt but at least the Egyptians were savvy enough to follow the "culture" with a belly dancer. Sheesh!

April 10, 2008

Ol' Mehmet the Conqueror decided a really cool place to build his pad was on a promontory near the narrowest part of the Bosporus. He began work on Topkapi castle in 1453 and the various Sultans have lived here until 1839. This had become a sprawling estate of four courtyards and an extensive Harem. We began our tour today with the latter, as they were to close it for tours in the afternoon. The Harem was actually the family quarters for the Sultan, his wives and his mistresses, although it is noted that Murat III sired 112 children, so it was not all polishing the brass and dusting. The castle buildings were in excellent physical condition and we toured the kitchens and treasury along with crowds of school children and uniformed Turkish naval personnel. This is obviously a popular destination for "field trips".

Annette was particularly impressed with the treasury as it contained the Sultan's jewels. The huge diamonds are never impressive to me as they just look like big chunks of glass but Annette's favorite was a casket filled with polished and cut emeralds. They were huge and would be safe for the grand babies to play with as they were too big to swallow. A fascinating place to visit.

Our next destination lay behind the University and we sought out a local market that specialized in kitchen-ware, both commercial and domestic. Annette was seeking a particular type of traditional copper couscous pot but did not find what she needed, although she had espied a possibility this morning at the castle gift shop. We ate the best meal of our trip as lunch in a restaurant next to the University. I noticed that most of the student customers were eating rice and beans, however we delved into the kufta version, with grilled peppers and grilled aubergines. The price was very fair and a stark contrast to last night's rip-off. Then the seafood restaurant tried to sell us an US$80 fish, to which was to be added everything. Annette paid US$8 for a plain ol' warm Miller beer, a price that even exceeded United Airlines tab. Sated with our fine lunch we headed back across town to the Castle and bought the pot she had spotted this morning from the gift shop. Mission accomplished! Istanbul crossed off! Actually we do need to head back to Marmaris. We are scheduled to be launched on 15th. and our rental car woes have cost us two days.

April 11, 2008

This morning we had an early start, found our rental car that we had abandoned a couple of days earlier and discarded the rude note attached to the windshield telling us something in Turkish about parking in an unloading zone. We headed through the suburbs of Istanbul trying to find a highway heading west. Our destination was Anzac Cove, at the end of the Gallipoli peninsular. First a brief history review.

In January 1915 the "Great War" that had begun in August of the previous year had now morphed into a horrific stalemate, where millions of soldiers faced each other across networks of trenches that ran in a band across France from the Swiss border to the Atlantic Ocean. The casualties on both sides were enormous and immense battles produced virtually no movement of the battlefield. Winston Churchill was Lord of the Admiralty, a civilian post as head of the British Navy and reporting to him was a "Sea Lord", Lord Fisher, essentially the top military position in the Navy. Fisher had suggested to Churchill that the Dardanelle Straits in Turkey could be forced by battleships. This would cause the fall of Constantinople, thereby severing Turkey from the war and allow an attack on Germany via the "soft underbelly" of Europe through the Balkans. Strategically it was a good plan and almost succeeded. It was defeated, as many attempts in wartime are, by inept "peacetime" military officers. The original plan was to use the firepower of the great battleships to outrange the Turkish forts guarding the straits and systematically destroy them. The risk of mines was well known but the attack was to be accompanied by mine-sweeping ships and the loss of several older battleships was to be expected. Although the battleships could operate out of range of the Turkish guns, the mine-sweeping trawlers could not and the civilian crews aboard did not like being shelled. By the time the crews had been swapped for military crews, much time and the element of surprise was lost. Two older battleships hit mines and the Admirals lost their nerve and cut and run. They decided that they needed ground-troops to remove the Turkish forts. As the generals cast around for troops to use, it happened that the first contingent of volunteers from Australia and New Zealand (formed into a single contingent - the Australia, New Zealand Army Corp or ANZAC) was passing through the Suez Canal on their way to the battlefields in France. The Anzacs were selected, together with other contingents, to make an a beach landing on the west side of the narrow Gallipoli Peninsula (the forts were on the other side of the peninsula). On 25th. April 1915, the Navy dropped the troops in the wrong place and the Anzacs found themselves on an exposed beach, as easy targets for Turkish soldiers shooting down at them from the steep hillsides. Even when a second landing was made, the British commanders had no sense of urgency about establishing and breaking out of a beachhead. The troops reconnoitered inland and then headed back to the beach to brew up tea. The next time they patrolled in that direction, they found a barrier of entrenched Turkish troops with barbed wire entanglements and machine guns. The same stalemate of trench warfare that existed in France, now existed on the Gallipoli peninsula. Over the next 9 months there were more than half of a million casualties with 36,000 British deaths, 47,000 French deaths and 55,000 Turkish deaths. The Gallipoli campaign was abandoned in January of 1916.

We finally cleared the traffic of Istanbul and followed our road map from town to town along the coast. The roads became narrower, and more rural and we braked and weaved between donkeys, horses and cattle. In one village we were forced to a come to a complete stop. Annette got out of the car and lifted a puppy that was resting in the middle of the road. She carried it to the roadside and set it down, while it looked on with puzzlement. This should have been a clue, as the road to the next town was gravel. The gravel soon deteriorated to single lane, rutted dirt, that would have become impassible with any rain. We dodged potholes and rocks for the next 40 kilometers, while driving in as high as second gear. The next town (?!) had some blacktop but that too went to gravel; thankfully we arrived back upon metalled, tarmac roads shortly afterwards. What amazed us was that the map showed no distinction between a four lane divided highway and a cow track.

Finally we arrived at our destination of Anzac Cove where the troops had landed on 4/25/1915. The cove was much smaller than I had imagined and the steep and rugged hillsides much closer to the almost non-existent beach. We visited the graveyard there and noted that almost all of the dead were either Australian or New Zealanders. A very large proportion of the dead were unidentified and another large proportion were never found.

We next visited the "Lone Pine" cemetery. This was the location of some of the bitterest fighting and was captured by Australian forces on 6th August, 1915 after suffering 4,000 dead within a couple of days of fighting. We saw the remains of trenches along this ridge top. The area had been heavily wooded and the Australian and Turkish trenches were often only yards apart.

After we left the battlefields we drove to the car ferry at Eceabat. We drove directly on board the ferry and as we got out of the car, we saw that the stern ramp had been lifted and we were already moving! A 40 minute ride took us across the Dardanelle strait to Canakkale, back in Asia. Here we grabbed a hotel room and spent the night.

April 12, 2008

Today we drove from Canakkale on the Dardanelle coast, to Marmaris on the Mediterranean coast. The highways were much better than those we experienced when crossing the center of Turkey on our northbound leg and navigation was much less an issue. We found DoodleBug waiting for us and are to receive the reconditioned pieces of the bow thruster tomorrow.

April 13, 2008

Today was bow thruster day. I spent the morning rebuilding the foot of the bow thruster with it's gearbox and propeller. All of the seals were renewed and the unit filled with oil. So far it has not leaked! The next task was to recover the motor that had been repaired with new bearings and had been repainted. This motor is heavy  and consumes 6,600 watts of power, peaking at 450 amperes at 24 volts. The motor was cajoled into place and then had to be connected to the bow thruster foot. It did not fit! The bolt holes were a few thousands of an inch out of alignment. I struggled; Annette jiggled from below; I swore in several languages. Finally after almost two hours of struggling, the two units were mated and bolted together. Some of the seals have been glued into place so we will not test the unit until tomorrow. To celebrate, we drove to town, collected our propane tank that had been refilled in our absence and ate dinner at Burger King. Sometimes you can have just one lamb kebab too many......

April 14, 2008

Another workday! We removed the backstays and SSB antenna so that we will now fit into the travel-lift. We also visited the marina office to get a permit to launch DoodleBug. We have never been asked for this permit but the possession of same, seems to mean that you really are on the list to get launched. We are now ready. DoodleBug's bottom has been painted with anti-foul paint and the sides of the hull have been polished. Tomorrow is the long awaited launch day.

April 15, 2008

Position N 36 49.2' E 028 18.5'

We are back in the water! The marina folks showed up with their travel lift at 0900 hours this morning but the propeller had just been painted with it's final coat of antifoul paint. We sent them away. We then whiled away the rest of the day waiting for their return. Finally at 1600 hours we approached the office and asked when we were to be launched. Ten minutes later the errant operators drove up in their travel lift and scooped us up. By 1700 hours we were floating again. We plan to remain at the marina for another week while we put everything back together and provision for our cruise.

April 16, 2008

Today we began the process of putting DoodleBug ready for sea. During yesterday's launch, the engine started immediately and ran smoothly. I did not try to use the rebuilt bow thruster until we began to back into our assigned slip, as I regarded the condition of the batteries with deep suspicion. Sure enough, as soon as I hit the button for the bow-thruster, the navigation display screens went dead and alarms began to sound. There was no sound at all from the bow thruster itself. I did try it briefly in an "out of the water" test yesterday morning and the prop turned OK; thus the problem does lie with the batteries. We had ordered eight new batteries when we first arrived in Marmaris and they were scheduled to be delivered yesterday. They did not show up and two phone calls today have elicited no response. The Genoa sail was placed in a sail storage facility last October, for cleaning and storage and it too was scheduled for delivery yesterday. On the second telephone call to the storage facility this morning I was asked, "What does it look like?"

We have reinstalled the backstays and re-rigged the mizzen sail. While I have begun a systematic check of boat systems, Annette took the car to town for phase one of her provisioning. She will probably make a couple more runs before she is satisfied that we won't starve. All day we have waited for the batteries and the Genoa to arrive. This evening Annette was so excited as she cooked our first "on-board, real meal". We had salmon with a white wine reduction, fresh dill, tomato, parsley, red onion sauce, together with fresh crusty baguette and garden salad. I got just one bite of the salmon when the Genoa showed up. No batteries though.

April 17, 2008

This morning we unpacked our Genoa that arrived at dusk and the beginning of last night's supper extravaganza. We rigged it and it looks good. I was particularly nervous since the sail storage company charged us 6 euros for "insurance". I needed insurance? To cover what? Cigarette burns? Rat chewed holes? No such holes were visible on our now "washed and pressed" sail.

I checked on the batteries and was told that the supplier had pushed the delivery date back to around the 28th. April. We have tentatively set 22nd. April as our departure date and since the new delivery date was subject to "manufacturing and import delays", this sounded neither viable nor credible. We met with Ilhan Demir who owns the company we have used to perform the maintenance work on DoodleBug over the winter and he has been a really great help on this and other problems we have encountered. He made one phone call and announced that the batteries (different capacity) would be delivered today. About an hour later, a passing boat neighbor mentioned that there were 8 new batteries at the end of our dock. I walked over and sure enough, there were 8 stacked batteries of the exact model and brand we had ordered. I carried one back to DoodleBug before walking the length of the dock to borrow a dolly. I should have taken longer, as by the time I had moved 3 batteries onto and off DB, a young man arrived to do exactly this for me. I pretty much watched as he sweated for the next hour. They are all installed and when I threw the switch, everything worked. Now I have real batteries, I was able to test the bow thruster. It made bow thruster noises and the bow moved left and right with the appropriate movement of the control stick. Fantastic!

I still have a stack of small jobs to do but decided that I would take a break from my tasks and assist Annette with her "Phase II" shopping expedition. We were so excited about the day's successes we drug (past tense of "drag") the barbeque out of it's locker and fired it up to cook chicken legs (butterflied and marinated  for 24 hours in vinegar, oil, Italian spice and soy sauce). The smoke drifted over the whole dock making everyone else jealous. They should make air-freshener in that scent.

April 18, 2008

We are still running down the list of chores but are approaching the last page. A well established rule of sailing is that when you reach that last page, just drop the lines and leave. Nobody ever get to that last page.

Annette completed her Phase III shopping marathon and is now satisfied that she is supplied for the next six months. She was exhausted when she finally had all of her groceries stowed and it took a full glass of Chardonnay to revive her. Ed checked the fixed rigging and found a broken wire in one of the intermediate shrouds on the main mast. Now we have to find the rigger again to get a replacement. Tomorrow should be the last work day and we have begun to monitor the weather reports  for the Dodecanese Islands.

April 19, 2008 - April 22, 2008

The final dance to get off the dock has begun. Sunday is the normal "rest day" in Turkey and although there is some work going on in the boatyard, the sound of hammering and the rumble of machinery operating has dropped from a roar to a muted throbbing. The Custom's officer had asked me for 48 hours notice of our departure and I had asked him if I should see him on Sunday morning. He nodded in agreement and Sunday morning found me in his darkened and empty office. He does not work Sundays. No problem! The weather forecast for Tuesday does not look that good and a Wednesday departure is much more favorable. We spent the remainder of Sunday checking the maintenance items off our lists.

On Monday morning I was in the Custom's mans office, just before his work day began. We talked and he insisted that I return tomorrow, that is on Tuesday. Once our exit documents have been issued, we must leave within 12 hours. We waited for the rigger this morning and then took a walk over to the work office. He is busy on another project and will be on DoodleBug this afternoon. We jump in the car and make a run into town for our last minute items. Annette has been working on a project for several days now. She wanted to convert the stern cabin bed from a supposed "Queen" size - more of a double really - to an "Empress Vivian" size. I believe that the latter is larger than King Size. To accomplish this conversion, she had made a cardboard pattern of the part of the cabin she wanted to fill in and had made pilgrimages to various offices to get words such as "marine plywood", "stainless steel screws", "PVC pipe" and "foam rubber", translated into Turkish and written out for her. She then wandered around the various Marmaris businesses and pointed to the word for the item she needed. This technique has also worked well in the grocery stores, as Turkey has few English speakers compared to other countries we have visited. For many Turks, at least amongst those we have met, their second language is German. Annette's project has been completed and she finally has her bed modified to her satisfaction.

Monday afternoon came and went and I have been checking off the jobs that I have really been putting off doing, until my list is near complete. At 5:30 in the afternoon the rigger finally showed up. He will do the work tomorrow morning. I tell him that I will not be here then but at least am able to show him the shroud to be replaced and to indicated the halyards and winch to use to climb the mast. Now everything is compressed to the last day - Tuesday. Gone is our leisurely drift through the departure procedure. Now we have to prepare for the rigger, see the Custom's man, pay the final marina bill for utilities used, make a trip into town to see if we can get some of our VAT refunded from the Customs office at the ferry boat terminal, return the rental car, pay the rigger bill, pick up our boat papers from the Custom's officer and stow the loose gear for sea. A typical departure really.