Lefkas to Turkey to pick up a boat and NZ Part 4

We’d been asked to go to Turkey and pick up a boat and bring it back to Lefkas. We’d been trying to get away for a week, but were held up with paperwork. As soon as we knew it was all sorted we booked the journey, it looked like this …..

07.00 Coach from Lefkas to Athens – 5 hours (incident – automatic door closed on me at the bus station and now I have a black eye)
13.30 Bus from Athens Bus Station to Airport – 1 hour
16.00Flight from Athens to Rhodes – 1 hour
17.30 Taxi from Rhodes Airport to hotel – 20 mins

We would stay in Rhodes 1 night before getting the ferry to Fethiye in turkey because you can’t complete the whole journey in one day.

Our Pension right in the heart of the Old Town

So we get up the next morning (Tuesday) to go book the ferry tickets – ferries run 4 days a week till the end of October, it’s the 26th – we arrive at the booking office and ask for 2 tickets for this afternoon to Fethiye please. The lady in the office looks apologetic and tells us the man from the ferry company in Turkey came in on Saturday and told her they were stopping the 4 ferries a week early and would only be running once a week from now on and that’s on Thursdays. Great!! So what’s an alternative – we can catch a ferry to Marmaris the next day (Wednesday) but it’s miles away from where we need to be, but if we don’t get that one, we’re stuck here till Thursday and only one day to get the boat ready and provision before setting off on Saturday. We opt for the Marmaris ferry and bus down to Gocek (where the boat is).

My views of Rhodes Old Town here

No problem getting on the ferry, the Sunsail rep picks us up from the terminal and takes us to the bus stop – she thinks it will be about and hour and a half to Gocek, when we get there the petrol station will be open and we can ask the attendant to ring us a taxi to get to the marina, it’s 5 kilometres away and we had lots of luggage – simple you might say. So the next part of the journey looked like this …..

18.30 Bus from Marmaris to Gocek – 2 ½ hours!
21.00 arrive at Petrol Station – closed, a man filling up with pay at pump facilities and a sign with a number for a taxi. We ask the man if he spoke English – yes a little – could he speak to the taxi driver and explain we want to go to the Marina. ‘I am a taxi’ he says. Really, his vehicle looks like a regular Joe – who cares, we’re tired, hungry, got HEAVY luggage and just want to get there. We say yes. Well the marina may have only been 5 kilometres away, but its 5 kilometres round the edge of a large bay and is like a rally track. It’s in the middle of NOWHERE!
21.20 arrive at boat – man what a journey. Next problem, the boat is so far off the key there’s no way we can jump on and no plank or passerale. BUGGER!! Taxi driver to the rescue, Mark pulls the stern lines in a little and he takes a running jump, I thought he was in but he made it – well done Mr Taxi driver. He lets the bow line off like he’s a pro and moves the boat back enough to get our older legs on.

We ask the taxi driver if he will take us into the centre so we can get something to eat – yes no problem. He drops us off at a restaurant and nearly next door is a small supermarket – great can get something for breakfast and lunch for the next day. He says he will come back for us and we agree on an hour. Best bit of the day, we have a nice meal and relax a bit.

He comes back just a promised and takes us back to the boat. We wander along happily to the boat and find it’s been moved back out again – will this day with its aggravations never end!

Mark goes off to find a marinero and I walk down the pontoon and spy a plank. Yes I steal it!! But only for a while – by the time Mark gets back, I’m on and loosened the bow line again so we can get on and off. I just want to go to bed now – NOW!!
Lovely sleep later we get up to a grey rainy day and start checking the boat over ready to go a bit further south to Fethiye where we’ll provision and complete the paperwork so we can leave the country. Thinking about leaving and out of nowhere BIG winds begin to blow, boats are heaving all over the place and it’s chucking it down. We’re not going anywhere right now that’s for sure. We go below and make a cup of tea.

An hour later, rain and wind have stopped and sun is shinning. Off we go to Fethiye. Three hours later we arrive, moor up and start shopping. By Friday afternoon, we’ve done all the shopping, it’s all stowed and I’m off to the Turkish Baths.

I’ve never been to a Turkish Bath before and am not quite sure what to expect. I read the pamphlet before I go and find I can wear a swimsuit (don’t have one with me) or use the little red wrap around they give you. OK it’s the wrap around. I’m going on my own – Mark wouldn’t be seen dead in a place like that so I’m asking myself - will there be men and women together or will they be separate?? Will a man or woman wash me? Will a man or woman massage me? Do I have any more inane questions before undertaking this new experience? Just get on with it Maureen!!

So I arrive at the bath house, it’s been there since the 16th century I’m told, but this doesn’t matter right now as I’m a little trepidatious, there only seem to be men around. I’m told to go into a little changing room and get my kit off (my words not theirs) and put my little wrap around on and some plastic sandals. I’m taken into the bath house which has had it’s centre a raised octagonal seating area, with 5 small ante rooms off at angles around the room. Four of these anti rooms have beautiful stone sinks and taps and one has showers. I’m told to sit or lay on the octagonal area, which is lovely and warm and someone will come back in 20 minutes. I’m on my own, not sure if that’s good or bad at this point. Will it be a man or a woman that comes back, I ask myself. Well it’s too late to worry about that now, I’m here.

Twenty minutes goes by, and I’m warm and relaxed and in comes a man, a big man, middle aged with only a wrap around on, humming and singing softly and starts to run water into one of the stone sinks. Well that’s one question answered, I’m to be washed by a man! He tells me to come and sit by one of the sinks and he starts pouring hot water over me, rinsing me down ready for my scrub. I lie down again on the warm octagonal area and think about how much of me is going to be exposed! I try not to think about it as he starts on my back. Well there wasn’t a square inch from the tip of my toes to the base of my neck not scrubbed with the lamb wool hand mitt (don’t be fooled by the lamb wool, it’s like being scrubbed with a pan scrubber). Time to turn over – have stopped worrying about it now, it’s too late – am just going to enjoy it, but will keep my eyes closed! Well my ‘little triangle area down there’ was covered at all times but every inch of my front from the tip of my toes to the top of my face was scrubbed. Back to the sink and more rinsing, great big bowls of water thrown over my head, it’s certainly invigorating. Back to the warm octagonal for the soaping and massage. Back first and I’m covered with lots of lovely suds then massaged to within an inch of my life. I’ve never had a massage like it. I’ve gone numb from my feet to my neck. I feel like I’m going to leave an imprint of me on the marble slab. My back has not felt this good in years. It’s difficult to tell if its pleasure or pain, it’s on that border line all the time. What the hell is he going to do to my front! I turn over. He massages my feet (lovely), legs, middle then stretches my arms above my head and seems to massage all the pain right up and out of my finger tips. Heaven. Now I don’t want it to stop. But it does. Back to the sink, shampoo and head massage, more rinsing with hot and cold water then wrapped up in a clean wrap around and given a cool drink.

Now for the Rose Oil massage – another man. What he did with my back and shoulders defies description. He seemed to have 6 arms and they were everywhere doing things I’ve never experienced before. I tell you no bit of a body would dare not to be relaxed after that. It was the same for my front and it was all finished off with a face massage. I can’t describe how great I felt walking out of that bath house. If I lived here I would be in there every week, what fantastic value for money at 25 euro. Would I go again – you bet!!

On a more sedate note here's a few shots of us coming through the Corinth here

Queenstown to Glaciers NZ Part 4

May 24th, we're leaving Queenstown and it's getting colder, I need a new hat .......

I'll never be recognised in this one!!

We drive through Arrowtown, a beautiful little gold mining town set in a fantastic mountainous landscape. It's raining so we have a quick walk around and visit the museum, it's well worth a visit, full of really cool stuff from the gold mining era. We drive up through Lake Wanaka, one of the most beautiful lake areas in the South Island and past Lake Hawera to stay at Makaroa in the middle of nowhere near to Haast Pass. This Pass will take us through the Southern Alps over to the West Coast for a few days. We stop at the only camp site and took ourselves into the bar for a drink. we start chatting to the Bar Manager and bugger me if he wasn't from Hebden Bridge (just a few miles from where we lived in the UK) – amazing. He’s been there 3 years and has no intention of moving back. We decide to stay for dinner. The Lamb shanks are recommended and it was the most enormous meal I've ever had put in front of me. It was two shanks, roast potatoes, kumara, pumpkin and green beans. I didn't know whether to climb it or eat it!! I did my best but finally had to ask for a doggy bag. I expected he would take it away and pack it for me – NO, he literally slapped a 'paper bag' on the table next to me – pack whatever you want he said – fantastic!!! In the bar they had the biggest piece of greenstone I’ve every seen, weighing in at somewhere in the region of 130kilos. The story goes that anyone that can carry it out can have it – it was worth a fortune.

May 25th, drive through Haast Pass and up to Fox Glacier, the first of the glaciers we’ll visit. The weather is closing in on us from behind. The bridge pictured here runs across the Haast River, one lane and reminds me of the bridge driving across the river into Dundee in Scotland.

News today is heavy rain and flooding north of Dunedin.

Here on the West Coast it’s quite nice. Walked up to the glacier and again is so hard to take in the scale of the mountains with this ‘wall’ of ice filling the gap.

Mark replicates the retreat proceedure as shown on the sign behind him at the foot of Fox Glacier.......

Look at the very small people, it gives some scale as to the size of the glacier face

Like all glaciers it’s slowly receding, leaving the typical flat terrain exposed. It’s very eerie. You can hear it creaking and see the occasional rock fall. The face is partly covered with scree, but where it is clear it is the most brilliant icy blue colour. A constant flow of milky white water runs from the beneath the glacier, it's melting from the bottom and washing crushed rock down the valley. It's truly awe inspiring. We just stand and try to take it all in but it's difficult. This force of nature makes you feel totally insignificant.

Down in Fox village we called into the Glacier helicopter office to see when we could go up, but the weather was on our tail again and it wasn’t looking good for the next morning. That evening in the village as the sun was setting, the mountains to the east were lit up in the most amazing vibrant reds and oranges and changing by the second. As the sun set then the clouds in the west were seemingly on fire. It was obviously a spectacular sunset even for the locals because they they were coming out of bars, shops and houses just to stand and watch with awe as the sunset went through its motions. Unfortunately we didn’t have our camera with us, but it was one of the defining sites of the trip so far.

May 26th, down to the helicopter office for our helicopter trip up the glacier and around Mt Cook, but it was not to be, the weather has scuppered us again, the winds between two big weather systems were growing stronger and making any flying impossible. So we drive up to Franz Joseph Glacier and walk up to the glacier face, I think this one is even more impressive if that’s possible. Walking up the valley we experienced gusts over 100km per hour, nearly lifting me off my feet on a couple of occasions. Apart from the wind, it was a lovely sunny day, on the east coast and in the south the weather continues to worsen. We couldn’t fly up the glaciers so we decide to continue north.

Next installment we cross the Southern Alps in the first whiteout of the season.

Some more piccies of Arrowtown, Haast Pass and the Glaciers here

Autumn arrives and NZ Part 3

Storms arrived early this year, where October is normally a beautiful month, this year it's done nothing but rain. Despite this there is some lovely autumn colours throughout the Olive Groves where we go biking if you care to look for it.

This autumn it has also been diffucult to get still enough weather to get the sails out and dry them before taking them off the boats, but finally a couple days ago we had a lovely day.

A single Pelican arrives back for the winter, he looking around for his mates but they're nowhere to be found. Looks like the Flamingos have also gone elsewhere for the winter this year, we have only seen them flying over, not one on the lagoon.

The rest of the autumn piccies here




NZ Part 3 Milford Sound and Queenstown

May 22nd - we left Te Anau mid morning to drive along the only road in and out of Milford Sound. It winds up and up through the dramatic Southern Alps until it reaches the 1.2km Homer Tunnel. This tunnel was initially started with men using pick axes and wheelbarrows then dynamited through the mountain side to gain road access to the Sound. In the tunnel you won’t see any shoring up, no concrete just hewn granite. About 2 meters up from the bottom it’s painted white and there are small lights showing the way. Once in the tunnel it’s all downhill into the valley leading to the Sound. It’s an experience in itself.

Homer Tunnel

Milford Sound was named by a sealer Captain John Grono, after his home Milford Haven in Wales. It’s in the South West corner of NZ and is known as the wettest inhabited place in NZ, with 6,813 mm of rain a year. It is technically a Fjord and opens out to the Tasman Sea, but has retained it’s original name of Sound. It was also described as the 8th wonder of the world by Rudyard Kipling. The Maori call it ‘Piopiotahi’ after a Thrush like bird.

None of that though, prepares you for the stunning beauty of the place. It’s very very difficult to take in the breathtaking scale of the landscape in the Sound, with sheer rock faces rising 1,200 meters or more on either side and waterfalls falling a thousand meters in length. Lush rain forests cling precariously to the cliffs and the wind blows so hard through the sound at times that the waterfalls are blown back up the mountains.

Milford Sound

Dolphins play around the boats, seals and penguins make their homes on the rocky shores and if you’re lucky the odd whale is spotted.

The trip out to the sea and back normally takes about an hour and a half. The time depends on how far you can actually get out to the sea, in rough conditions the boats don’t get far enough out to even see the sea, luckily for us it was a calm day and we went far enough out into the Tasman to get a view of the entrance of the Sound as seen by the early explorers. It is in fact almost impossible to tell there is an entrance at all!! It was a very frightened captain and crew that were blown into the Sound in a storm and realised as they got closer the land opened up and eventually far enough into the Sound they found shelter.

The observatory has only just opened this year and is a very clever piece of engineering and a great idea. Due to the high rainfall in the Sound the salt water is covered with a layer of fresh water. Combine this with the narrow shape of the Sound, light is prevented from penetrating past the fresh water, creating a similar environment to the deep ocean at the much shallower depth. The Observatory is floating with fixtures to the shore and a lower circular viewing level at 10 meters down. Outside each of the viewing windows is a marine shelf, where plant life has attracted a variety of fish, starfish and octopus.

Fish at Observatory

The shelves are movable so when there is heavy freshwater influx the shelves are lowered to ensure the marine life remain in the right seawater levels. It’s unique in that the people are contained and the fish are free to come and go. The hour we were there seemed to pass in a flash. When we left the Marine Centre the weather had closed right in and it was raining, the photo here looks like it was taken in black and white, it was in fact taken in colour!

May 23rd, after another night spent in Te Anau we drive up to Queenstown, the last time I was there was 1976, I couldn’t recognise the place. It’s also seriously expensive there now. NZ wine is cheaper in the UK than it was in Queenstown. Having said all that it’s still a stunning place. We went up in the Gondola to temperatures of 2° and nearly got blown off our feet, the weather is obviously changing from the long summer and warm autumn they’ve had to full blown winter.

Once at the top (790m above the town) it is spectacular with 220 degree panaramic views of Lake Wakatipu, The Remarkables and Coronet Peak.

View going up the Gondola

This is the type of Gondola I went up in 1976!!

This is the home of most of the extreme sports that have come out of NZ. As Mark puts it, they’re not happy unless they’re trying to throw themselves off something in an attempt to die!!

That afternoon we went out to the Shotover River to have a trip on the Shotover Jet boat. Shotover River was one of the richest gold mining areas in the late 1800’s and in modern times NZ is the home of the development of the Jet boat and these boats will run in 10cm of water. I had bought Mark this as a surprise, but the ride is not for the faint hearted. It’s one of those rides that you’re not sure if your legs will hold you up when you get off. They warn all passengers that the wind chill can reach -30° in the boat so if I look like I had a lot of clothes on in the picky below you’re right – it was COLD!

We stayed in Queenstown for the night and during our wander around the town we went into a liquor store for a bottle of wine and found the lad on the till was from Pickering!! He had been there 3 years and had got a bit trapped, the wages were poor and it was an expensive place to live, he had trouble saving enough to move on – seems it’s a common problem for people arriving in the Mecca of extreme sports capital of the world.

All the pictures here of Milford, Queenstown and Shotover River

Winter Racing Begins and NZ Part 2

As if we haven't had enough sailing this summer, we've signed up for the winter series as well. First race is going north of the island up to Prevesa on the mainland and everyone is looking forward to the first encounter of the season. Neil our skipper decided Leona (the boat) needed her bottom cleaning before the race and idiot me volunteered. So we take the boat away from the town into clean water, Mark loads me up with my dive gear - can't dress myself, it's to heavy :-( - am becoming a weakling lol and in I go to give her a scrub. The water was so murky I couldn't even SEE the keel from the water line, this is not my favourite type of diving, so I feel my way along most of the time and I did my best to clean all her bottom. This time of year the water is still warmish but the wind was chilly getting out. So race day. Not much wind and a limited choice of where to lay the start line as the shore is at one end. With wind light and all over the place it was a lengthy debate on whether to start with white sails or spinnaker. White sales won to get over the line and within ten minutes the spinnaker was up. It stayed up for 2 thirds of the trip north, wind changed dramatically and back to a beat for the rest of the leg. Around the Prevesa buoy, spinnaker up again for a third of the leg back then white sails for a beat to the finish. What a weird race!!! Anyway, champions (lol) that we are, we were 2nd over the line and first by miles on corrected time.

NZ Part 2 Home and Going South

After a 12 hour flight - great for me, I had four seats to myself and slept 8 hours of the journey - nightmare for Mark, he wouldn't move and didn't get much sleep - we arrive in Auckland in the morning. I was lovely to see Mum and Dad there to meet us, 8 years since I saw them, about 16 since Mark saw them. Bundle us all into car and lets get home for a cuppa and long chinwag!! A relaxing day needed to get over Mark's jetlag.

Next afternoon we went into Auckland, and had a wander around the Maritime Museum. It's pretty impressive. The picture of me is in a bunk in a mock steamer, it's built on one of those hydraulic things simulating sea motion, creaking wood and everything. It's even got scratchy blankets to give authenticticity.

May 19th – Manukau Heads Lighthouse

NZ was a very sea fairing nation, they had no choice being so far away from any other land mass and the Manukau Heads is the western entry into NZ's biggest harbour. It's the most dangerous harbour entrance with a trecherous, tidal sandbar across the entrance and the location of the most disatrous shipwreck in NZ's history. The warship HMS Orpheus grounded on the sandbar and 185 lives were lost.

Manukau Heads Replica Lighthouse

A few years ago the locals decided to recreate the lighthouse and using the original dome (which had been sitting in a farmers field for years), lantern and prisms set in a timber replica of the original tower. The lighthouse was reopened in 2006, 132 years from it's date of first use. As Mark is always pointing out to me - NZ is a young country and history is thin on the ground (he lived in a pub older than the oldest building in NZ) but they do their best!

More Piccies of the Manukau Heads here

We take a leisurley drive back exploring some of the lovely bays around the harbour and look what we come across......

Yep it's a carrier/cargo plane in someone's garden!! That's what the Kiwi's do best ... surprise you on many levels lol.

May 20th we set off to fly to Queenstown to pick up our camper for 9 days whistle stop tour in the South Island. Well we got near Queenstown and had to hold for 20 minutes to see if the weather would clear enough for us to land – wasn’t happening and had to re route to Christchurch – bummer.

Decision time - ring the camper company to see if we could pick up our camper here or take a 6 hour coach trip down to Queenstown. Don't fancy 6 hours on a coach to we opt to pick up the camper in Christchurch. Paperwork and instructions complete we spent the first night spent just outside Christchurch.

May 21st, it's a long drive down to Te Anau to get back on our planned track. The changing landscapes of the south island are wondrous, first stop Lake Tekapo and the autumn colours around the lake are just beautiful.

The trusty camper parked at Lake Tekapo

Autumn colours at Lake Tekapo

More piccies of the changing landscape on that drive to Te Anau here. Next installment the famous Milford Sound and the Glaciers.

The Raft Race and NZ Part 1

As if there wasn’t enough frivolity in our lifestyles here we have to invent more. This time the ‘raft racing’. This event was the 2nd part of a 2 part series, the first we missed we were 12,000 miles away in NZ, so we took time from our busy resting period to see what was going on. As usual when this lot get together it’s a bit mad and this was no exception as you can see from the piccies here. Rafts were judged on looks then everyone took part in time trials to set the pursuit race positions and of course there was NO cheating during this bit at all!!! The most intellectually challenging part of the afternoon (other than choosing what to eat) was deciding on whom to bet on prior to the pursuit. Needless to say we didn’t win a thing. The slowest in the pursuit set off first and guess what – they came home first as well. It was a nice afternoon, especially as I was a little hung over from the night before and wasn’t fit for much else.


NZ Part 1 - We set off on our BIG journey

Most of you will remember the chaos caused by the volcano in Iceland erupting in April of this year, hundreds of planes grounded and people stranded all over Europe. Well we were obviously keeping an eye on this hoping it wouldn’t affect us leaving the UK for NZ. For the week prior to leaving all was quiet, but the day before we left it all changed again – it didn’t matter how much we watched the news and kept our fingers crossed it was looking worse and worse. Being ever the optimist (in this partnership that’s only me) we set off to Heathrow and got to our hotel, still with fingers crossed as they were now saying that the airport would close at some point the next day. Our flight was early in the morning so we were up at silly o’clock to get checked in. No cancellations yet! We waited to board with baited breath, please let us out, please let us out – you know how it is. We boarded on time, we actually took off and we kept going – thank you God we’re on our way!

About 13 hours later we arrive in Brunei, the journey was fairly civilised, a day flight to Dubai and a night flight to Brunei. We then had a full day in Brunei to have a look around. Brunei is a Sultan ship and we didn’t hear a bad word about the Sultan all day from our guides, seems he looks after his people pretty good. We toured the biggest Mosque (supposedly in the Southern Hemisphere,

however, Brunei isn’t technically in the Southern Hemisphere – so not sure what that’s all about), visited the Sultans Palace, the Royal Museum and the highlight of the day was a trip around the water village.

An amazing place that’s been there over 700 years and property is handed down from generation to generation. The water village is fully equipped with electricity and gas, has its own shops, schools and Mosques. We had afternoon tea in one of the old houses which was one of those experiences that you’re not too sure was good, awkward, weird or just ‘different’. Tourism in Brunei requires a little nudging into the present me thinks.

The water village was quite an experience and one I would recommend to anyone. One of our lasting memories was a sign regarding littering – anyone caught littering would face a fine of 3000 Brunei dollars (Brunei dollar is the same value as the Singapore Dollar), needless to say it’s a VERY clean place. Take a look at more pics of Brunei here