Saturday 1^st May 2010

Well today we took our first big step into the blue and left Marmaris heading east. We need to renew our visas, so we've decided to sail east along the coast to the Turkish town of Kaş which is a couple of days sail away. From there we plan to catch a day tripper ferry to the Greek island of Kastellorizon so that we can get another 90 days. Also I need to check out of Turkey on my EU passport and come back in on my Aussie passport. The primary reason for this is that we've heard stories of foreign flagged yachts owned by EU residents being charged VAT on the value of their boat if Greek authorities deem they've been in EU waters for more than 3 months.

There's been a couple of stories of people having to pay upwards of EUR10,000 in VAT to the authorities and there seems to be nothing they can do to escape it, short of trying to make a run out of the country with their yacht and then never come back. Given the current economic state of Greece at the moment, we don't want to risk it, so I'm switching back to my Australian passport just to be sure.

This morning Nick and I got up and went into town to get an RJ-45 ethernet plug to reconnect the radar to the chart plotter. When we removed the mast, I had to cut the plug off the radar cable so that it would fit through the holes. Now we are back in business, I figured it was prudent timing to reconnect it. We also wanted some batteries for the fridge temperature displays and I needed to get my laptop charger cable repaired. Unfortunately the other day, I broke the end off the power cable when I got tangled up in the cord. On the way through, Nick and I snuck into Netsel yacht marina and had a shower each. We weren't sure when we would get another warm shower, so made the most of the opportunity.

Around 12:30pm, we weighed anchor and headed out of the Marmaris bay into the Mediterranean proper. The forecast was for westerly winds of 10 – 12knots. When we finally got out there, we had something between 10 and 15knots from the south. We ran on a nice beam reach all the way to Ekinçik and arrived around 5pm. Seas were beautiful and we enjoyed our first sail. Cheryl helmed for the first while, but then she was relieved by our new auto-pilot which held a true course all the way to our destination. We had two attempts at dropping anchor, but couldn't get the anchor to bite. On the third attempt we went out a little deeper and when we got it down, it bit with a vengeance and stopped the yacht abruptly. We set the snubber line and then tried backing up with the engines to ensure we were well attached. There was no movement and while we're glad to be firmly set, I do wonder if we'll get the anchor up in the morning.

Sunday 2^nd May 2010

Departed Ekinçik for Fethiye. Anchored in a nice little bay just near Ragged Bay.

Monday 3^rd May 2010

We enjoyed our little bay so much that we decided to break our travel and stay another night. Today we swam, explored, watched some long skinny “tube fish” float past us and generally had a relaxing time. That night we had dinner on the beach and even had a small bon-fire there as the sun set. We went for a walk up the hill to what looked like a small lookout. Unfortunately on the way down, Chelsea got out of control on the descent and ended up running the last 20m as she tried valiantly to reign herself in. It didn't work, and just near the bottom of the rocky hill she tripped and fell hard on the rocks. Beside quite a few grazes and bruises she was complaining of a very sore wrist and forearm. Movement was painful and limited and I was worried she may have fractured her wrist. We took her back to “Connect4” and strapped it with a compression bandage and splint to immobilise it.

Not to be outdone by Chelsea's “mountain goat falling down the hill” saga, Cheryl informed me that the fridges had turned off and wouldn't start. I investigated only to realise that our house batteries were very low on battery voltage. This means that they were going flat too quickly. Upon investigation, I discovered to my fault and dismay that the batteries that were marked with “Maintenance Free” stickers were way low on battery fluid!!! This was my fault, as I should have checked the battery level earlier, however I read the “Maintenance Free” stickers and assumed that I didn't need to do anything. “Hmmm!!” Here we are on our first shake down cruise and the batteries are nearly flat already and the fridges aren't staying cold.

Cheryl also noted that as soon as the fridges were turned off, they were warming up at a rate of about 1 deg C per two minutes !!!! This wasn't how our first “shakedown” cruise was meant to pan out. I mean I was expecting to come back with a couple of items that needed fixing, but I wasn't planning on having to rebuild the fridge boxes !!

Tuesday 4^th May 2010

I would like to say we sailed from Fethiye to Kalkan. The reality was we spend about 9 hours motoring in a headwind, watching as many yachts sailed in the other direction. The weather is meant to be predominantly westerly at this time of year, so technically we should have been the ones sailing and all the yachts coming the other direction should have been motoring. This isn't how I imagined it! When we got to Kalkan, we caught up with some friends Tim and Stephanie on a catamaran called “Honu” who were opposite us when we were in the Marmaris marina. They're a young couple who, like us, have just bought a catamaran and have decided to take a couple of years off and go sailing. I picked them up on the VHF when we were about 15NM out of Kalkan. They had came up from Kaş and were making their way back to Marmaris. Tim informed us that the marina was filling up fast and that there was only one or two spots left in the anchorage. We grabbed the binoculars and watched eagerly as we motored towards the marina. Unfortunately there were other yachts closer to the marina who looked like they were making their way into the marina. 10 minutes later Tim was calling us on the radio to inform us that the marina was full, but that he had a plan. As “Honu” was on the end of the marina wall and there was just enough room for one half of our yacht to sneak in along side their yacht, against the marina wall, his plan was that if we anchored then rafted up next to his yacht we might just sneak in and stay secure. Rafting is a term used to describe where you tie one yacht along side another so that they are securely held together. We gratefully accepted and managed to get into a “tight” marina spot with one half of our cat hanging off the end of the marina wall. The attendant was very quick to come along and charge us the 80.00TL for the mooring for the night. I thought this was a bit steep since we technically were only occupying half of a spot!! The insult was that if we wanted water it was going to cost an additional 20.00TL and on top of this the use of showers was an additional 5.00TL each. We were a bit cheeky here as we paid the doorman 10.00TL for us two adults and just walked in with the kids anyway. I didn't feel bad as we had cold showers for the first half of the wash, and we only had a light turned on towards the end of the shower. Cheryl and Chelsea had to put up with a shower in the dark until the guy ran an extension cord from the men's toilet to the ladies toilet and plugged in a light bulb there.

We went out to dinner that night with Tim and Stephanie and enjoyed a fantastic meal in this lovely little town. Sadly Chelsea's arm is still hurting, so we're watching it closely. Right now it's splinted and strapped to try to immobilize it.

Wednesday 5^th May 2010

We left Kalkan early and motored the whole way (approximately 3 hours) to Kaş where we anchored in a little bay opposite a construction site where they are building a new yacht marina. Our side of the bay is old and quaint, but the other side reminds me of a construction site similar to the ones I used to work on. I don't know if I'm tempted to want to go over and do some work, or to be wanting to get as far away from it as I can. When we arrived Cheryl went to turn on the stove to boil some water for a cup of tea and discovered that we were out of gas. One more job to add to the growing list. The two small 3kg gas bottles onboard just aren't big enough for a live aboard family of four. I bought two 12kg gas bottles which are more suited to our situation, but they were too big to fit even one of them into the gas locker. They don't fit by a mere 5mm … grrrr!!!

Chelsea's arm still hadn't improved, so suspecting it might be fractured, we took her to a local hospital to get it checked. The payment system here is quite unusual in that it really is “pay as you go” We got Chelsea in to see a doctor almost immediately. She looked over Chelsea, asked a few question, then recommended that she would like an x-ray of her wrist and forearm. We were sent out to the waiting room where I was beckoned by the cashier. He asked me to pay him 13TL for the Dr's consult. I had nearly finished paying him and getting my receipt when they called Chelsea for the x-ray. I grabbed my change and receipt and hurried off to see Chelsea in for her x-ray. The Turkish word for the x-ray room was the “Rontogen room” which I found kind of amusing (must be the engineer in me). No sooner had we come out of the x-ray room than the cashier was calling me back over. I went over to see what he wanted and he informed me that I had to pay 21TL for the x-ray. I was in the process of paying for that, when the x-ray came back and the Dr called us back into the consulting room. I was itching to get into the consult room, but the cashier wasn't going fast enough. I really wanted to hear the Dr's report, so I asked if I could come back after the Dr's report and fix him up. I was told sternly “No – please pay the account now”. I took out a 50TL note and handed it to him, then told him to bring me the change and receipt when he was done. He seemed happy with this and I was happy to run into the consulting room to hear the prognosis. The Dr confirmed that Chelsea's radius bone was fractured with a green stick fracture and that she should go to Fethiye to get it set as soon as possible. Apparently Kaş didn't have any paediatricians who could set her arm. Great – we've just sailed from Fethiye and now faced a 200km bus trip back again. They offered to put a slab on her arm for support during the journey, so we accepted and then had get directions from the hospital for the bus station to take us to Fethiye. As we were about to leave, the cashier came up to me with some change and a couple more receipts. The cost of the materials for the slab came to about 4TL and I was presented a receipt for this as well as another receipt for the cost of the nurse who fitted it. This came to about another 20TL. Why they couldn't just square the bill with me in one hit when it was all done is beyond me.

Nick and I reluctantly went back to the boat while Cheryl and Chelsea boarded the bus for Fethiye. They left at 2:00pm and after finding a hospital and getting Chelsea's arm put in a cast, caught the last bus back from Fethiye and arrived back at “Connect4” around 10pm, thoroughly worn out.

Nick and I spent almost the whole day scouring every hardware store, gas store and any other place we could think of to try to get the fittings we needed to move the gas bottles to an adjacent locker and connect the larger bottles, which unlike Aussie fittings differ depending which size gas bottle you get. After three trips back to the yacht and then town and even reaching a desperate low – so low in fact that I went to a fabrication shop and tried to get the machinist to fabricate me a fitting that would convert from my current gas connection to the new one I needed, I was out of ideas. The fitting I needed was a left hand thread which was something unheard of here in Turkey.

Weary and feeling depressed, we all went to bed exhausted. This was one huge, unplanned day and one we would sooner rather forget.

Thursday 6^th May 2010

I woke up early with a bright idea on how I could connect the new large gas bottle to our stove. I quickly found the bits I needed and assembled it all. YES !! It worked !!! Cheryl had boiling water for her cup of tea. Caught a ferry to Kastelorizon to renew our visas. Kastelorizon is called Meice by the Turkish – how silly that one island can have two names in this era.

The ferry trip to Kastelorizon very relaxing and we laid on the mattresses that were on the bow. This beautiful little Greek island is an absolute gem and as soon as we arrived there we were captivated by its beauty and relaxed nature. Motoring into the harbour, we saw many small houses all brightly coloured and picture perfect. As we walked around the town we found that despite its size, it used to be one of the most affluent places in the Mediterranean as it was a trading port for many of the east and west bound ships. In it's hey day it had a population of nearly 20,000 people, but sadly now it's population is only around the 350. There is a story that if ever the population of the island drops below 75 people, then the island will be handed back to Turkey.

We looked at many of the old photos dating from the early 1900's showing a thriving town with many times the number of houses that are there now. I asked a local shop owner why most of the houses have gone. He explained that much of the island got damaged from bombing raids during the war. I couldn't see why such a little island would receive such attention during the war. When I asked him why they would bomb a small coastal island like this one, he looked at me and said “politics – bad choices in politics”. Looking closely at some of the early photos taken during the war, I could see about 15 – 20 sea planes moored in the centre of the bay. I can only guess that the reason for all the attention may have been because the island chose to provide a base out of which the sea planes could operate during the war, so may well have been a hot target. Either way, it's a tragedy that such a beautiful island was so nearly destroyed in the war.

After walking around and looking at the island's museum and climbing to the top of a ruin lookout, we made our way back down and finding a little waterfront restaurant, we sat end enjoyed the atmosphere of the island. We were served an amazing lunch of fresh calamari and a mouth watering Greek salad. We enjoyed out meal, and it made me realise how much I have missed the flavour of food since I've been in Turkey. Turkish food is nice, but I must say Greek food has so much more flavour.

Saturday 8^th May 2010

Today we left our anchorage in Kaş, to begin our trip west again and back to Marmaris. We departed on an uneventful morning, motoring in about 3kts of wind. Fortunately for us it was only a short run to Kalkan where we had planned to stop for the night. We anchored out in a little bay on the western end of Kalkan and curled up in bed to watch “Iron Man 2”. I don't know if it is showing in Australia yet, but one thing I have to say about Turkey is that they don't seem to have any copyright laws, so as soon as a movie is available it's copied to DVD's and is on the shelves of all the little video shops for sale at around $2.00 Australian. So we curled up in bed and watched a DVD together. Half way through the movie, the wind suddenly picked up and we could feel our yacht turning and moving against the anchor. We went on deck and spent a good little while just watching to see if we would drag anchor or if we would hold. We were pretty close to another yacht, and we had a bit of a fear that is we were to swing, we may catch their yacht in our swing radius. We'd been diligent and let out about 80m of anchor chain in 15m of water. In this bay we'd been advised that gusts of wind could come through quite quickly and to add to this, the holding isn't fantastic. Of concern was that the other yacht nearby had only set about 30m of chain, so was on a much tighter swing radius. Fortunately for us, the anchor held, so after about 15minutes of freezing our backsides off on deck, we went below to warm up in bed and watch the end of the movie.

About 3am, we were woken to the sound of the wind buffeting “Connect4” and decided it was best to get up and check that we weren't dragging. We went up on deck to watch and wait out the blow. The yacht we were next to came on deck about the same time, and so we sat and watched and waited. I'm not used to how much I can trust my anchor yet, and the last thing I would want would be to see us wake up to the sound of “Connect4's” hull on rocks, so we're pretty paranoid until we get a feel for what is the “norm”.

While watching, I shone the spotlight around and noticed another yacht had joined our little group of two. We thought he was pretty close to the other yacht, which sort of cuts civil courtesy and respect for one's swinging, until we realised he was the yacht that was anchored a couple of hundred meters closer to shore earlier that evening. It was a sort of “out of body experience” to watch this yacht that started off on the shallower side of the bay make it's way across the bay to near our yachts. We watched, and sure enough, noticed that with each gust of wind he was getting closer to the other yacht, and closer to the rocks behind us. Not quite sure on the protocol in this situation, I quickly started flashing my spot light over his yacht, hoping I might shine it in the port holes and get someone's attention. The other yacht did the same, but as he dragged closer and closer it was apparent that it wasn't working. Some of the people on the other yacht ran forwards to fend off this dragging yacht, so that it wouldn't foul their anchor, or damage their yacht. Somebody on the other yacht must have run down below and grabbed a compressed air horn, for soon they were on deck giving blasts of the air horn to rouse the attention of the couple in the other yacht. It worked ! They came on deck, looking tired from just being woken, until they realised the situation, then they were wide awake and springing into action. They quickly started their engine and managed to avoid hitting the other anchored yacht, although they would have passed within a meter or two. They pulled up their anchor then motored away from us all to try to set their anchor again.

I watched them as they made their way across the bay trying to find a refuge hole in which to bury their anchor against the gusty wind. I watched feeling a sort of sadness that their beloved yacht almost wasn't. That their dream of sailing was nearly shattered. I think it's every yacht's worst nightmare to drag anchor onto the rocks. I know we will go to any lengths to do everything we can to ensure we never drag anchor. I watched them motor around as they tried to reset their anchor in the dark of the night, feeling sympathy for their plight as if they were some juvenile bird that fell out of it's mother's nest in the middle of the night and couldn't find a way back in again. I double checked my anchor, just to be sure, then retired to a broken sleep, half awake for any gust of wind that might unsettle us from our anchorage.

Sunday 9^th May 2010

Woke at 5:45am to the sound of the wind shifting again. I got up and realised it was nearly morning. Cheryl came out on deck a couple of minutes later, so deciding that the winds looked favourable for our big sail to Fethiye, we decided to haul anchor and set off. We were underway just after 6am and found some nice winds of around 15 – 20kts. The only problem was they were right on our tail, and “Connect4” doesn't like sailing directly downwind. In any case though, since we were going against the prevailing winds for this time of year, we were grateful for anything that wasn't on the nose. We sailed in shifting winds. It seemed that every time I got the sails set just right, the wind would shift. I had the sails set beautifully for a run with the wind on our aft quarter, then they swung 40 degrees and threatened us with an unplanned jibe. I altered course, to compensate for the wind direction then they strengthened and I had to reef. It felt like no sooner had I got the reef in, then they died out all together and we had to start an engine and motor as our wind indicator spun circles atop our mast! At one point we went from having the wind astern, to having it swing nearly 120 degrees so that we were close hauled (well close for a cat anyway). It was a fickle wind today as we made our way to Fethiye.

We did arrive though and while we hoped to find a marina where we could leave “Connect4”

for a day while we headed off to explore, we were figuring that we'd have to anchor in the bay, as most of the marinas are pretty expensive. We did pull in at one little floating pontoon that is attached to a restaurant and a small yacht club. We drifted nearby as we asked how much and were very happy when he 120Tl per night, or 40 TL if we eat a meal at the restaurant. Another minor miracle. We moored at the pontoon, then went for a walk to explore. They had a beautiful swimming pool, an outdoor bar and even showers and toilets. This is heaven. We went for a swim in the pool and enjoyed a fantastic dinner at their outdoor restaurant. OK – truth be known, we loved it here so much that we stayed not only Sunday night, but Monday and Tuesday night.

Wednesday 12^th May 2010

After a couple of days in Fethiye, we've decided it's time to leave. We're doing one last trip into town to buy some snorkelling gear and to look for a replacement laptop battery as the laptop is only lasting about 15 – 20 minutes on the battery.

Saturday 15^th May 2010

Some things only happen once and so you have to watch and take note of them when they do happen. Some things just can't ever be repeated. Today was one such day: Nick caught his very first fish, and all by himself. While motoring between Ekinçik and Marmaris, the hand line that we'd bought in Fethiye that Nick had run out earlier in the day began to jump and dance. As I looked back there on the end of the line was a fish jumping out of the water and making a right carry on.

Nick quickly climbed down onto the transom steps and began reeling in his first catch. To our delight (but not as much as his) he'd caught himself a vibrantly coloured Tuna. Now not being one to harp on the minor details of the catch, as in our opinion however Nick landed the fish is fine – the fact that he landed it is the bit that counts. But … when we hauled in the fish, we discovered that the fish was coming in backwards. Indeed, Nick had done better than just catching a fish the normal way around, he'd hooked the fish by the tail and so landed it backwards. This we believe is a feat that just can't be repeated without extreme skill and ability. We took some photos of the fish and then since it was Nick who caught the fish it was Nick's call to keep it or release it and his call was to let it go – Much to Cheryl's dismay. Believe me, she tried every which way to coax Nick into wanting to see that fish on the dinner plate. But at the end of the day, the first catch was released back to the sea and we enjoyed the memory of catching Nick's first fish.

Thursday 20^th May 2010

Time is racing for us now. We arrived back in Marmaris last Saturday and anchored out the front of town rather than go into the marina. This way we're pretty close to town to get all the little jobs done and provisioning completed. I'm clocking through the jobs and Cheryl is busying herself with making curtains for the yacht. In between this, we have the bimini guys finishing and fitting the new bimini and sides.

When we arrived back in Marmaris, we were delighted to hear that Jim and Michelle aboard “Wind Machine” were still in the bay. Unfortunately for them, their SSB radio broke and then had to stay back another week to get it repaired. They'd hoped to leave last week with “Apparition” so while we were sad, for their sake, that they were still here, we were happy that we had some friendly company. Since we're both heading the same direction, they've graciously decided to stay on another couple of days while we get ready to go and sail with us. They weren't really going to head to Rhodes, but have agreed to detour to Rhodes with us so we can have a look in at this delightful Greek Island. Also it's kind of comforting to know that we're at least beginning our journey with company that has a while lot more experience than us. Besides that, they're just a great couple and travelling together means we can learn some new games from them (like Farkle and Mexican Trains). So D & M (yeah you guys) we've got some great new games to teach you when we get back.

This week in Marmaris is a festival week. We're not quite sure what the week long festivities are for (possible celebrating the Australian Cruisers leaving Turkey) but we decided to go in and check out the activities. Last night about 5 yachts got together and we all dingied into town where we tied up under the bridge and watched all the pomp and pageantry. The evening started with a parade, followed by the official opening, then music and dance demonstrations. The parade was fun to watch and each “float” or “group” was based on a ethnic community residing in Turkey. The floats were all creative, but the one that took the cake in our opinion was the Brazilian pirate ship manned by some gorgeous Brazilian women wearing very small pirate costumes and some equally stunning shirtless men with bulging muscles. If ever we get boarded by pirates, I want it to be by the Brazilian female pirates please !!

The night was entertaining but second to the pirates, I would have to say the traditional Scottish band member who played his “fox” bagpipes took the show. This guy had a set of bagpipes that were made from a complete fox. The main pipe they play the notes through was into the fox's mouth and his four legs and tail had the remaining bag pipes sticking out of them. It was an incredible sight to see however his charisma stage persona made it all seem perfectly suiting to him.

Sunday 23^rd May 2010

After a false start yesterday, when the yacht we were travelling with had alternator problems and we had to turn back, we departed Marmaris for the Greek island of Rhodos. This being our first offshore sail to another country. We set out with some nice winds on a reach, however typical of the Mediterranean, they swung around and strengthened as the day progressed. We enjoyed the sail and we made pretty good time to Rhodes.

Now checking into another country was a pretty amazing experience. No doubt after we've done it another hundred times, we'll be old hands at it, but for now it was a new experience. I'm glad Jim from “Wind Machine” was there to help guide me. First we had to go to the Customs, and get our passports signed, show them our crew list, then to the Port Police for our purchase of transit logs and declaration of supplies and equipment onboard. From there we had to go to the Harbour Master (called the Harbour Police) where we had to show our insurance papers and yacht registration.

They were the most picky and wanted to see all of our paperwork and ensure we are properly qualified. In the EU there is a new scheme that all sailors have to be qualified through before they're allowed to sail a yacht in EU waters. We looked into this before we left Australia, but as Australia isn't part of this scheme/agreement, Australian's can't obtain this qualification. Hence the small issue of non conformance vs requirement to conform. When being questioned by the Harbour Master, she asked if I held a degree and if I had my certificate of qualification. I tried to explain that I did have a degree (all the while wondering of what relevance this was to my current situation) but that the certificate was back in Australia. She asked what my degree was and if I was an engineer. I answered that I was and that I was an Electronic Engineer. She looked puzzled for a minute and said “But this is of no relevance to operating a vessel” I too was wondering the same thing until Jim leaned over and under his breath said “She wants to see your boat licence – show her your car licence or something”. I searched through my wallet for my boat license, but to my horror I couldn't find it. I pulled out all my cards and found my car licence, firearms licence, even my SANTOS training qualifications card, but no boat licence. This wasn't a place I wanted to be in knowing the “financial difficulties” Greece is in at the moment and their desperate attempt to grab every dollar they can in fines and taxes. I wasn't about to not produce a licence for this lady. I searched through my wallet again in desperation but still couldn't find it. Quickly I produced my Aussie car drivers licence and handed that to her. She studied it for a minute, a bit closer than I would have liked her to, then in her thick Greek accent looked at me and said “But this is a car drivers licence?”. Without missing a beat and dear God please forgive me on this one, I showed her my driver's licence again and as calmly as I could I pointed to my classes and said “Class C is for Car, Class R is for boat – in Australia they are all on the same license” Now all you Aussies know that class R is for a motorbike, but hoping she wasn't up on the intricacies of the Australian licensing system I tried this one on her. She looked for a minute and smiled at me and said “Thank you for showing me that – it was what I was looking to see”. With that, she stamped all my paperwork and returned it to me. We were now officially signed into the country. As I walked from the building, I looked in the folder that had all my ships papers and there inside the front cover was my boat license plain as daylight. Too late for me to repent from my sins.

We went back to “Connect4” and lowered our yellow “Quarantine” flag and raised out Greek courtesy flag. After a short walk through town, then a quick meal out – yes I had pork, then it was back to “Connect4” and back to bed for a well earned sleep.

Monday 24^th May 2010

Today we went for an amazing walk through the old part of Rhodes town. The old town is encapsulated within the fortified walls of the city and includes a huge castle and parapets, moat and watch towers. We walked for most of the afternoon as we explored and got ourselves lost in the maze of little side alleys and winding streets. The history of the place is amazing as you walk around and see all the Greek inscriptions and learn about the things that happened over the centuries.

We even saw “Knight Street” that is a whole row of houses, each with the coat of arms (family crest) of the knight who used to live in the particular building when they came to visit. Luckily for us, today was a national holiday, so entry to all the museums and attractions was free – this is something we really like. We went and visited the castle and walked through the museum that was attached to it. We saw the most amazing collection of coins, statues, sculptures and artefacts from approximately 400BC through to the 14^th century AD. On the way back to “Connect4” we stopped at an ice cream shop and enjoyed a traditional Greek home made ice cream. Each of the ice cream tubs we're filled with delicious ice cream sculptured into the shape of an animal, complete with eyes. Just looking at was photo worthy.

Tomorrow the plan is to sail to Simi. We would have liked to stay longer in Rhodes as it's a beautiful place and we could easily spend another day chilling out and exploring, but we're mindful of the fact that we need to get west before the Meltami kicks in and makes any travel west awkward, so provided the weather is still good in the morning, we'll be heading off bright and early.