Turkey wrap

We cut loose after Fethiye.  Two other boats we’d hoped to inspect in Turkey evaporated, for different reasons, and with four boat-free (ha!) days to fill, Alex suggested we “pop up to Ephesus”. I thought that

sounded romantic. I hadn’t given Ephesus a thought since my Bible-reading youth, of which no more.

Alex had gone to Ephesus as a young man, en route to India in a VW combi van. Different youths we had, and were.

Venus (above) and Marcus Aurelius, both from Ephesus originally - take your pick

The road to Ephesus (which is just short of Izmir, about five hours north of Fethiye) took Alex by surprise.  His Turkey of 35 years ago was a place of slow travel, of donkeys and dust. We didn’t see any donkeys, but there’s still plenty of dust. Turkey seems to be literally bursting out of her crusty old skin, heavy machinery, cutting, digging, pushing, scooping her features into a new shape…As with any work in progress, what catches on the eye are the unfinished seams, the raw edges.



The  beauty we found en route was not  generally in the towns (functional at best, and more commonly ugly) but in the natural landscape - olive trees, millions of olive trees, which cover those flinty mountains which have not had their lids blown off for road metal; pink and white oleanders in bloom everywhere; groves of fig trees; citrus and apricot orchards; fast-running streams. I took great delight in finding storks nesting opposite Hotel Bella in the old quarter of Selcuk, the town nearest Ephesus.

  

We travelled quickly and in air-conditioned comfort, enjoying marvellous roads which swept up and over seemingly impassable rocky fronts and back down into fertile river valleys. We sped through tunnels which compare well with anything in Europe. That’s the idea, I imagine.

The summer heat has set in in Turkey in June. We were hot in Fethiye, but we melted at Ephesus.  Melted both physically, and into crowds such as we could not have imagined. “Holy shit,” I said to Alex early in the morning when, from the window of our bottom-of-the-bucket Kusadasi hotel, I spied three cruise ships slipping into that lovely harbour. The biggest was a floating city, the second smaller,  and the third smaller still, like Russian dolls. 

We drove early to Ephesus to be there when the gates opened -  "the first private car here,” Alex noted, with some satisfaction. I wondered why so many empty coaches were driving into the carpark. Perhaps the cruise ships had some arrangement with local companies? I thought no more about it. 

We’d beaten the crowds, we thought, as we went through the turnstiles more or less alone and ambled past the great amphitheatre, which once seated 24,000 people, and down the Marble Road towards the ruins of the agora, once the biggest commercial marketplace in the Roman empire. A couple of tour groups appeared from the opposite direction. Strange. Where did they come from? Perhaps they were VIPs with special passes.  We waited for them to go by before we got to the centrepiece of the ruins, the Celcus library. We wanted to enjoy it in comparative solitude.

We walked through the arches before we saw it – a solid procession of humanity moving towards us from as far as the eye could see up Ceretes St.  

The coaches were letting their cargo off at a second entrance at the top of the ruins, so the tour groups needed to walk only one-way, downhill, and would be met by their coaches (those empty ones we’d seen at the main entrance). We were the odd ones, pushing against the tide. Thousands of people were being tipped into Ephesus. They came in sets, like waves. We found shade,  took our time, waited for the lulls.  That’s how Alex got this photo below of the smaller theatre, without a soul in it. The people came from everywhere – Poland, France, England, Russia, Japan, the US. Their guides told them what to look at. They took their photos, and like schoolchildren on excursion, moved on command with their eyes glazed.

Alex remembered coming to Ephesus in the mid 70s, and sharing it with (he guesses) no more than 500 others. We reckon you could have filled the great Ephesus amphitheatre twice over the day we went. That’s not to diminish the impact of the ruins, but it did get us thinking about what it means for our plans to be tourists, albeit on the water, in Turkey over the summer.

A woman restoring frescoes in what were the houses of the rich in Ephesus

From Ephesus, once the most sophisticated Roman city in Asia minor, we went to a more modern hub. This is what we saw.

This is the Marmaris Yacht marina (the biggest of three marinas at Marmaris) as seen from our lodgings at the Pupa Yacht Hotel (a simple little establishment about 8 km from Marmaris town, and one we’d highly recommend to those not into clubbing, for which Marmaris is apparently famous).

A boat up on the hard at Kusadasi. The same technique is used in Marmaris.

Back to boats after all. Just for a quick look, he said, then we’ll go back to the hotel for a swim (the sea, the Mediterranean sea – astonishingly clear and very warm) and send some emails, do the blog. By noon we were well grilled by an unforgiving sun.  We'd checked out the hard stands (the Turkish variety, above) and the boats in the water.  We were pounding the marina arms, getting an idea of who was there, what the facilities were like should we want work done in the future on our boat, and what, by chance, might be for sale.  “Just one more, Mary”, he said.  Always just one more. 

I insisted on a water break. That’s when we saw the Hallberg Rassey 48, Destiny of Scarborough, with a backside on her just like Enki’s.

There were noises coming from down below. I called out, and the owner, a Yorkshireman who introduced himself as David,  put his head above decks. To cut this very long story short, we stopped right there. David, we learned, had bought his boat only two months ago, and was still playing with her, figuring out how she fitted together. As he warmed to Alex's well-informed questions, he mentioned that he would be taking her for her first sail, just a short one,  that afternoon. Would we like to come? We would. Very much so. He seemed pleased. It was a deal. 

Alex talked David through the in-mast furling (there were a few loose ends, literally). I made myself handy with the lines and fenders as she came out of the marina. There was a gentle breeze blowing and Destiny did what she was designed to do. She surged across the flat blue water, picking up even more speed as Alex and David tweaked her sails. I made myself at home. It was good to be on the water again. Very good. The HR 48 is a bigger boat than we've been used to, but we liked how she felt.

That was last night, and tonight we’re in England. It's cold, and the sound of tyres on wet streets outside our pub, The Stag in Lyndhurst, makes me feel more at home than I have for a few days.  Tomorrow morning, we're heading off first thing for Plymouth to meet another man about another boat, and on Monday we fly in and out of Belfast for the day - same thing.  Two more HR 46s to see.  I’m tired. They’re big days, and as we get closer to making a decision on what to buy, we talk endlessly about the heart of the matter .This quest of ours is not just about what we want to sail in, but why we want to sail, and where....Those different youths we had, they make a difference.