Homesickness is an expected visitor

I cant put my finger on why, but I am longing for home more than usual today.  Maybe it is because we have been staying put now for 10 days - the longest stay since Navpaktos - and the plan is to stay here for at least a month.  It might be because we are not crazy about this particular marina.  In itself, it is fine, but the fact that the marina is so far out of town and feels cut off from Turkey bums both Code and I out.  We are thinking about moving to another marina about 40 miles south east of here in a town called Fetiye.  While there is a marina closer to town here in Marmaris, it is triple the price.  Fetiye (FET-ee-ya) has a marina in town but it is a little pricer than where we are now, but not as high as the other Marmaris marina.  We will check it out next week. 

The homesickness may also be triggered by all the boats being pulled out of the water for the winter and the crews are heading home or traveling elsewhere for the winter.  There is quite a number of boaters who stay on their boats all winter long, like we are going to do, we are far outnumbered by the boats that are kept 'on the hard' (on land) for the winter season.  The huge boatyard is filling up with boat after boat like a herd of mammoths, with dates marked on the hulls indicating when they will be splashed back into the water in the spring.  We feel small as we shortcut through the yards to get to the offices, the library, the stores, weaving through the underbellies of the beasts on our bikes.  It is an odd to think we are becoming more accustomed to recognizing the bottoms of the boats than the tops.

Graeme and Aethan have taken to making forts out of the boats that are drydocked near us.  They make perfect shelter.

I might feel homesick because we lack compatriots.  We're younger than everyone here, and there are a few Americans, but many are just readying their boats for the winter and taking off for Florida or Texas.  Then there is the cultural barrier.  For example, there is a disgusting old and fat german dude who hogs the sauna - literally 30 minutes in, then 30 minutes out, the entire time that they have it running (3 days per week).  He insists on being naked in the sauna and even in the shared dressing and shower area.  A woman I have been doing yoga with (she is young - only 61) asked if we would please cover up.  He shot back that this is how it is done in Germany, so he isnt going to change.  Last time I checked, we were in Turkey, but no matter.  I am not a big fan of the sauna, but there are quite a few people with that kind of attitude around - and they can be loud about it, which can get annoying pretty fast. Hopefully the management can address it.

Maybe it is the fact that the holidays are coming up and I am feeling wistful that we will not be celebrating with our family and friends at home.  THere is nothing like watching the kids get together to trick or treat, or having a giant Thankgiving dinner, or having the kids fly down the steps to open christmas presents.  I like to decorate for the holidays, and here there really is no place and it feels like no point as it just adds to the everpresent clutter on the boat. 

I might be homesick because there are so many things going on at home in terms of the house (Code is focused on getting the contractor started), our squished cars, the broken waterheater, and finding tenants on Saltspring.  With so many things going on, it is hard to handle it from afar.

It helps me to keep our room/bed very tidy and to keep the kitchen spotless.  Even if the rest of the boat is a wreck, I can retreat to our bed where I have my favorite pretty duvet cover spread as neatly as possible (the bed is an irregular shape, so it is never easy to make it), close the door, spray on some of my favorite scent (Clarins' Eau Dynamisante or Hermes' Verde Orange), and lay down on (fairly) clean sheets. 

Yoga helps a lot, as does running, to make me feel like I have done something good for me.  Even though I am the only one who loves tabboleh and wheatberry salads in our family, it feels good to cook them or other healthful foods. 

I dont know what it is, but when you are homesick, you are just homesick.  The best thing I can really do is acknowledge it as the visitor that I had been expecting, and hopefully let myself get something out of its visit, and then move on.

Space travel, according to our 9 year old

The kids like to lay in their bunk in the V-berth and talk in the morning.  I love to listen to their conversations, especially when Aethan shares his expert authority on worldly topics with Graeme.  This morning, Aethan was telling Graeme about space travel, and that you cant take a space ship to the sun.  He explained though people have tried, they all burned up and never made it. 

I asked him why didnt they just go at night?

He looked at me like I was clueless, shook his head at my naivety, and explained that is when they went to the moon!

We have travelled 7250 miles!

OK, Code has traveled that far, but the kids and I have done over 3,000 miles.  THat is a lot of miles to log to get to Turkey for the winter.. and guess what?  We are spending the winter in Leisureworld!.  We were expecting to find mostly retired people who winter over, but it is different when, in our 40's, we are decades younger than nearly all the other cruisers here.  That said, these cruisers are hardly your average retiree as most have sailed the far corners of the planet and have faced more storms, more repairs, and faced down more fears than Code and I together.  We are hoping that we'll see some other cruisers who have kids, but for us, age is just a number. And, at least we did not have to qualify by age to get in (although for me that is unbelievably just 10 years away!)

There is only one other kids at the marina right now, but he wont be here after next week.  He is a 9 year old boy, by coincidence, but he and Graeme hit it off in many more ways than with Aethan.  Aethan is a bit more reserved with making new friends and doesnt put himself out there unless he is totally engaged in an activity with the other kid.  Graeme and Bertaud (totally killing his name) on the other hand, love to hang out.  They are a both a bit bossy, and Graeme certainly doesnt back down where Aethan might.

It is hilarious to observe the two of them. Graeme and Bertaud listening to Rihanna, Beyonce, and Michael (as in MJ) mangleing the lyrics with Bertaud, showing eachother their scootering 'moves', and playing videos on the iPad.  Actually it is Bertaud who is playing, and Graeme is standing over his shoulder coaching (read: yelling at) him to do this and that.   Picture an overtall half-algerian French kid with grown out dreads and Graeme, who has become scrawny and always long haired, playing this stockcar derby video with the hill-billy hee-haw music of 'Dixie' as the game theme-music in the background. I suppose it can only happen in Turkey.

Aethan took the opportunity to go to town (Marmaris) with Code today to try to buy some used mountain bikes.  Marmaris is about 6 miles away and there is a mini bus that runs every 1/2 hour.  We are out in the sticks a bit, but there is a grocery, a laundry ($2.50 per pound for wash, dry, and folding - same day service...and my concern was laundry?  I am in domestic bliss), post office, a restaurant, bar, and even a workers cafeteria (where the brave can get lunch for about $1.50) and marine shops of all sorts.  Code is in heaven.  My heaven is more like being on a yoga farm for a month or skiing in the Alps...or even just being underway on the boat. 

There is something not quite right about wintering.  I guess you have to do it: haul out the boat for painting, scrubbing, replacing parts, general repairs, etc and taking a rest from the nomadic life during the cold and rainy season.  Frankly, I prefer to not stop; every day we are here in a yacht marina that holds, get this: 1,300 other boats, we are not somewhere else like Cyprus, Lebanon, Israel, or Egypt--and those are places I would like to see if they are politically settled.  While we are Marmaris, we will be traveling in Turkey and beyond, too.  I hope to spend several weeks skiing in Turkey, too, as I hear it is really good.  Nevertheless, I will be enjoying steady wifi, clean laundry, and abundant water and electricity until we hit the water again!

Love Turkey already.

We sailed from Symi (Greece) to Bosboyrun, Turkey yesterday in what you might call 'breezy conditions'.  The harbor where we stayed that night was calm so we could not quite believe the weather reports calling for 25-30+ knot winds.  Good thing that winds like that dont bother us much, because when it gusts up to 40 knots on the beam (side) it feels like the whole boat is going to blow over.  Fortunately it was just a 15 mile, 3 hour sail and once we got tucked into the harbor in Turkey, we were once again well protected. 

The difference between Greece and Turkey are striking, and hard to believe for two countries separated by just 5 miles in some places.  The first thing we noticed were the mountain cliffs that drop straight down to the water.  Much greener than Greece, and much bigger than Greece.  It has less of a Mediterranean look and feel and it seems much more eastern, or middle eastern.  The islands seemed like they moved aside as we pulled in closer to the harbor where the first building we saw was a mineret with a blue stained glass 'steeple' and a silver domed mosque.  They do call to prayer 5 times a day, but it seems that most Turks blow it off. 

They seem to love Americans, and Code's Canadian passport was a bit of a novelty for the customs guy.  The infrastructure seems less developed here; the local roads are a bit of a mess, the power goes off occasionally, and the cafe's are not as glossy as Greece, you get the feeling that the Turkish government use their money wisely and doesnt overspend- in a good way.   We found that the young Italians choose either not work because they want the 'good life' and the government corruption keeps things backwards, the Greeks didnt work because there were no jobs (the government overborrowed, overspent, and now that the EU would like their money back they Greeks dont have it).  In Turkey, the economy is strong, with unemployment being about 6%.  People are employed, they are happy and you can feel it.   We learned it is the 15th strongest economy in the world.  Who knew?

So far, we went to the market, which happens to be on Tuesdays.  We filled up on cheeses, spices, and some fruit.  Turkey is known as Europe's garden, or something like that.  The fresh foods are abundant.  The people are unnervingly friendly.  The instant they talk to you, you are their friend.  We are of course, wary and careful, but the friendlyness is pervasive - shop owners, people in the cafes, the passport checker guy, even passersby stop and talk with the kids.  And it isnt just a smile, it feels like they genuinely want to chat and engage but without pressure.  It is just really nice.

For certain, Turkey wont be a bed or roses, like any country it has its share of issues and foils.  But at first glace, I think we're going to love our time here.

Last of the Greek Islands

We have had a good stretch of days literally island hopping on 5 islands in as many days from Naxos to Symi.  Each island is special and has a personality of sorts.  On Amorgos we spent the morning renting scooters to drive up to a monastery built into a hillside.  It was hundreds of feet above the sea and was probably the closest I have felt to a spiritual experience inside a church.  The Greeks build their churches and monasteries on hillsides and mountaintops. My guess is that it must stem from their religious roots of their images of the gods on Mt. Olympus.  It strikes me how the surroundings and location of a church is as integral as the structure itself.  Or maybe the heart-pumping hike that one has to do to reach the church helps connect the mind and the body to the spirit.  Whatever the reason, it does inspire a sense of the divine to be in a quiet sanctuary, overlooking the beautiful islands and crystalline blue waters and hearing the wind blow across the grasses and scrub pine trees.  It is a place of peace that I will mentally return to again and again.

Some of the churches, in fact, most of them are tiny and could surely fit no more than 10 people at a time, standing, at best. In the Cyclades, all are freshly painted white with blue trim.  Sometimes we see more churches than we do houses, and much of the time the tiny churches are in the middle of nowhere: on a mountaintop, a lone island, or along rugged deserted coastline.   In fact, they are so remote, I can’t imagine them ever reaching their capacity.  They are unlocked and filled with beautiful icons, candelabras, paintings, photos, and coin offerings.  I guess there is no concern that someone is going to steal from Gods place.

We are now in a different group of the islands called the Dodecanese, which refers to the ’12 Islands’.  They are comparatively greener than the Cyclades, many of which were barren rocks.  Although, Symi is rather barren.  The waters here are tidy bowl blue and generally devoid of marine life.  It is like a giant swimming pool.  We are so far south that the season for swimming and sailing extends through the end of October, even though the sunny days are starting to be less consistent and it has cooled off to the low 80s during the day.  It is breezy though, so it feels cooler and it takes me an extra ounce of motivation to jump in the water.  I love to go for long swims with the mask and snorkel.  I usually find swimming to be a dearth of mental stimulation of any kind and oxygen, but with the mask and snorkel both issues are addressed here.  I will head out for an hour and sometimes swim a mile or so out along the shoreline and back.  The time just flys by.

Believe it or not, though, I am feeling ready to leave the Greek Islands.  We have been here for 6 weeks, now, and while it is undenyably beautiful, we are ready to move on toward our more permanent home which will be in Turkey for the winter.  I have been putting things off, like laundry, for a day we have a launderette nearby.  We can see the mountainous coastline of Turkey, and have at times our boat has been closer to Turkey than to Greece.   I guess it is the lure of the next thing, and what is just around the corner that is pulling us in.  Also, the lure of setting down some roots, albeit temporary.  I have a need to spread out a bit, and claim some space beyond the 36 feet that we have had for the last 4 months.