It has been a while coming... there has been much planning and anticipation for this trip. We had 14 people, 2 yachts and 1 week of mayhem to organise and the months of planning were worth it as we had an absolute blast!
So we flew to Dalaman on Thomas Cook Airlines (I recommend that you avoid this airline like the plague, it was terrible!) anyway after uncurling our legs from around our ears we picked up our gear and headed to Gocek where we chilled out by a pool until the boats were ready. We got all of the provisions that we were going to need for a few days and headed to the boats. They were 42 foot yachts, one slept 6 and the other 8. 
We had our two very experienced and responsible captains, Jon and Jase with their excellent first mates Shane and Simon. We were on the 6 berth boat and Shane and I even got the V-berth (Captains quarters) for the week! nice one! Our boat was called Nautical Dreams, this was quickly changed to Nauti Dreams and we have a photo of the captains with the 8 girls on the bow to send to the owner... hehe, hope he has a sense of humor!
Anyway we left the marina and raced the boats to our first stop Kapi Creek, Nauti Dreams won convincingly! I spent a bit of time at the helm and after an emergency tack (or two) we were cruising - full credit to Jon for his patience over the week. We were waiting for an hour for Avanti (Captain Jase's boat) to arrive and found out later that they had been racing the wrong boat for the last hour or so... very funny! That night we stayed in the little bay, had a few drinks with our neighbours and slept under the stars on the deck of the boat - perfect! When Avanti arose in the morning they had a new addition to the crew on the boat .... a little white dog! He had hung out with Herbie for the night and was keen to come sailing.
We left Kapi Creek earlish and headed to our next destination. There wasnt much wind so we ended up motoring along for awhile. As we crossed to the next bay we came across a pod of dolphins which spent a bit of time bow riding with us - this was really cool! The ocean was incredibly blue - I have never seen water like this soooo sooo blue! We had a pretty chilled out day lying in the sun, reading and oh sailing when there was wind. That night we rafted up and stayed at another cute little bay where we came across The Killer Donkey! Straight out of a Stephen King novel... not quite... we came across a couple of donkeys on the beach that were making a bit of noise, their owner proceeded to tell us how they were upset cos they were tied up. Yesterday one of the donkeys had killed a ladies dog that had been on one of the boats when it came to close by chopping on its neck. The german owner got upset and asked him what he was going to do about the situation. He informed her that he had a heap of stray dogs in his village and he would shoot home and get her a new one - free of charge! apparently she was not impressed by his generous offer! Who would have thought...
The next morning we had breakfast up on the hill and soaked up the magnificent view before heading off for our longest sail yet! Luckily we took the time to tidy the boat first and come across all of the things that Avanti had sabotaged (hiding our winch handles, putting their rubbish on our boat, tying the ropes in knots... you know all of that stuff). We covered about 40 miles down the coast on our way to Kalkan (our stop for the night). When we were almost there we stopped at Patara beach for a swim - it is one of the only sandy beaches along that stretch of coast. Anyway we anchored up the boats and while we were swimming Avanti lifted anchor and beached it self on the sand! Nauti Dreams was called into action to rescue Avanti and haul them back out to deeper water - justice for the sabotage perhaps? - anyway it was a piece of cake and then we were on our way to Kalkan! Jon got all of the girsl on Nauti Dreams for the ride to the next port. He and Shane looked like very lucky lads when we pulled up at the next marina with 2 boys and 8 girls on the boat!
That night some of the team went out on the town while others stayed on the boat for the evening. The next morning we went up for breakfast at a little restaurant where we had 'Robbie Williams' as our waiter! Yep this guy looked like Robbie, had his tattoos, hairstyle, England football jersey - the works! He even sung Let Me Entertain You to us while we had our breakfast - hillarious! We shopped our way back to the boat and I managed to get Shane and Jon decked out in a few shirts and jeans each - Jon even gave Nauti Dreams a fashion show once we hit the water which was absolutely hillarious.
We hit the water again and made our way to Kas. This was a fairly large port further south. We made friends with our neighbours in the Marina and headed out for dinner. Some of the crew ended up back on the boat partying with the neighbours while the rest of us headed to a local bar for a few drinks. We decided to stop for a night cap at 'The Hideaway', this proved to be dangerous to the wallet and the liver! We ended up getting locked in with the bar staff and making ourselves right at home! With Jon dancing on the bar, Jaz sorting out the free drinks and me taking over the DJ booth we owned the bar! We headed back to the boat once the barman started proposing marriage and carried on partying with the neighbours!
The next morning there were hangovers all around! Noone was spared! We had a very slow morning restocking the boat etc before hitting the sea again and heading towards Kekova. We found a little bay near Kekova where we stayed for the night. The restauarant that we ate at that night hgave us the choice of Fish or Chicken.... we just had to order with enough time for them to go and kill and prepare the chickens... what the??? I guess you dont really get any fresher than that! The next day we headed over land to the sunken city. This was a great walk over to another bay where there was an acient city that had literally slide down a hill into the ocean as a result of an earthquake over a 1000 years ago. There were toms scattered down the hill right into the sea. We spent some time wandering through the ruins before having a swim and heading back to the boats.
The next stop was Kekova - we docked the boats and wandered around the small town for supplies and to have a nosey at life in Kekova. This town is where the main sunken city was supposed to be - this city had sunk under the water and the theory was that you can sail over top and the water is sooo clear that you can see the city below - ATM's and all.... just kidding (no ATM's 1000 years ago that we know of). We attempted to do this but couldnt see much at all.
After our unsuccessful viewing fo the sunken city we started to head back to Gocek - we had about 100 miles to cover to get there and the boys had decided that they would sail through the night while we slept. We had had brilliant weather every day however this particular night everything blew up and it was rough all the way back... bugger! The boys did an awesome job on deck in their wet weather gear, strapped to the boat making sure we got back safely! When we got up in the morning we were in a bay next to the 'blue lagoon' - this was where the movie was filmed with Brooke Shields. Well we headed that way with a view to run around in loin cloths pretending to be castaways... too our suprise the place was so commercial it made disneyland look cultural! Everywhere you looked there was perfect plastic everything - we were a little disappointed!
We proceeded to have a great sail back to the marina where we checked the boats back in and headed out for dinner. Everyone was pretty shattered that night from the previous nights sail so it was relatively early nights for all! Saturday came around way to quickly! We left the boats and went on a tour for the day before heading back to London. We headed out to some roman ruins, tombs and a turtle beach before hitting the mud pools. The mud pools were awesome! Everyone had a blast getting messy in the mud! We soon found out that the mud gets everywhere and takes ages to get out! Good times though.
Turkey was incredible - one of the best countries we have visited so far in fact! The people were incredibly friendly and accommodating - nothing was ever a problem! The scenery was beautiful and the sea and sun were amazing. We spent alot of time buzzing about how blue the sea was! I cant recommend a visit highly enough - we will be heading to Istanbul as soon as we get the chance!
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