Turkey        2012

On 28 May Salanjo appeared on the horizon perched along with 10 other yachts and vessels on the deck of the bulk carrier MS Gretche. Geoff was already in Marmaris seated in the Castle Bar, the highest point around!, watching her arrival with excitement.

 

The next day was unloading. This was all accomplished with no issues. It was exciting to see Salanjo slash down in the Med. The motors started first shot, the lines were dropped and I motored off into a little bay near the Marina to sort out the ship.  There was still quite a bit of work to be done to repair the lightning damage. The battery charger did not seem to be working, the generator certainly was not working, the freezer was not running correct as it never went off no matter how cold it got! I also noticed that the boat had lots of little filings all over the decks and stuck along the top sides in places. This has subsequently turned out to be quite a problem. It seems that the crew of the ship were doing some welding, or scrapping or something...although at first they suggested it might be from the sands of the Red Sea! Anyway more about that later!

Having spent a couple of days on anchor, and done as much as I could there I took her into Yacht Marina so I would be already for when Anna arrived the next day. Yacht Marina is huge! Bigger than Westhaven and with acres of solid stand haul-out area, which as we were to find out later in the season will be filled with over 1,000 vessels laid up for the winter.

Anna helped me try and scrub all the filings off, and we had experts attend to those damaged items that needed repairing from the lightning strike. After 4 days there was nothing more we could do so we hired a car and headed off for a tour out to the west along the Datca peninsula. We visited Datca, of course, then out to the end to the old ruins of the 300 BC fortified port of Kuenos, then back to Palamut for a night in a Greek styled hotel right on the sand. Really nice. Then back to Marmaris for a check on the progress on Salanjo. On the 4th of June Anna and I flew to  Milan for a couple of days of retail therapy..before taking the train to Garda to meet up with our party to walk in the Dolomites.