17th - 18th May 2006 - Alanya (Turkey) to Girne (Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus)
Posted at 1:40 AM, Sunday, May 21, 2006
This was the first overnight leg we’ve been asked to complete, and at 100 miles the longest leg also. It followed the day after another super evening meal and party hosted by Alanya’s municipality and mayor. The party took place in a classy restaurant overlooking the sea, with Alanyas imposing castle floodlit on the cliffs high above us all.
The fleet had been briefed that they could each depart when they wished, but to ease the mooring logistics at Girne in
It was interesting lazing around on deck and watching a majority of our fleet up anchor to depart. Some of the smaller yachts began exiting late morning, and even some of the bigger yachts left early afternoon. Several picked up old anchors and underwater rubbish from the depths of the harbour as they hauled up their own chains, and a small Turkish fishing boat zoomed around checking out the value of anything dredged up – and were happy to take any of the old anchors retrieved.
We finally got underway ourselves at 1700 - almost the last boat away.
The day had been hot and somewhat airless in the harbour, but as we hoisted sails off Alanya in light southerly winds, clouds began to roll up over the high mountains on the coast to the north. It was then strange sailing along gently in sunshine only a mile or so offshore - and watching those same clouds darken and develop into impressive black storm clouds. We reduced our sail area – replacing the Code 0 we’d first set with our working jib - just in case the storm created winds that may effected us. As it happened no winds were generated despite its close proximity, but we sailed off accompanied by the soft rumble of thunder and watching the lightening flash show in the clouds two miles or so north of us.
All we ever got was a rain shower which only just wet the deck – no strong winds at all.
We wanted to average 5 knots boat speed in order to reach Girne at our allotted time, so when the wind began to ease further and we had dropped to less than 3 knots on the log, we furled the jib and leaving the main up to dampen any rocking and rolling, began to motor sail.
The motoring also gave us the chance to fire up the watermaker. Having neither fresh water nor shore side showers in Alanya had depleted our tanks – and we knew the water supply in Girne is suspect also. It went off when all four tanks were full.
As the sun set we were still motoring off the Turkish mainland coast, heading south east towards the open sea and
Sue went down first to try and sleep whilst I read in the fading light, and when necessary took avoiding action with the small boat fishing fleets which seemed to always camp off each headland we passed. It was sometimes difficult to differentiate with these fishing fleets and the navigation lights of our own fleet that we were slowly catching up to.
The ERYR white stern lights were spread out before us when Sue took over at 2300 and I hit the sack. Still motoring. Sue woke me at 0200 and by then we’d left Turkey behind and were slap bang in the middle of the sailing fleet, apparently all under motor, all sliding over a flat calm sea.
A bright full moon was up, the sky was warm and clear, and all the stars burned brightly above us. We counted 48 yachts lights around us, red, white and green. Very pretty.
The wind began to gently built from the south and by 0300 I could make our target speed of 5 knots under sails alone. So off went the engine and Sue slept on as we glided along quietly making 5 / 6 knots under working jib and mainsail. It was still a dead flat sea.
Dawn came up around 0500 and with it the mountains of
Girne old harbour looks beaut. In fact it looks like St Tropez as set in the 1950’s. A small attractive and totally enclosed harbour fringed with restaurants all operating out of tall good looking old buildings - and the moored EMYR boats only 10 feet from the restaurant tables.
Where we are in Delta Marina is certainly adequate, but sadly not so attractive – and we need a cab (or our scooter) to get to the main town.
We had another formal reception hosted by the Presidents office in the castle grounds at Girne on the Thursday night – great ‘proper’ cocktails and stunning setting. The steward served nibbles were copious and good - we porked out so badly that all thoughs of a meal disappeared. We ended the evening with a nightcap and ice cream after on the quay – then crashed.
Friday saw most people off on island bus tours. We instead stayed solo and hired a scooter to explore, aiming to maybe have a swim. Here's Sue as a bikers moll.
Would not recommend anyone else tries to do the same – very gritty / dusty / busy roads – and beaches sadly not appealing. We eventually found a nice waterside restaurant for a long lazy lunch, and zipped back for a siesta before dressing up and bussing it into Girne for the rallys ‘Pirates Party’.
A fun event. We had to off load our bus on the Girne waterfront and march along to the hotel venue under respective national flags.
Great spectacle and some pirate costumes were superbly inventive. Heres Chas an expat Oz touring with his young family.
The food, dancing, atmosphere and belly dancing entertainment were all excellent at the Globe Hotel. Heres Sue singing the rally song along with Mary Helen (USA) and Sylvie (France).
Heres a shot of Guy and self trying to look loike appealing puppies. Pissed or what.
And heres who we were trying to tempt over towards us. We failed.
Another super night out - freebie on the rally organisers.
We’ve just listened to the regular 0830 morning radio briefing with good winds (F3/4 from WSW) forecast for the trip back later today in a NE direction to the port of Mersin on the Turkish mainland. It is 120 miles which could take us 20 hours if we average 6 knots, so our planned departure time from will be around 1500.
Cheers