Meeting old mates








Summertime! 


M. 
Setting off from Loryma, we headed to our planned rendezvous point of Palamut. A small village offering a harbour and local restaurants vying for custom along a wonderful pebbly beach. A bit of a motor around the North end of Simi and a short upwind sail, bowling along at 8-9 knots, giving our new standing rigging a good tryout. I can understand why sailors anthropomorphise their boats. When the sails are well set she seems to take on a life of her own and with a good wind in the rigging a thrum rings out like a song and vibrates like a cat purring. Wonderful.

Our friends Linda and Lyndsey, on Livianda arrived on cue to join us in Palamut, and it was lovely to meet up again after a year. As expected we had plenty of blether and a few beers, catching up with all their news. They have already been sailing here for 2-3 weeks, but we’ll have their company for another 2, with a vague plan of aiming East towards Kas.
Livianda - who was passing who?

So we set off to Sogut in the Gulf of Simi where we were promised a good feed at the lovely Octopus restaurant. It has a popular reputation but with prebooking, they had a slot waiting for us on the pontoon. This time we sailed downwind, again blasting along as if propelled by a hot hairdryer.
We berthed near a group of yachts run by a Russian training school. The crew were well rehearsed and running about being useful, so we watched them with interest the next day as they left the gulf, tacking in textbook fashion, measuring sail curvature and winding winches with gusto. Good job.

Sogut to Ciftlik - note the tacking out the gulf!

Holes in the rock? Tombs? 
Ciftlik
Next stop Ciftlik, where a backdrop of mountain shelters a small village with several restaurant pontoons touting for business. One characteristic of this area are the tombs peppering the cliffs. Not grand and sculpted like the famous tombs of Kaunos and its wealthy denizens, these are just holes cut into the cliff face for lesser beings. Quite a feat.

Our Russian school crew berthed close by and again we were entertained by the enthusiastic work ethic. Light winds were forecast, so they changed their genoa sail to a fancy radial cut job. I like the cut of your jib! 

Great shoutings, winching, teamwork in action. All very impressive, but what new sailing technique is this? They put it on upside down! Nil points there chaps. Everyone had a good laugh and we couldn’t see any floggings. Its reassuring to see that even they could make mistakes.

Comments

  1. Give Rindsay and Rinda our love - I think winning the best blog has led to an imagined career as a new Wilbur Smith - certainly it is affecting your writing style!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi John,

    Not sure if that is a compliment or not. I will have to read some Wilbur Smith.

    ReplyDelete

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