Turkey - Kusadasi

We caught the ferry over to Turkey at 8.30am in the morning.  We walked out of the port and opened a map only to discover a sign 20m away for our hotel. Great location!  The guy was nicknamed “"Mr Happy”, he greeted us with “Kia ora” as soon as he sighted our passports and then proceeded to poke the women checking us in with a stick saying “They work slow without the stick”.  We ended up with a great room for a low price, we almost wish we’d booked in for longer! Also, there’s great breakfast in turkey! After going through Europe we were used to bread, ham and cheese… Here we were presented with French toast, omelettes etc. etc. we were fairly full by the end of it!

 

Once we’d dropped our bags we went out for a walk around the city, the guys in the markets are like persistent parrots!  They have about 5 English sayings and they’ll try them all in a circular sequence hoping for the best… Such fraises include “Hi, where are you from?”, “Sir, buy here?”, “Cheapest here”, “Very good, very nice”.  Trace bought a couple of items, she negotiated well  and got quite a bit off but somehow you never knew if you’ve negotiated a good price or not!

After a couple of hours we headed back to our room to cool off as it was about 40 degrees outside and humid!

After recharging in the aircon we decided to hike up a hill which we could see would have a good view. Great views of the city! We were surprised that as the view got better the houses got worse… At the top of the hill with amazing views of the city was a collection of slums.

  The pirate castle

We went to dinner at a great restaurant recommended by the lonely planet and ended up on paying about 15NZD for a great meal.  I think we’re going to like Turkey prices!  We walked home along the water front and got a few photos as the sun was disappearing.

Samos

After departing Athens at 12pm we were bound for Samos on Olympic airlines.  Our flight was good with some amazing views of the Greek islands.

We collected our baggage and stepped outside into the hot temperatures. . . . . from here we had no idea were we were going so we jumped in a taxi and eventually made it to our accommodation.

Below are some pictures of the views from our room.

 

The afternoon was filled with swimming at the beach and looking around the markets in the main street of Samos. Dinner was at a beachside restaurant.

After dinner we walked back up the hill to our hotel and took some photos of the sunset from our hotel room.

Athens

DAY ONE

We caught the bus out to the airport with fellow Croatian sailing friends, were we chatted and waited to board our plane at 12pm.  To get to Athens we needed to connect with another flight, the check in lady told us to collect our next boarding passes at the Rome terminal.

Once we landed in Rome it was a rat race around the Rome terminal to try and find where we were to get our boarding passes from.  We ran from one terminal to another being told a different story each time.  Eventually with not much time to spare (the lady told us the check in had just closed) we got our boarding passes.

Our plane ended up being delayed by about an hour . . . . typical!

Once we had landed in Athens we made our way on the subway to our accommodation.  The lady really like Mike, and keep calling him “Michelle”.  That night we went out for dinner which was such a bargain, we handed the guy over what we thought was 20 Euro and he gave us 35 Euro change, thinking we had given him 50 Euro.  We didn’t work this all out until we re-evaluated our finances back at the hotel and confirmed we had in fact handed him a 20 Euro – better than winning lotto!

    The view of the Acropolis from our hotel balcony

DAY TWO

We had a much needed sleep in and then ventured out into the hot sticky climate to see the Acropolis after meeting up with Josh and Pip.

  

Once we had endured the steep climb up to the Acropolis it was an amazing view of Athens with some great ruins.

After descending from the Acropolis we looked around the shops, which had 50 to 70% sale signs!  We assume this is due to their crashing economy.  To Trace’s disappointment most of these were shut due to it being a public holiday.  However, we did manage to purchase some rain proof jackets, marked down from 70 Euro to 20.

Street View of Athens

After that it was back to the hotel for a rest and to escape the heat for a little while (air con set to min temp and max fan!). 

Good marketing???? Mike loved it!

We had our final dinner with Josh and Pip before we waved our fellow travelling buddies farewell.  A tear or two were shed.  A part of us wished we were going back to NZ, we miss you guys!!!

 

Now the adventures of Mike, Trace and Tiki (Josh gave this to us, to look after us) begin . . . . .

Sail Croatia

After arriving in split at 8.30pm we caught a taxi to our hotel.  Here we were told to wait outside and a man would be around to pick us up in about half an hour to take us to an apartment right in the city.  We were left thinking we had booked some dodgy accommodation and after our Rome experience we were a bit worried.  Eventually the guy showed up but could only take two people at a time so Josh and Pip went and Mike and Trace stayed.  We made it to our apartment which turned out to be brilliant, it has only just recently been done up – thank goodness!

That night we went out and had a drink, soaking up the Split atmosphere – Party Atmosphere!

DAY ONE

11am we boarded our boat and home for the next week, Siena.  It was nice to stay in one place for longer than three nights!

We had lunch as soon as the boat left the port and then followed it up with beers and cocktails on the sundeck! Until we reached the first of many swimming spots!

 

The water was so amazingly clear as there’s no sand, its beautiful.

At 5pm we arrived at the Island of Brac and went out for dinner with the rest of the boat, there are 18 of us, all around early 20s.  The first nights partying resulted in a few hangovers around the boat but nothing serious.

DAY TWO

Sailed to Hvar.  Had a couple of swim spots along the way and saw plenty of impressive super yachts!

Before we went out to dinner we raced up a hill to a castle and took some amazing photos of the town.

Once we got back down the hill we went out for dinner and had an awesome steak, the best meat we’ve had since we have been away! We went to a beach bar after dinner, we were at least 3 or 4 hours of drinking behind everyone here! They were all super drunk and dancing away on the beach in their speedos and bikinis to dance music. 

DAY THREE

Sailed to Kocrula, a island which is believed may have been the birthplace of Legendary 13th Century explorer Marco Polo. More swimming.

 

Synchronised dive team potential? Fun though!

It took a couple of days for Trace to get the confidence to jump dive from the top deck… This was her first attempt, perfect!  Don’t know what she was worried about!!

 

Got some food from supermarket and watched the sun set with a few others from the boat.  We saw the house were Marco Polo lived and then we went up the to the bar “Massimos”cocktail bar, built in the turret of a 15th century tower, were we enjoyed amazing cocktails which were bought up by a pulley.

A group photo on the top of the castle bar

DAY FOUR

Sailed to Dubrovik

The ships captain took us passed the Dubrovik wall on the boat.

In the afternoon we walked around the old village. For dinner we got some of the best burgers we have tasted for next to nothing!

We went out for cocktails that night, these were served in sand buckets! Mike had a big one – 1 litre long island ice tea cocktail for 65Kn… Which equates to a little under 10 Euro / $18NZ. Needless to say it was a good night!

DAY FIVE

Sailed to Mlget.  During the swim stop we spotted some dolphins.  The captain was more excited than anyone and after they left the area he decided we should lift anchor and follow them! Eventually, once we were close enough, he pushed the kill switch and dived off the boat in an effort to swim with them…. once he was in he said “Captain’s in the water and boat is floating, are you worried now?” bit of a character!  First time he’s ever done that he told us later.  Unfortunately they didn’t hang around long enough for anyone to swim with them but it was entertaining just following them!

Once we arrived we walked around some cool salt lakes and then headed back to the boat for what we were told was always an amazing sunset followed by dinner on the boat… It sure was an amazing sunset! the captain launched the boat and did a little loop to ensure we all got good photos from the water! Very proud of Croatia he was!

They put on an amazing BBQ!! The captain told off the first person that touched the bread on the table “”You’ll need to save yourself for the good food” he said, and he was right! We didn’t come close to finishing, but we felt sick from trying!

DAY SIX

Sailed to Makarska.  We swam and walked around the markets shopping for pirate gear as we were having a pirate themed party.  The locals thought we were a bit nuts when we were walking to dinner as pirates and saying “arrrrrrh” repeatedly.

DAY SEVEN

We more a less raced back to split to secure a good berth as there was a huge party bringing in 40,000 people, Carl Cox was the main act.  We might as well have thrown away our tickets and watched from the sundeck on the boat because we were that close! There were some cool fireworks, amazing light displays and MTV cameras running around.  A good way to finish of the week!

It wasn’t quite the restful week we were expecting but we had a great time and made plenty of new friends!