Greece, Turkey, Cyprus
Man-O-War, 13 Jul 2014
Join Edmund again this year on his quest to move Panope through the Med.  The previous 2 years have been:
    2012   Barcelona to Corsica and Tunisia to Sicily
2013 Malta to Crete
This year, the plan was to:
  - join Panope in Rhodes, Greece
- make a passage to Fethiye, Turkey
- jump ship there to spend a couple weeks touring Turkey on my own
- then rejoin Panope in Finike to make the overnight passage to Latchi, Cyprus
- spend my remaining time in Cyprus, touring about as much as possible.  I'd like to see some of the places mentioned in Bitter Lemons.

  		 
Places where stayed at least one night on this trip
Summary of trip:
Rhodes to Turkey - 1 week aboard Panope, Edmund's Crealock 34.
Travel around Turkey - 3 weeks...
Fethiye - Pammukale (bus) to see the travertine pools and the Hierapolis ruins
Pammukale - Selçuk (bus) to see if the museum was open and make train reservations for the overnight legs
Selçuk - İzmir - Ankara (train and overnight train)
Ankara - Kars (overnight train) to see the ruins of Ani
Kars - Ankara (overnight train)
Ankara - Göreme (bus) to see the "fairy chimneys" and underground cities
Goreme - Konya (bus) to see the Whirling Dervishes
Konya - Antalya (bus)
Antalya - Finike (bus) to meet Panope again
Turkey to Cyprus - 1 week aboard Panope.
Cyprus - 1 week at Amal & Edmund's house and around Cyprus.
[Well, I didn't make it to Cyprus this trip :-(]
References:

28 May 2014
Street of the Knights.

I arrived in Rhodes and easily found Panope.  Here are some photos from Rhodes.
These are in the Palace of Grand Master of Knights.
The lighthouse. Panope was tied up just to the left.
The fortress and waterfront.
Here is a higher resolution image.

28 May 2014
Panope tied up at the marina in Fethiye

The next day, we made an easy passage to Fethiye, Turkey.  We motored for the first 5 hours with no wind.  But as we approached the coast, the afternoon sea breeze let us sail the last couple hours into the bay.
Some of the "Gulets" tied up along the quay.
The fish market in Fethiye. The deal is you pick out your seafood (vendors here on the left) and have a restaurant
(here on the right) cook it up for you.

3 June 2014
Pammukale Travertines
Then I jumped ship to tour around Turkey a bit on my own.  First stop was Pammukale.  Its main attraction is these travertines - pools formed by carbonate minerals in the springs flowing from the hillside.  You are asked to remove your shoes if you want to walk up through them from the town at the base.  At the top of the hill are the ruins of Hierapolis, a small museum, a restaurant and a pool if you want to take a swim.
In the museum.
In the ruins of Hierapolis.

4 June 2014
Then I took the bus to Selçuk.  There you can catch a tour to Ephesus.  I saw Ephesus last year.  I was kind of hoping the museum in town would be open this year - it still wasn't.  But Selçuk, itself, is a fairly pleasant stop - with reasonably priced hotels conveniently located between their bus terminal and train station.  I wanted to make train reservations for overnight trains from İzmir to Ankara and Ankara to Kars.  The young lady selling tickets at the train station was very helpful in making my reservation.
One of the many restaurants on the pedestrian-only streets
between the bus terminal and train station.
A portion of old Roman aquaduct that runs through town.

6 June 2014
In Selçuk, I made a reservation on the overnight train from İzmir to Ankara and Ankara to Kars.  The train included a sleeper car and restaurant car...
I got a private sleeping compartment - a little more than the cost of a hotel room for the night.
But a lot more fun.
The dining car.
Dinner and breakfast.
This is a typical Turkish breakfast, BTW.
Sorry to gross you out, but these are the facilities in the WCs on the sleeper cars. It turned out, these are on one end of the car with western-style facilities in the WC on the other end.
Watching Turkey wiz by.
Another view from my sleeper compartment. Most of the countryside is broad agricultural fields.

8 June 2014
Looking out through one of the gates to Ani.
(click on image to enlarge)
From Kars, I joined a small group of 3 others on a taxi ride out to Ani.  One of the riders, Steve, said that he has visited Ani about a hundred times over the past 17 years.  Here is his website.
 
The other couple was from Australia, headed back home from a trip that included a week on the Trans Siberian Railway from Vladivostok to Moscow. 
The Small Turkish Bath, 11-12th century
The Church of Saint Gregory of Tigran Honents
The Cathedral
Church of The Holy Apostles
King Gagik's Church of Saint Gregory
Ani City Walls
The neat thing about Ani is the setting. Its in a big green valley (steppes, actually)
with a canyon along one side. Magestic.
Mosque in Kars
Church of Apostles, Kars
Kars Castle

14 June 2014
Göreme is a small town in the Cappadocia district, home to 'the "fairy chimney" rock formations'.  It is increasingly popular to take a sunrise balloon flight over the area - the hotel manager said that the number of balloon companies has increased from 4 to 24 over the past 4 years.  Also interesting is a tour of one of the underground cities in the area.
In the Open Air Museum.
This is in the "Love Valley". Can you tell why they call it that?
The pilot said there were about 90 balloons in the air that morning.
These three photos were taken in the Selime Monastery shown below.
These ceiling paintings were in a
church in the Ilhara Valley (also
carved into the rock).
Selime Monastery (carved into the rock).
The guide said this was used as a backdrop in the first Star Wars movie. He said the movie makers wanted to film the movie in Cappadocia but the Turkish authorities didn't want to give them permission. They went to Tunisia instead and built the set there.
The underground city in Derinkuyu. People would seek shelter here from invaders.
I think the guide said 10,000 people could live in this one.
Kind of a fuzzy image.  The guide pointed to this tunnel and said it went 9 Km to the next underground city. Amazing.
Üçhisar.
Here is a higher resolution version.
In the Open Air Museum in Goreme.

18 June 2014

Konya - where the Whirling Dirvishes originated. 

21 June 2014
Hadrian's Gate - built for Roman Emperor Hadrian's
visit to Antalya in the year 130

Antalya is a stylish little tourist town on the Mediterranean coast.  You can easily get to the nice museum at the end of one of the train lines from the center of town.  The airport is fairly large with lots of cheap flights to England, say.
In the museum in Antalya

3 July 2014
I took the bus from Antalya to Finike to meet Edmund and Jens for the passage to Cyprus.  This is where things went a little "pear-shaped", as they say.  Shortly after I arrived in Finike, I got into some bad food and was sick for several days.  OK.  Finally got over that.  Panope's departure was delayed with some mechanical problems.  I was running out of time.  It was getting to where I needed to get back to London to catch my return flight to the states and then the Bahamas.  Then, the day before I was to leave (flying from Antalya), I twisted my knee chasing after a "dolmus".  Thankfully, Edmund helped me get some crutches and got me to the airport for my flight out.  With the help of the fantastic wheelchair services through the airports, I was able to eventually get back home to the Bahamas in pretty good shape :-).  Didn't get to see Cyprus and Villa Yasmin :-(.  Hopefully a future visit.
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