Serçe Liman, Turkey

Anchored at Serçe Liman
The Carian Coast
Turkey
36'34.8N/28'02.7E

Ok, well we didn't quite make it to Greece yet. But we are just a few miles east of our first Greek Isle landfall. We left this morning at 8am but had a bit of a head-wind and we saw an inviting cove where we could stay for the night but most importantly we could swim and cool off our hot bods. After a splendid night at anchor before making our way into the town of Marmaris we awoke to a broken head, a.k.a toilet. Nothing better than scooping out poop in the morning before the first cup of coffee. 'Living the dream', that's what we keep telling ourselves anyways.

Once that was taken care of we motored into town where we anchored just off the marina. Then we packed the backpack with all the bits we needed to check-out of Turkey. First stop, Harbor Master. We ran into a bit of trouble as we originally thought we would be checking out of Fethiye and were threatened with a 1,000 Euro fine (almost USD$1500!) . But got away with a $30USD fine. The lesson here: When all else fails, act stupid.

Second stop, passport police. Because we got bumped off our first flight home and had a 'canceled' stamp in our passports, this caused some extra time. But once again, when there is a language barrier, act stupid. Finally we cleared with customs got our official get-out-of-Turkey paper work and we were legal. All in all, this process took us about three hours.

A cruise ship was in town. And customs/passport/police office where we cleared was at the cruise ship dock, which made for a very busy building. We had a liaison from the cruise ship help us get through quicker than to be expected. Usually when someone wants to help you in Turkey they also want to take you to their shop and sell you a carpet. Not this guy. His M.O... 'Can I use your passport to buy me a bottle of J&B duty free?' How can we say no? And surprisingly we didn't acquire anything duty free as there was no beer. So sure, why not?

We then had dinner and back to the boat. We should arrive tomorrow am on the Island of Symi where we hear they have bulk Ouzo and cheap wine. Yippee!

Peace Out,
Amy and Tom

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Note From Ron: Serçe Liman is known for the discovery of a shipwreck of an 11th century Byzantine trader ship. Here is an pretty good post about from Texas A&M University.