We just can't get off! I'm not talking about sexual frustration here, but a complicit universe seems to be throwing all sorts of obstacles in our way. Let's start with our launch from Bozburun. All was going well, we'd moved all our belongings to the boat with the Brompton Moving Company (it took a lot of trips). I'd hastily slapped on the last coats of anti foul to cover the patches left by the props. The boat was on the water's edge and the big Cat bulldozer was straining at the wire waiting to launch the boat. But wait, the skipper was down on the ground, and the launch crew had no way to get me up on the boat. Megan was starting to get a little panicky.
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| Brompton Moving Company |
No ladders to be found, the crew laboriously uncoupled the bulldozer and used that to hoist me up to the deck. Chagrinned by the hold-up, the crew then hastily launched us without sufficient precautions.
The trolley skewed in the launch ramp, we had no stern line to hold us against the cross wind, and we ran aground on a shallow bar. To add insult to injury, when told to try and motor off, the prop promptly picked up a rope and seized the engine solid.
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| Storm brewing over Bozburun village |
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| View from our balcony |
Hmm, not an auspicious start. It took a knicker-clad boat crew to clear the line from the prop. He started with a wet suit, but without lead weights, couldn't get down to the prop. It was a comical farce, including the boat guy who jumped in a dingy to come to our rescue, then realised that the boat he'd grabbed had no oars or means of propulsion. I don't think we'll be using Locaturk boat yard again.
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| Megan farewelling our apartment |
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| Hmm, can't argue with the Admiral. |
Putting all that aside, we sailed around to our second Turkish 'home' in Orhaniye and tied up at the Iskele Restaurant. Then our fun really began. If you've been reading our saga, you'd have heard about our 'blown up' rudder, that Sami Yuksel destroyed for us by not allowing the foam to cure before glassing the rudder back up. The foam promptly expanded, stretching the rudder out of shape. This last winter, we'd agreed that Sami could repair the rudder for the E300 we'd already paid him as deposit for a gel-coat peel. We'd decided not to go ahead with the osmosis job (a reflection of our trust in Sami), and rather than try to get our deposit refunded, we applied it to fixing our rudder, which Sami had damaged in the first place.
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| Our favourite nook in Orhaniye, down near Buk restaurant |
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| The shore-line near Iskele jetty |
We were horrified to find that the boat now steered worse! The symptom of the asymmetric shape is that the boat pulls to port, and needs a constant correction on the wheel. Not only is this going to be an issue for longer passages, it will place an extra load and current draw on the autopilot. We were able to get a quote for a new rudder, to be built in England by Rustler yachts. The cost, without shipping and similar added extras will be over GBP 2000. Looks like we now have an additional job next winter. So, Yuksel Marine in Marti Marina definitely does not get our stamp of approval for boat work in this area!
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| Megan in a mood |
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| At the Iskele dock |
Then there was the nightmare of installing the new autopilot. Our old Raymarine Autohelm 600 became very unreliable last year before dying the final electronic death. George was no more. While we were in Australia, we bought a new Simrad AP24 system, with compass, rudder feedback, main computer and control head. This provided 4 solid days of unpacking tiny spaces, constricting myself like an Indian fakir and squeezing my impressive bulk into those places that I was scared I'd never extricate myself from. Much failure and false starts. Its still not working, and we have a service person coming out from Marmaris at great expense next Wednesday.
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| Orhaniye moon rise |
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| The scenery that we have come to love |
I think that the weight of all the boat maintenance and the endless 'fixing things' only for other things to break had been taking a toll. Today, Megan and I decided to escape reality, put off fixing the next thing on the list, and retreat into a great fantasy. We watched several episodes of 'Game of Thrones'. As the famous psychologist said: 'I've given up searching for reality, these days I'll settle for a good fantasy'!
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| Our back door view |
Hopefully, this too will pass. Otherwise Megan and I have both been threatening to trade Pavlov in for a used motorhome!
Hi Steve and Megan, pleased to hear your sanity is not completely broken yet and you keep your noses to the grindstone so you can overcome your many problems. You must ask yourself how much more could go wrong on such a small vessel? But at least you are back in the water which must be a relief.
ReplyDeleteI have been reading your blog and followed you back to Aus and all the different emotions that it brought, i imagine it is like me going back to my home town in the south of England, that for many years was home and I knew so much about and knew so many people. Now I go back, I reconize most of it, but a whole lot has changed and no-one knows me. I see faces but too many years have passed and I am not even a memory. I've been here on the Isle of Man for 18 years now and still local people ask me, where is home?
Well it's not England, although I can melt into the crowd there, the feelings of home get less everytime i return, but not being born here on the Island I am always at best going to be a "come over", not that it bothers me, home is where you make it I suppose.
To reinforce this fact, an ex girlfriend who was as Manx (born in the isle of Man) as the hills once met a friend of mine who came to the Island about 35 years previously from Preston (I think) and has picked up the accent and is about as local as they come. The conversation developed to where they were born and his past was questioned. " Oh, you're not local then" my gobby girlfriend chirps up, "well how old are you he asked, she was 30 something! "Well" he said " I've been here longer than you"
As much as I admire (in a way) people who stay in their home town and fit into the way of life and have a network of friends and colleagues to help and be helped through life. I also feel a bit sorry for them that they missed out on so much, the world is a big place and getting smaller every day. But each to his own.
Cont.
Hi Keith,
DeleteThanks for your comments and views, much appreciated.
I guess we don't think of cruising as being about sailing. I love to race multihulls and fast lively boats, but Pavlov is really about being able to live in foreign cultures and travel (although slowly) through them. Its more about cultural exchange and travelling, and we put up with the sailing. Sailing in fair conditions or racing for a few hours is one thing, but anchoring night after night, surviving whatever weather comes, finding safe havens in unknown locales.... is another thing entirely. Sometimes it gets hard.... and we dream about selling Pavlov and buying a motor home. Other times its just glorious. I blogged about the fjord we were just in... that was magic. Marina's are an evil necessity for us, we avoid them 75% of the time and anchor in pristine sites, or at cheaper municipal docks. We love the freedom of anchoring out, but it comes with its own terrors, as you would know if you've ever dragged in a crowded anchorage in high winds in the middle of the night.
But at the moment, the pendulum swing is on the up. We're really enjoying being back on the water, we've had some spanking sails in southerlies up the coast, and life is good. Pavlov is behaving herself, she's had a few new upgrades (like a working autopilot) which we are really enjoying.
Our long term plan is to bring the boat to the UK where we'll sell her. It might take a year to sell, so we'll live aboard, maybe in Falmouth (Red Ensign is a broker that specialises in Bowman's). We plan to buy a motor home then, and continue travelling. We're thinking about 3 - 5 years to get to the UK, so we're in no rush.
Thanks for your offer of help. I'd appreciate any info you have on brokers in the UK, who's good and who's not. Pavlov is a bit of a specialist boat, but the right person will really appreciate her. (She's had so many new goodies thrown at her, its beyond ridiculous).
I wanted to email you, but don't have your email address. Mine is steve.garlick99@gmail.com if you want to reply directly.
Kind regards,
Steve Garlick
Having read your blogs and spoken to you, you do bring the reality of what you are doing out. Since I have got into sailing , to be able to just get on your boat and go sounds idyllic but I see now that there is a lot of ups and downs. I enjoy my sailing enormously but whether I want to do what you do, I am not so inclined now. I watched and talked to many live aboards whilst in Turkey and found the pace a bit too slow for me, at the moment anyway. It appears to be a trade off of plenty of time but limited funds almost constantly, finding the cheapest moorings, feeding yourselves the most cost efficient way and using the boat wisely so as not to wear things out and incur additional costs. Many of the live-aboards did more or less that, they did'nt seem to go very far, they read a lot of books and went to bed early, I'm not at that stage quite yet.
ReplyDeleteI thoroughly enjoyed Turkey, I enjoyed skippering my own vessel without being watched all the time, making my own decisions and mistakes. I am glad I did it but cannot see it happening again in the near future, Sharon and Aimee liked it till the wind blew up a bit and were'nt so happy after that, so I cannot see us doing it again. Whether I do it with someone else is not beyond possibility but I can't see Sharon being too happy about me sailing in the sun whilst she is......doing something else. She tried it anyway so I have to give her credit for that but she really is a fair weather sailor in the biggest sense.
I have managed to get out a few times this year, we have had a Spring racing series for the first time and its nice to get out on a sunday despite the chilly weather. We are off for what I hope is the first trip of the year next weekend for a week or so. The idea is to head up to the Clyde in Scotland, firstly it is a very nice sailing area and we also need the rig checking and there is no-one on the island who can do that and sign it off for insurance purposes. We will have to navigate the Irish Sea North channel which has a lot of tide, how we do it will be decided nearer the time but Tidal Navigation is something that I enjoy doing anyway. If you carry out your plans to sail to the UK you will need to buff up on tidal navigation, I think you might have had it easy over the last few years in the Med, getting it wrong and spending 4 hours going nowhere or even astern is no fun at all. Not to mention the wind over tide situations that if nothing else tire you out physically and possibly worse, the dreaded seasickness.
Have you made a long term plan yet?you were talking about heading to the UK.
If there is anything I can help you with there do ask even if it theortical to make a final decision later, I have people here who will know answers or know someone who does.
I see you you have moved back round to Orhaniye, we thought it was a lovely spot, You obviously have made friends there, we just pulled up at a restaurant taking a chance, we had no idea which one was best assuming that if there was a yacht there already, it must be OK. You seem to be pretty close to where we were, I know the family that ran the restaurant also had accommodation, is that the same one?
Well I hope I have'nt bored you too much and if nothing else it has passed some time for you, I don't know what the weather is like there but it looks like its warming up for you. It is nice here at the moment, till the end of the week no doubt to coincide with our trip. It would'nt be the first time we have spent the week being beaten up in the notoriously choppy Irish sea. We tend to change plans more often than not so next week could just as likely be Dublin as Glasgow, we will see what the wind throws at us.
Keep your chins up at get yourselves moving and I am sure all the hassles will be left in your wake.
Thanks Keith,
ReplyDeleteHome for us has become the small little shell of Pavlov, so when she has problems, we are perhaps even more affected. All is well at the moment, we're in Turgutreis, heading up the coast in Southerly winds (its a bit stormy, but its better than bashing into it). We're looking forward to the temperature picking up a bit. We're crossing over into Greece at Lesvov, so that will be the end of Turkey for us.
Turgutreis, is a pretty impressive marina, we went in there to empty our foul and fill up with fuel, it looks expensive though.
ReplyDeleteOur home marina was a couple of hours up the coast, Yalikavak. Again the Marina is very nice but a bit pricey, there is berthing available in Yalkavak town centre which i would imagine to be quite cheap, it is small but we saw some large deep keel yachts in there, just an option if you need it. The town is quite nice and worth a day having a poke around if you feel inclined.
Nice to hear you are on the move again anyway, that's what you intended.