This is an account of our trip to Europe from September 3 to 23, 2010.
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Pictures of this trip can be seen by clicking on the line below:
https://picasaweb.google.com/107923363810248771461/Europe2010
Sailing in Turkey
We had arranged to meet our British friend David Smith at his yacht club in Turkey to go for a week of sailing. David is a friend for many years when we worked together at the World Bank’s IFC. We had sailed with him over the years in Scotland and Greece as he had moved his boat to different locations. His sailing boat is a 46 foot Swedish made Halley Rasberg. It is a single mast boat which David bought 15 years ago from a man who had sailed it around the world twice and who had tired of owning it. The boat is equipped with many or most of the electronic gadgets which modern sailboats can have including GPS for navigation, radar, depth finder, auto-pilot for holding course and holding best wind position, speed and wind gauges along with a reliable Volvo truck engine in case everything else gives out. The interior and exterior uses a lot of teak wood which is very decorative inside and very practical on the outside. It has a small kitchen, galley and can sleep 6: 4 bunks forward and 2 in the owner cabin in the stern. In the centre there is a very comfortable sitting area where the whole crew can sit to eat or just sit reading, chatting or playing cards. It can also provide sleeping space for 2 more if necessary.
We left Washington on Lufthansa on September 2nd and flew through to Frankfurt and Istanbul where we had a 4 hour layovers in each place until our final destination of Dalaman in Southern Turkey. We checked our bags through to Dalaman. After this long trip, we were joined up with our bags in Dalaman. When I got to my bag I immediately opened it as I wanted to use my German Mobile phone. I unzipped it there beside the luggage carousel in Dalaman on the floor and immediately realized that the trunk had been opened and someone had lifted my phone as well as a new GPS I had just acquired before leaving to help our driving planned for Germany. I had no way of knowing where the dastardly deed had occurred and no one in Turkey was at the carrousel nor would they have been interested anyway. I suspect that the pilfering was done in Frankfurt airport which has a very bad reputation of luggage robbery. I will complain to Lufthansa at one point, but that will not return my stolen goods. Why I did not carry these items in my hand luggage which I normally do is not clear to me so I am partly responsible for this event This does not make me feel any better. But live and learn, although I should already have learnt over the years I have lived.
We had arranged for a driver to take us the last 80 miles from Dalaman to Marmaris where the boat was tied up. The driver eventually showed up and we proceeded down the road at around 7pm. The driver made it in record time by flying down the road at break neck speed. By this time, I was so tired I did not really care. I put on my sunglasses and slept most of the way. We met David in the yacht club dining room and had a nice fish dinner. Then we had one of the security men drive us with bags in a golf cart to where the Gulkarna II was moored. It was now 24 hours since we had left Virginia so we were ready for bed.
Next morning we arose refreshed. I went to the club pool and had a great swim. We did a bit of shopping, used the ATM to stock up on Turkish Lira as we were heading to a lot of small places along the coast which did not take credit cards. The arrangement on such a trip is that David provides the boat and guests provide all food and drink, including dinners ashore in the various places visited each evening. So the normal routine is to have breakfast on board, lunch of sandwiches while sailing and dinner in the port where we overnight. We do not sail at night but seek fine places to stop along the coast which are mostly small bays with one or two restaurants or small towns where one can eat and also stock up on provisions. The sailing usually happens but on some days the sails do not even go up and one motors. Unless the winds are unfavorable, being too strong or too difficult to deal with given the directions of our destinations, the sails go up and we are at sea all day under sail. Sailing a big boat like this normally requires 3 crew but can be handled with 2 persons which will happen on this cruise as Brigitte will not be able to do much heavy lifting.
So after topping up on food, drink and cash we headed out for our first day sailing which in fact was a day of motoring as winds were dead against us. After 5 hours of traveling we entered the small bay of Dirsek Buku. In the Bay, there were 3 restaurants but nothing more as there is no road to the bay. We were waived into the mooring area of Mustapha’s restaurant and we moored to a loop held by a large soap bottle. A man came out and took our rope through the loop and handed it back to us and we tied up our ship. After late afternoon relaxing, swimming and reading, we got into the rubber dinghy with a small motor and headed to the restaurant. Brigitte was able to go down and up the ladder on the stern to get into the dinghy although it is not an easy climb.
At the restaurant, we were greeted profusely by Mustapha, the owner as David had visited the place several times before. When we arrived, we met an Australian couple from the boat moored behind us. So we joined them for a good fish meal. I mentioned I had been swimming and had noticed that our mooring was anchored to one large cement block and their boat had 2 such blocks. I had hardly said that when Mustapha came running to inform the Australian that his boat had left its mooring in the heavy wind. He and his boys had managed to bring the boat back to the pier. It had been dark and he had noted one of the mast lights had moved. He had jumped into his boat and chased it reaching it about 60 feet before the wind would have pushed it against the rocks of the bay. He had managed to start the boat motor and had brought it back to the pier against heavy winds. The Australian skipper was badly shaken as he had almost lost his boat worth several hundred of thousands of dollars. The rope he had used to tie to the mooring for 2 days had been burnt through and frayed letting the boat float free. Needless to say, the Aussie was very thankful to Mustapha and left him a fine tip. We then returned to our mooring and immediately doubled the line to the mooring for the night. I felt badly for not having taken a look at their mooring rope when I was out swimming above their cement base. Had I followed the rope up to their boat, I may have seen that their rope was already fraying. It is amazing how small things one does not do in life sometimes have huge consequences.
The next morning we headed back to the restaurant for breakfast and bought some fresh bread. During day one could see the operation of this restaurant. It was totally isolated but the infrastructure included the restaurant as well as bathrooms and showers which were all driven by a generator grinding away in the back ground. Supplies had to be brought in by boat from the next village outside the bay. There was a cell phone tower on the hill behind so that they also had phone and internet connections. The whole operation runs for about 5 months during the sailing season and then shuts down for winter. It is run by a crew of 7 or 8 persons and turns out good food and service.
The next day we headed out of our bay with the destination being another bay around a point of land. We sailed on that day as the wind was fine. The boat sails nicely although it can heel over quite a bit in a fresh wind of the port or starboard side. Sails we hoisted and off we went with mainsail and jib, albeit reefed a bit in deference to the strong wind from the west. This area of Turkey is very dry during the summer months and it rains very little. As a result, the surrounding hills are very dry and only bushes grow. The hills along this coast rise sharply out of the sea but are not very high. With so little vegetation, there is little agriculture and one sees only the occasional sheep or goat. It is a great sailing area and one sees many boats in every size and shape. There are a lot of fleet boats which are rented boats which sail in packs and meet each evening in a specified port or bay. One tries to avoid being in the same port with them as they can be 40 to 50 boats all tied up together with a lot of partying going on.
The following night, we spent in a different bay, Bezuk Baku which had only 1 restaurant but was quite a bit smaller. This time we put out a forward anchor and then I rowed ashore with a line which I secured to a large rock. I had a little trouble getting it secured as my knot ability was a bit rusty and I could not get a bowline on a bite to work. We then put out another line for security given the heavy winds. It was again in the early afternoon, so we had a few hours to read and swim. The water in the Mediterranean here is clear and warm and teeming with fish. I had brought my snorkel and eye goggles so I was able to do a bit of diving. We had a nice dinner and headed back to our boat for the night.
The next morning we headed for Datcha on the main coast. We went through a narrow passage off a Greek island of Simi so we lowered the Turkish flag and raised the Greek flag. It is strange but all the islands here off the Turkish coast were taken away from Turkey after the First World War and given to Greece. There are many such islands very close to the mainland coast of Turkey, included Rhodes where we were sailing.
The wind en route to Datcha was very irregular shifting from heavy to light and from all directions so sailing became a bit of a challenge. But we made it to Datcha where we decided to anchor for the night about 200 yards off from the harbor. The winds were strong so we made double sure the anchor was working with extra chain to add to the weight. I had a nice swim in the water which had a strong current out of harbor induced by the off shore wind, we jumped into the dinghy and headed ashore. David recommended the Culinarium restaurant which is run by a Turk and his German wife Ulirike. We had a great meal. As B’s back was starting to hurt, I decided we would not go sailing the next day but rather do some land tourism. The ruins of the city of Knidos were about 90 minutes west of Datcha and we decided to head there the next day. We asked Ulirike how we should best get there and she suggested we return the next morning after 11 am and she would recommend a driver.
The next morning, David dropped us off at the pier and headed back to the boat to do normal ship chores. We met with Ulrike who said that she could drive us to Knidos and back in her own car. We found that very nice and she only accepted gas money from us. So off we went out of Datcha to Knidos on a beautiful road which rises high above the Mediterranean for about 50 miles. On the way, Ulrike who used to be a German language teacher gave us a lot of interesting insights into Turkey where she had chosen to live several years earlier. She loved Turkey and its language in which she was fluent. Interestingly, that same Sunday, the Turks were voting to make changes in the national constitution removing the military as the ultimate authority. There was some tension around this as many felt that this would be the first step in the islamisation of Turkey. A week later, the referendum was approved by 58% of the population with little support from the coastal inhabitants of Turkey. No doubt the fears of this more western exposed population were a major factor.
The ruins of Knidos at the westerly most point of the Datcha peninsula are quite impressive. Major dig works are underway to uncover the ruins and so far the main amphitheatre and the market place have been exposed. No one knows why the place was abandoned by it 50,000 inhabitants but the most likely theory is that the place was destroyed by an earthquake. The remains of the city lie in individual stones strewed all around the place. In fact, Knidos occupied a very strategic location where the Aegean Sea meets the Mediterranean. The city thrived on commerce and had a huge commercial port and a smaller well protected military port with a narrow entrance which could be defended with ease. I left the ladies having a cup of tea and chatting and did a fairly extensive visit of the site. It was a pleasant visit. Ulrike then took us back to Datcha along the coast and showed us a couple of nice beach villages she and her husband visit when they have some time off from the restaurant in Datcha. As Datcha is over two hours from the nearest airport of Dalaman, tourism tends to be mostly local except for sail boats which put in for the night as we did.
In the morning we headed out to sea and sailed westerly towards the town of Bozurun. It was a quiet day and we arrived there in the early afternoon. We tied up directly in the main harbor right in front of a nice restaurant which offered toilet and shower facilities. These are real luxuries when living on a boat. They also offered wireless internet connections which allowed us all to catch up on our email. After dinner, we strolled around the small town and returned for the night to our boat. As we were hooked up to a land power line, we had the luxury of having lights on in all cabins. It is interesting how one does not appreciate these comforts until they are not available
On the following day we headed for our final destination of Sogut. David had decided that this would be our jump off point as he did not want to sail back to Mamaris again. He was exepcting a new crew arriving from the UK to join him the evening after we left.
This was the nicest place we visited with good facilities to tie up the boat as well as a swimming area with a ladder and a restaurant at the beginning of the pier. Luckily we had made reservations, as this the first day after the end of Ramadan and every Muslim wants to celebrate the end of this fasting period with good food, and in Turkey, often with good wine. We had a beautiful dinner at the restaurant. Our table was out on the pier and the evening was pleasant with a light breeze. It is really impressive that one can find such fine restaurants in these little towns living off the sailing world. We headed to bed early as we had to leave Sogut at 5 am to check in and make our 9 am flight from Dalaman to Istanbul.
Istanbul
The next morning we awoke around 4am, dressed and took our trunks off the ship. David slept through this. We rolled our bags to the main street and waited for our 5 am taxi which arrived at 5.20 which still gave us ample time to make our plane. The drive back was half in the dark but we did get about an hour and a half in the rising sunlight so we were able to enjoy the scenery. Our flight out of Dalaman left on schedule and we arrived at 11am in Istanbul. I had made arrangements with a niece, Sissy Popp from Toronto to meet at the airport and to do a little tourism, have lunch and get back to airport for our 6pm flight to Frankfurt and Graz, Austria. As we had checked our bags through to Graz we had only my small roller backpack with us. As we came out of the arrival lounge, Sissy was there along with her Turkish husband Genghis and their 2 year old son Kaya. They had their car in the parking lot so we jumped in and headed for Istanbul. As it was Saturday, traffic was light. I had decided that Brigitte should at least see the cathedral of Hagia Sophia. This had once been a catholic cathedral but had been converted into a Mosque when Istanbul had fallen to the Muslims. In 1914, President Ataturk had decreed that this was no longer a Mosque but would be considered a museum. It is one of the largest covered areas in the world and carries both Christian and Muslim decorations. All of the vast mosaic work was plastered over during the Mosque period but much of it has been uncovered nowadays. It is a contrast to see these symbols of two religions in the same holy place which makes this a most unique museum. The sheer size of the building makes one feel small but the history it contains makes one feel one is in a most important place.
We then headed for lunch at a small restaurant on the Bosporus. There was a flotilla of several hundred ships anchored in the bay waiting to make the passage to the Black Sea. Probably because of Ramadan, shipping had come to a stop and this huge number of boats had backed up waiting for pilots. After a very informative and fun lunch with Sissy and Genghis, we were dropped off at the airport. We flew to Frankfurt and caught a late plane to Graz where we were joining a meeting of the German chapter of the World Bank Group alumni association of which I am currently a Vice President. We arrived at the hotel in Graz around midnight and went straight to bed after a long but interesting day.
Graz, Austria
The next morning, I was up at 7am to attend the business meeting of the chapter. There were 100 members with spouses. As often at these meetings, many alumni members were worried about the health of our World Bank pensions. I was asked to make a statement and I basically said everybody should relax and sleep well as our pension is guaranteed by the World Bank and if the World Bank ever got into problems, something very bad would have happened to the world and we would not have to worry about pensions. I was told by many after the meeting that my statement had calmed the spirits and the mood had become more positive.
After the meeting, we set out on foot to visit the city of Graz and a nice lunch at a beautiful building. We enjoyed sharing the table with Willi Wappenhans and his wife. Willi had been one of the most senior German staff in the Bank. The afternoon had further tours but we ducked out and had a quiet afternoon to recover from the previous short night. At dinner, we reconvened in a former monastery not far from our hotel. It was a formal affair with fixed sitting. The location was beautiful and the food was excellent.
At 10am on Sunday, 2 busses appeared at the hotel doors and we headed out for a day of sightseeing in the Steiermark, Styria area of Austria. First we headed for Piper which is the breeding farm of the all Lipizzaner horses which show in the Vienna Riding School. At the lovely Piper farm, we were guided around the stables by the chief breeding master. It was an interesting tour which lasted for almost 2 hours. Piper maintains very detailed records about the breeding with family trees of each male and female horse. It is a very scientific operation and has maintained the blood line of these horses for centuries. They sell the horses not needed for the Vienna School and prices reach into the thousands of Euros.
We left Piper and headed for a Buschschank which is a country restaurant serving only cold food. Our group was divided into 2 groups as these types of restaurants cannot seat 100 persons. After lunch we set out for a 2 hour drive to an Austrian wine producer. The road ran along with Slovenia which is a beautiful region of high mountains. The wine cellar visit was a standard visit with a good tour given by the son of the owner.
The last event was dinner at a lovely restaurant in the country on top of the mountain chain. There was a full pig on a spit for dinner and lots of wine flowed until we left back to Graz for the night.
We stayed on in Graz for one extra day and enjoyed the fine weather in this jewel of a city. The next day we headed for Nice to visit with Claire and Keith Norman who are old friends from our Amsco days.
Nice, France
Keith and Claire Norman picked us up at the Nice airport and we headed to their flat in La Napoule which is about 30 kms west of Nice. Their penthouse apartment is half apartment and half garden with a magnificent view of Cannes Bay and of the Mediterranean. They have had this flat for 4 years and have done a superb job in building up a very extensive garden with Palm trees, bushes and flowers. Sitting in the garden of their flat one forgets that one is sitting on the 7th floor of the building. I went swimming in the pool of the complex and each morning I went with Claire to the village to buy fresh fruit, newspapers, bread and croissants. On one day, we drove to Les Isombrers which is west of La Napoule just on the coast before arriving in San Tropez. Here we visited Carola and Franz Kaps who are former Bank staff and who own a lovely house high above the Med and with a magnificent view. It was a nice lunch which we had to cut short as Brigitte had to return to the doctor we had visited in the morning as she had severe pain walking. We had brought her to an x-ray clinic and were to return with the pictures to the doctor. She has a pinched nerve in her back. The doc prescribed some pain killers and advised that Brigitte see her doctor on our return to Virginia. The pain has not let up as yet.
Munich
On Saturday morning, we flew to Munich arriving around 10 am. We met at the airport with a nephew of Brigitte’s, his fiancée and a son out of a previous relationship. The nephew, Ruediger is the son of Erhard, one of Brigitte’s brothers. We had time to have a nice lunch and do a little sightseeing around the town of Freising which is just outside Munich.
Berlin
At 5pm, we boarded our plane to Berlin where we would spend 3 days staying in the flat of Nico and Margareth Nisssen. They could not be there but they gave us the key and we settled there on our own. The next day we boarded a double-decker tourist bus and did a 4 hour tour of Berlin. Although Brigitte had lived for 20 years in this town, the changes since her departure in 1961 had totally changed the face of the city. Huge efforts have been made to erase any signs of the communist part of the city and now the German Government is based in Berlin with the rebuilt Reichstag and a whole series of new buildings housing the government of the country. Berlin is a huge city of over 900 square kilometers with giant parks, lakes and more bridges than Venice.
That evening we met with Brigitte’s oldest brother Rudi and his wife and had dinner with his son Lothar and his wife Susie. It was a great reunion and Brigitte was able to catch up on family stories after being away from Germany for more than 5 years. This trip will also take her to Frankfurt to meet with her 2 other brothers.
Frankfurt and Cleeberg
From Berlin we flew to Frankfurt. We took a taxi from the airport to our hotel in Offenbach. Brigitte’s brother Erhard lives in Offenbach and we had agreed to meet for dinner. Erhard drove us to a very German type of Restaurant on the Main. He told us that in Germany nowadays there are not too manyGerman restaurants as most are run by foreigners.
The next day we had lunch with a cousin of Brigitte Gunter Nabroth. He is the son of her father‘s brother. I had found him while doing some genealogical research on Google. He has since met most of Brigitte’s family. His third wife is a teacher and a very nice person. Later that afternoon, Erhard and Mary picked us up at our hotel and we headed out to Cleeberg which is about 40 miles east of Frankfurt and where her brother Edgar and his wife Helga live. Also both of their children had settled there also. Their daughter Hilka died earlier this year of cancer so the visit was somewhat subdued. Helga has stepped in and takes care of the twin boys of this family which allows the father to continue working. It is a heavy load for Helga who is also now mid 60’s. We had a pleasant dinner in a hilltop restaurant and got back to our hotel around 11pm.
The next morning Erhard and Mary picked us up again and drove us to the Frankfurt Airport. Starting in France, Brigitte had developed severe pain in her leg while walking. We had x-rays taken in Nice but the doctor could not make a precise diagnostic. The day after our return to Virginia, we went to Brigitte’s doctor who set up an MRI for later that afternoon. We will have to await the analysis until next week to know what is causing her this pain. But is great that she could have the MRI done within 4 hours of seeing her doctor.
It was a great trip except for the pain that Brigitte developed but she carried it out with her usual determination. I had offered to cut the trip short and head home from France but she so much wanted to see her siblings that we stayed the course.
