Gyatso being hauled out at Port Annapolis Marina on 27 May 2014, bringing an end to our extended voyage. Photo by Lisa Borre.
When hauling out Gyatso two weeks ago, the reality finally sank in: our 8 1/2 year voyage had come to an end. I was grateful and relieved that we had completed the journey safely and sad because it meant the end of long-distance cruising for us.
We’ve been busy since our last logbook update, which was about loading Gyatso on a freighter for the trip back from Europe. I wrote about our experience with “Shipping Home” in the December 2013 issue of SpinSheet magazine.
Gyatso being loaded onto the deck of the ship that will carry it from Palma de Mallorca, Spain to Palm Beach, Florida.
Yesterday, while everyone else was tuning in to watch the America’s Cup finals, David was on a flight somewhere over Newfoundland. Earlier in the day, he had tied up Gyatso alongside the ship that would carry our beloved boat home and was rushed to the airport in Palma de Mallorca, Spain just in time to catch a flight home.
A last-minute delay prevented him from being there to watch Gyatso get hoisted up onto the deck of the freighter, along with about ten other boats and regular freight. Over the weekend we learned from Sevenstar Yacht Transport, the shipping company we’re using to ship Gyatso home from the Med, that the ship would not arrive until the evening of Tuesday the 24th. The new loading time would not be until 2:00 p.m. on the 25th, but David’s flight was booked for noon on the same day. Continue reading Gyatso Catches a Ride Home from the Med→
We’ll stop in Istanbul for two days on our way to Gyatso.
We’re in the final countdown to departure for some seasonal cruising in the Med after nearly 18 months on dry land. We hauled out and stored Gyatso at the end of the 2010 cruising season and returned home to write a cruising guide to the Black Sea. The book is scheduled for release later this month, and we’re now looking forward to our return to Marmaris, Turkey where we will begin this year’s cruise. Continue reading Countdown to Departure for Seasonal Cruising in the Med→
We just set-up this new blog platform and will start posting here soon. While we’re making this transition, all of Gyatso’s previous website pages will remain available.
We made a long passage today so that we could get to the Setur Marina in Kusadasi ahead of some stormy weather in the forecast. Once again, the forecast was fairly accurate — we had rain and thunderstorms in the early morning hours and passing showers the first day in Kusadasi. Continue reading A visit to ancient Ephesus from Kusadasi, Turkey→
After spending most of the day in Bodrum, we left the dock at 2:30 p.m. and anchored three hours later in this quiet little fishing village on the Bodrum Peninsula which is slowly being taken over by tourism judging by the fish restaurants lining the shore and the grid of holiday homes being constructed on the surrounding hillsides. We’d already visited a historic site and eaten out once today (a döner kabob snack on the walk back from town), so we decided against going ashore to look for the ruins of ancient Myndos. We shared a bottle of wine and enjoyed leftovers onboard while watching two men fishing in a small boat off our stern instead. It seems that they were doing the same as us, except they had a few fishing lines in the water and were pulling in some small fish every now and then. Continue reading The quiet harbor of Gümüslük, Turkey→
Despite warnings from other cruising sailors who did not like the marina in Bodrum (mainly because it caters to charter yacht fleets and is therefore expensive), we decided to put in at the marina for a night anyways for the convenient access to shore. We arrived around noon after motoring from Knidos since there was no wind for sailing. Continue reading A glimpse at underwater archeology in Bodrum, Turkey→
We anchored in Büyük Limani harbor at Knidos on the western tip of the Datca Peninsula by late afternoon on our second day out from Marmaris. We rowed ashore to visit the ruins of ancient Knidos which are scattered around the surrounding hillsides. It must have been quite a place in its heyday, but now there is not even a modern-day town on the site which was famous for having been home to the first nude statue of a female figure: a marble statue of Aphrodite by Praxiteles. From our guidebooks, we also learned that this was the home of Eudoxos, one of the founders of Greek geometry. Continue reading Anchoring among ancient ruins in Knidos, Turkey→
Today we departed Marmaris and set sail for the 2010 cruising season. After two months of polishing, painting and varnishing to prepare Gyatso for another season, we don’t even mind the first spray of salty water over the bow. In fact it’s a real thrill because it means we’re off on another adventure. Continue reading We’re off to Dirsek, Turkey→
The upside of installing a new water heater was replacing the sink countertop in the galley. Credit: Lisa Borre.
Logbook Entry
Date: 4/11/10 Location: Marmaris, Turkey
While wintering-over in Marmaris, Turkey, we installed a new countertop for the galley sink. The old one was cracked when we bought Gyatso five years ago, and we’ve lived with it that way until a corner piece actually broke off last season.
