Kuşadası, Turkey

Not quite as picturesque as others, but an excursion to
 Ephesus was the real attraction.

Here I was in Turkey, just over an hour from my sister's home in İzmir, and where was she?  Why, in the United States of course.  As a matter of fact, she was home visiting the United States the entire summer that I was in the Mediterranean.  When I returned to the other side of the world to sail the Caribbean, she had then flown back to Turkey.  Ironic.

Just a little "In your face" moment in Kuşadası

We ported twice in Kuşadası, both times near the end of the summer.  By August, I was already missing Victoria, so being in a place where I felt she should have been definitely made me very emotional.  The first day, I got off in port alone and walked through the city just for the sake of being of the ship.

Mantı and çay--feeling authentic

Restaurant owners in tourist areas in the Mediterranean always try to incessantly coax passerby's into their restaurant, but I felt this even more so here in Kuşadası.  It may have been because I was a woman alone, it may have been because I simply said "hello" in Turkish and that was a tourist novelty, but I finally sat down and had the meal I was looking for.

One owner was persistent on my eating at his restaurant despite their not having mantı, the meal I had my heart set on.  When I told him this was why I wouldn't stay, he told me he would make the well known dish for me regardless.  He had to go to his friend's neighboring restaurant to get the ingredients, but either way, he made sure to make what I asked for!

Well, I learned for my second port day, when you are already missing someone so severely, going off alone in a country you've only ever been to with them is probably not the best remedy for loneliness.  Kristine helped with that and we explored the bazar together the second time in the port of Kuşadası.  With Kristine's Mexican genes, we had a fun time confusing vendors as to where we were from...they think she's Mexican, they think I'm Turkish, and they would never speak to us the most obvious tourist language--English.

Picking up the pilot--view from Deck 4

 Fun Fact:  When coming in and out of ports, a local pilot is aboard to steer the ship out of port.  Once safely into open waters, the pilot literally jumps from the moving ship back onto the moving pilot boat and they head back to port.

The shimmering moonlight on the Agean Sea