6 in 6: Travel - Cyprus to Israel

215 Nautical miles sailed

3 days at sea

Sailing from Paphos, Cyprus to Herzliya, Israel was quite an exciting one.  It was probably due to the fact that we had a film crew on board so we did a lot of fun stuff.  (Click here to see the documentary said film crew made).

We had set off after a very long morning of trying to work out all the paperwork for us to leave.  Once we were under way with the main sail up and catching wind, I went to take a nap before it was my turn to be on watch.  (I have learned the secrets to knowing when to nap as well as when and what to eat in between watches on a sail).  (Oh the things you must learn on a boat)

I was taking a nap when the general alarm went off.  That's always the best way to wake up.  Really, it is, what with the loudest bell ever ringing right outside your room.  So great.

I went up to the wheelhouse to ask the captain what was going on and he said we were doing a Man Overboard Drill.  Something that is required that we practice in the unfortunate event that someone does actually fall overboard and we have to rescue them.  It's good to know what to do in that situation.

When I found out what we were doing, I came to discover that the 'man' overboard (i.e. a fender) was already in the water and the dinghy was needing to be ready to lowered.  As has been my usual position for over a year, I went to the aft (the back of the ship) and took my position, ready to lower the dinghy with Thomas (our excellent first mate) (he's from Ibiza) in it.  However, as Thomas came back, all suited up with a life jacket and a radio in his hand (as well as a GoPro camera on his head) he asked me if I was ready with a life jacket on.

Umm...pardon me?

What?

We were heaved to (read this post to find out what that means) just off the coast of Cyprus and the water was just a bit choppy but not too bad.  So with 'what?' being my only question, and not actually getting an answer back, I went back to the wheelhouse to get a life jacket on and get ready to be lowered to the water behind the ship.

The majority of the time, I wasn't entirely sure what I was supposed to be doing.  I just kind of did what Thomas told me to do along with a bit of common sense and it worked.

I was in the very front of the dinghy as Thomas revved up the engine and we headed off to find our man.  Well, fender man.  I could see it in the distance so I pointed with my arm and we raced towards it, bouncing all over the place over the waves.  We made it to Mr. Fender Man and I brought him inside and we set back off to the ship across the choppy waters.

Let me pause and say that it was quite the view in front of me as we raced back to the ship.  With the hills of Cyprus on the right and the ship with the main sail flying high, it was a sight not soon to be forgotten.

When we made it back, I thought the job was done.  

I thought wrong.

Next thing I knew, someone in a bright orange life jacket jumps into the water behind me (literally didn't see this coming until she splashed in the water) and we had to rescue her.  We pulled her up into the dinghy and practiced using the Jacob's Ladder.  Why it is called that, I have no idea.  But it's a very interesting contraption that attaches to the ship and the person needing a rescue goes inside of it and it literally rolls them up on to the deck.

Once she was up, my job on the water was finished and then I had to be in the raising party to get the dinghy back on board in it's proper place.  It went well.

Thomas and I made a great team that day.

Again, I thought my job was done and I could go back to my nap.

I thought wrong.

There's always so much you can do in a day on a ship.

We then went into a full fire drill with a 'casualty' in the engine room.  (That means one of our crew members had a fake injury and we needed to rescue him and bring him on deck.)  In this particular case, our engineer was unconscious in the engine room.  Every fire drill is different and every one is very much a learning experience.

A lot was learned this day.  I don't think I managed to get back to my nap as after all this excitement finally came to and end and we were setting off again for our destination, it was my turn to be on watch. 

I slept well after that watch.

6 in 6: Israel

Cities Visited:

Herzliya

Tel Aviv (well, just the bus station)

Jerusalem

Jericho

This is a long one.  It was a busy day.

The ship was docked in a marina in the city of Herzliya, Israel for a week, moored between 2 incredible yachts.  During that week, the Bible school that has been running on board left the ship to do days of endless walking and touring and studying and seeing all the sights.  Unfortunately, I had to stay back on the ship most of this week.  However, there was a day when I got to visit Jerusalem with my 3 friends and fellow crew members, Kyrah, Marina, and Whitney.

We set off in the morning to the bus stop.  Well, we had little hope for the bus coming so we just grabbed a taxi and he took us straight to the bus station in Tel Aviv which would lead us to a bus that would take us to the heart of Jerusalem.  This drive was beautiful.  It took us up, around and through the beautiful mountains of this amazing country.

We disembarked and began our quest to find the Old City.  We had no idea where it was.  We had managed to ask a few people and they told us to just go straight down this street we were on and we would find our way there.  So that's what we did.

As we navigated our way through the streets, we happened to look to our right and saw a little market so we decided to have a bit of a detour to walk down there and check out what goods were being sold.

There were stalls filled with fresh bread, fresh fruit and vegetables, olives (not for me), spices, nuts, and beautiful clothing.  We took our time walking down this street amongst locals and tourists alike, attempting to understand the signs that were clearly in another language along with prices for things that made no sense.  There is quite a difference between a dollar and a shekel.

After wandering around these streets for a while, we continued and finally spotted the walls to the Old City.  But before we got there, I looked to the left and saw something colorful in the distance so I decided to check it out.  They were stationary bikes.  But they were no ordinary stationary bikes.  They were bikes with which something happened above your head when you pedaled.  For some, a fan turned on to blow down onto you, for others a lamp or a drum or a contraption that played music.  That was the best one.

We finished our playing and headed to the Old City.  We went through the Jaffa gate and were met but crowds of people and open stalls selling all sorts of things.  It's like a labyrinth in that place.  There was the Jewish Quarter, the Christian Quarter, and a couple others.  It's hard to describe in words what we were seeing and what we were walking through.

These were streets that Jesus walked through.

There were a few places we wanted to see so we attempted to follow the signs as best as we could to find them.  We made it to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher.  This was is believed to be the place that Jesus was crucified and buried, known as Golgatha or Calvary.  It is beautifully decorated in every corner of this amazing church.  We walked around quite a bit and ascended the stairs to the place where Jesus was said to have been crucified.  Here, underneath a sheet of glass was the rock of Calvary which contained the hole that was said to have been where the cross went into the ground.

After this time, we wandering around some more and made our way to the Wailing Wall.  We didn't go down and say a prayer but we just watched from a distance.

We decided that we were tired, hot and hungry so we spotted a tree and sat on the stone wall underneath it to enjoy our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

Marina really wanted to go swim in the Dead Sea.  We had talked about it before but didn't know how we could work it to get there.  We brought our suits just in case we made it there.  Marina was determined to get there.  She walked down to where there was a line of taxis and managed to find a man who would not only drive us there (about an hour drive) but would wait there while we swam and then drive us back.  We pondered on it for a bit, deciding if we wanted to spend the money on the taxi ride (which was actually incredibly reasonable for what we were asking) and decided that it was totally worth it.  How often were we going to be in Israel, this close to the Dead Sea.

We hopped in the taxi and off we went.  Our driver was an incredibly nice man and turned into a bit of a tour guide for us and was telling us about all the places we were driving past.  As we were heading towards the road that would lead us to the Dead Sea, we passed by the Mount of Olives and he decided

to take us up there so we could see it and get a quick picture.  He even took the picture for us.  We were at a spot that overlooked all of the Old City of Jerusalem and it was a site to see.

We were off, on our way to the Dead Sea.  I couldn't believe what was actually happening.  The area we were in pretty much looked like a dry dessert with hills everywhere.  To think about how the people of the Bible had to walk through these places to get to Jerusalem was just incredible to me.  As we drove down, we watched the signs on the side of the road which told us the elevation.  But it was in the negative numbers.

We were then going below sea level.  Very far below sea level.  Eventually reaching 1,400 feet below sea level.  How that is even possible, I have no idea.  It was a strange thought that we were well below where the ship was.  It was a beautiful site to see as we were driving.

So we swam.  Well, we floated.  Weirdest experience of my life.  There was a sign which told us how to go about getting in so we followed it.  You would wade out to the water, squat down and then just lay back.  And when you lay back, your feet floated right up to the top.

As we were walking down to the water, we saw plenty of people all around us floating so we knew that's what was going to happen.  But when I experienced it for myself, I was still just as shocked at what was happening.

But a word of caution - do NOT get the water in your eyes or anywhere around your mouth.  Not a fun experience.

We rinsed off all the salt that accumulated on our bodies and in our hair as best we could and headed back to find our taxi man who was waiting on a bench for us.  He was from Jericho and he is very proud of where he is from so he wanted to take us there, free of charge.  We agreed.

He took us to what was believed to be the sycamore tree that Zacchaeus climbed so he could see Jesus walking by in Luke 19.  I think this was one of my favorite things we did because I knew that story well and to think that I was in the street that was once filled with people as Jesus was walking down this street was an amazing thought.

 As we finally started to head back to Jerusalem, we made one more stop to see some of our taxi man's friends and get bombarded by salesmen trying to sell us Dead Sea products.  We got to try them first and my hands have never felt so soft in my life.  If I had more cash on me, I probably would have got something but we awkwardly all said no and made our way out the door.

Our last adventure of traveling back to the ship in Herzliya consisted of another bus and taxi ride which we nearly didn't have enough cash on us to complete.  But we made it and it was a very good day.

It was an incredible experience to have the chance to be in these places, to see the history of it, to see the places where all of these stories I've heard all my life actually happened.  It makes the Bible come so much more alive and when I went back and read a few of the stories that took place where I had just been, I could picture it in my mind in a whole new way and it gave it new meaning.

I never thought I would ever have the chance to go to Israel, let alone sail directly there.  But it was an opportunity that I am so thankful for.
 

6 in 6: Israel to Turkey

305 nautical miles sailed

4 days at sea

To be honest, I don't really remember much of our sail from Israel to Turkey.  Sometimes, all those nautical miles I've sailed tend to blend together and I can't distinguish between them.  But sometimes I can.  But this time, I can't.  And that's ok.

It was a relatively calm sail, I think.  And, if I'm remembering the right sail, which again, I could be mixing up with another one, I got to sail by the stars.  (Even if it wasn't this particular sail, it's still a good story.)

I love stars.  That's no secret.  During these sails I have learned a lot about stars due to the most amazing app ever on my phone which tells me all about them and where they are.  I just set my location and point my phone to the sky and it tells me what's in front of me.  (Thank you Starbucks app for that awesome free download last summer that I never thought I would use).  There have been many nights searching out Orion, Jupiter, Pleiades, and more. 

There was a night when it was so calm and so clear that we spent the entire 3 hour night watch outside (with the occasional check inside to plot our position, make sure we were staying on course, and make tea (and probably popcorn) because I'm a good watch leader like that).  You might be wondering how we stayed on course when we were outside the whole time.  Well, that's why there's a wheel (or helm) outside with a large compass in front of it.

Confession: I didn't sail by the stars like the sailors of old did by plotting where the stars were and using of of those funny contraptions and doing all the math to figure out where we were and which direction to go.  I don't know how to do that.  But I would use the compass to point in the right direction for where we wanted to head and once I was on course, I looked up to find a few stars I could use as a reference for a while.  When I could find a good, bright, easily recognized star, I would see where it was in relation to something on the ship like the mast or a shroud or the crow's nest or bow sprit and steer to keep it there.

Helming by sight is much more fun than helming by numbers on a compass.  Helming in general is a lot of fun and is by far my most favorite thing to do on a sail so that's saying a lot.  Seriously though, I love helming.

It was a good night.

We also did plenty of swimming on this sail, as usual.  It was always the routine for the captain to pop his head out of his cabin just before lunch time to see if conditions were right to stop the boat, have a swim and eat some lunch then carry on.  I like it when we Heave To.  I believe during this trip we stopped again at a small bay just off the tip of Cyprus for a night to have a break and relax a bit.

305 nautical miles by sea

What I do remember from this particular sail was standing in the wheelhouse, looking into the distance at the land that was Turkey and having no idea where the marina was that we were supposed to be going to.  It was a new marina so it wasn't on any of our charts or any map or book we had.  We had to rely just on GPS coordinates we were given and binoculars.  

But don't worry.  We found it.

   

6 in 6: Turkey

Cities Visited:

Mersin

Antalya

Dalaman
(well, just to get to the airport so I'm not sure that really counts...)

Mersin Marina

One day in Mersin, Turkey, my friend Tessa (she's from the Netherlands) and I decided that we should go on another bike ride together.  We had done that once when she first came on board in Cyprus and we had made a deal that we would ride bikes in every place we came to.  We've only been twice...

We decided to go on our day off but that day off, it happened to be raining.  A lot.

We went anyways.

We stayed along a very nice path that went along the coast with the water on our left and the city buzzing on our right.  After getting completely soaked, we took a turn down some semi busy streets.  We came to a get together of sorts which kind of looked like a little market with different stalls of food and picnic tables (all covered because well...it was raining).  We dismounted our bikes, out of respect of course, and walked ourselves and our bikes around it.  I have almost never felt so out of place in my life.  Here I was, a blonde American girl soaked by the rain in a bright green jacket walking around Turkish people in their traditional Turkish dress.

We didn't stay long.

As I said, Tessa is from The Netherlands.  They bike there a lot.  So she basically has no fear on a bike in the middle of the road.  Even if that bike has no brakes.  Which hers did not.  (Insert Kellie's laughter at the thought of what happens next in the story...)  We were making our way back to the ship so we headed towards the water again (that's the nice thing about living on a ship in a marina.  If you get lost, find the water and you'll be able to find the boat again...)  We made it back to the main road so all that was left to do was get to the other side.  However, there wasn't much of a cross walk.  So we just decided to go across at a random spot when we could find a break in the traffic.

The break came so I went first and was able to easily cross and pop my front bike tire up the curb and continue on.

What a nice day on the Mersin coast looks like...it didn't
look like that this day...

As I did this, I heard Tessa yelling something behind me along the lines of, "I have no brakes!" as she came closer to the curb.  So I looked back as she rammed right into the curb, luckily not quite flying over the handle bars.  There was much laughter.  (And not just from me.  She was laughing too.)  She was able to finally stop (well, obviously because she hit the curb and that's kind of an almost automatic stop right there) and she made it to where I was and there was only minimal damage to the bike.  Just the chain coming out of place a bit and a big chunk of plastic coming off from somewhere unknown but it was fine.  It was an old, rusty bike anyways.

Again, still raining which added to the comedy of the situation.

All was fixed and we continued back to the ship.

A few days before this, it had been discovered that the supermarket nearest to us was selling strawberries at about 2 Lira per kilo, which is about $1.00 per kilo.  That's a cheap price for that amount of delicious strawberries.

As Tessa and I were on our way back to the ship, we passed by this store and decided to get some strawberries to treat ourselves for the adventure we just had and to have a snack for the movie we were going to watch.  So she stayed outside with the bikes as I went in to get a big box of strawberries.

Again, it was raining so I was incredibly wet as I walked inside.  A bit out of place, yet again.

With strawberries purchased, we concluded our journey, dried off, put on warm clothes, probably made some popcorn, and enjoyed a movie with a box of strawberries.

A good way to spend one's day off.

6 in 6: Travel - Turkey to England

This is the story of how I traveled for 2 days, crossing half the length of Turkey to get to England.

It was 4AM in a small marina in Mersin, Turkey, just outside of Tarsus, my guitar case full of more than just a guitar and a backpack ready to go.  I said my goodbye to the ship that had been my home for the past 8 months straight and got into a car with the skipper and 2 of his friends.

So began a 9 hour car journey along the coast and through the mountains of Turkey.

We set off for a few hours of darkness on a main motorway when it became a windy mountain road with the sun slowly rising up behind us.  A stretch break showed us the beginnings of some pretty amazing sites were were going to see along the way.

About 4 hours or so into the journey, we decided it was time to have a bit of breakfast.  So we found a small restaurant at the top of the mountain over looking the ocean.  We stopped and received the most amazing Turkish breakfast I have ever had.  Well, it was the only Turkish breakfast I have ever had but still, it was amazing.  Scrambled eggs with sausage and some really great spices which I don't know the name of, vegetables, fresh bread that kept coming, homemade honey, apricots, dates, and more.

I'm glad we stopped there.

We continued on, trading seats every once in a while to get a different view from the car, counting all the mosques I saw along the way, until we made it to Antalya.  There, we stopped at a resort that my 3 car buddies were staying in for a few days.  We took advantage of the all inclusive beverages and just relaxed for a bit.  I then understood how people can go on vacation to a country and just stay at the resort they whole time.  It has everything you ever need.

I then had to meet up with the person who was going to take me to the place I would be staying the night.  It was one of those, friend of a friend of a friend kind of situations.  We met up near the docks where Paul once made berth way back when in the Bible.  That was neat.  But she took good care of me and I had a bed for the night and breakfast in the morning in a random city in Turkey which I had never been to before.

The next morning, I was walked to a bus stop where I got on a bus which took me all around the city before going to another bus station.  I then immediately got on another bus which would take me the 4 hours to Dalaman where the airport was that I was flying out of.  But this was unlike any bus I have ever been on.  First of all, it was driving through Turkey so that was a new experience which was beautiful, but every seat had its own television screen.  There was also a guy serving complimentary refreshments up and down the aisle.  Quality service right there.  Hello apple juice.

We came to a rest stop half way through and I decided it would probably be a good idea to take advantage of using the toilet.  However, when I went to the restroom, I didn't find a toilet but rather a small hole in the ground.  Awesome.  Squatty potty.  Just what I wanted to experience at that moment.  I now have a new appreciation to be in places with proper toilets.

I made it to Dalaman and it's a good thing I was paying attention as the driver didn't announce at all where we were and he kept letting people off at random stops on the side of the road whenever they wanted to.  So I luckily took initiative and watched the signs (I'm so thankful I pay attention to detail...) and decided this was my stop.  The next task was to find a taxi to take me to the airport.  There was a friendly man who gave me a discount due to the fact that I only had a certain amount of Turkish Lira left in my wallet that didn't quite add up to his asking price.  What a nice gentleman.

450 Miles by land

However, this brought me to the airport 7 hours before my flight was due to depart.  So off I went to sit at a cafe that happened to be open right in the parking lot with nothing else around.  It was there that I sat for the next 5 hours, occasionally watching a group of passengers coming down meeting their tour buses and taxis and such.  It was then that I was incredibly thankful for the new colored markers I had just purchased.  I drew lots of colored circles.  It's a good thing I like waiting while traveling.

Finally it was time to check in with the masses and board my flight to England.  But not before finding a sign in the bathroom (with a real toilet) that told me I couldn't wash my feet.  Sad day.  That's exactly what I wanted to do.

1764.73 Miles by air

We took off and a few hours later I landed in the great country of England with a sigh of relief and contentment and joy, even though it was 1 in the morning.  As I stepped outside the plane in Luton to walk down the stairs to a bus that would take me to the terminal, I instantly knew I was back in England because it was cold.  So cold I could see my breath.  And it was raining.  Happiness abounded.

That is the story of how I traveled from Turkey to England in the spring of 2014.

Note to self, next time, maybe just pay the little extra for a flight at a closer airport...but then again, where's the fun in that?