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.