We tried to stop at other places than those at which we stopped heading north. c*** (I'm going to have to spell it" Kunta" the blog won't allow the other spelling!!) was a nice little town that was packed out after Ramadan and for the weekend. We tried to stop at Foca which is a little Greek type town but the seaweed left us with poor holding so we moved on to Cesme. We tried to pump out at the marina there but one side didn't work properly but at least we got our Blue Card registered. Cukuralti was our final stop before Didim and we put in a few days here because the Marina had someone else in our preferred position. Peter and I took advantage of this and went by taxi to Ephesus. This was once a thriving port town of the Romans which had silted up and is now quite a few kilometres inland. This fact and a few earthquakes were the death knell for this once lovely town. The ruins of many temples, streets, monuments and public buildings abound - some are being restored by the authorities. We almost missed coming here but are glad we didn't. The Temple to Artemis was one of the 7 Wonders of the Ancient World but now only one column remains. The Christians contributed their share of tearing down as they became more prevalent in the area. It's just lucky that so many items ended up in the major museums of the world otherwise we wouldn't have them at all today. I'm divided on the wisdom of returning some artefacts to their country of origin as is popular now due to some countries general instability and inability to guarantee their safety.

We arrived back in Didim ready to do some work prior to our annual haul out. It turned out that there were 4 boats we knew still here so all had dinner on the first night. This time we have hired a car to help with the running around. Prices of taxis have risen dramatically and we are scared of their driving anyway. Prices in general have risen in Turkiye since our first arrival nearly two years ago. Huge inflation and Russians with cash are causing it. We nearly fainted when we went to the Yacht Club for a night cap and got charged the equivalent of $AUD 17 for a glass of wine! It's $17 a bottle in the supermarket. We had found the same back in Australia last time home but had become used to things being a lot cheaper here. Not so anymore…..

We've been having fun with Alan and Ingrid from Coyi, an Australian boat who turned up on our dock. They spent Coronation Day with us on board watching it all on my BBC news app that I managed to mirror to the big TV. Peter asked Cora to make me cucumber sandwiches as a surprise. It was fun.

Peter, Cora and I went off to Bodrum (with Kiki driving) for the day to the hospital that we went to last year for skin checks. Peter has stiches in his foot again (almost 12 months to the day from the last time) from a BCC and I had a freezing off (an old people thing). Now just filling in time till the haul - more then.