We left Yat marina in April and
made the short hop to Netsel marina in Marmaris where we joined the Levante
Basin rally comprising 13 yachts of mixed nationality. We cruised along the
coast of Turkey getting to know each other before setting sail from Finike for
Larnaka in Cyprus. We spent almost a month getting to know the island touring
both the Turkish north and the Greek south. We drove through the Trudos
mountains, saw the beautiful mosaics in Paphos and the strange empty eeriness
of the Famagusta no go zone. The rally fell apart in Cyprus due to a mixture of
reasons including trouble in the middle east and the organisers incompetence.
Due to renewed fighting Lebanon was supposedly now unsafe and we could no
longer sail there. Since we were due to visit Syria by land from Lebanon which
was now not going to be possible, a reduced group including ourselves flew to Damascus.
We embarked on a full on amazing tour of Syria the highlights of which included
Damascus, Aleppo, Palmyra, Apamea and the castles of Saladin and the Krak des
Chevaliers.
The rally as such disbanded at
this point. Some boats went straight to Lebanon and others including ourselves
sailed directly to Israel. After surviving the constant barrage of VHF traffic
by the Israeli navy and being visually checked out by an armed patrol vessel we
moored up in Herzylia marina only to be thoroughly swabbed and questioned by
yet more officials. It is a fascinating country despite the politics and ever
constant paranoia. We spent a couple of nights in Jerusalem and hired a car to
visit the ancient site of Caesarea, the beautiful old port of Acre and the
ancient fortification of Masada situated on top of an isolated rock plateau on
the edge of the Judaean desert. We floated in the Dead Sea, visited the Sea of
Galilee and the Golan Heights and braved the Palestinian border crossing to
visit Jericho. We spent time in Tel Aviv and old Jaffa and visited the very
moving Yad Vashem holocaust museum.
Herzylia proved a safe place to
leave the boat so we decided to take a trip to Jordan. We got a bus down to
Eilat and then walked across the border to Aqaba in Jordan. We spent a day
following in the footsteps of Lawrence of Arabia touring Wadi Rum by landrover
and camel and a night under the stars in a traditional Bedouin tent. We
continued down the Kings Highway to Petra. We walked through the siq, a narrow
gorge over 1 km in length flanked on either side by soaring 80 metre high
cliffs until we got our first glimpse of the famous Treasury. It was a
wonderful site which we spent two days exploring. We then continued north to
Amman and hired a car to visit ancient cities of Jerash and Umm Qays
overlooking the Golan Heights. We also stopped in Madaba to see the wonderful
mosaics and Mount Nebo from where Moses saw the Promised Land. We then took a
bus back down to Aqaba and spent a day snorkelling and swimming in the Red Sea.
We returned to a very hot and
humid Herzylia and began planning our trip to Egypt. We managed to find a bus
from Tel Aviv that went all the way to Cairo. This involved changing vehicles
at the Taba border land crossing. We went from a sixteen seater air conditioned
minibus to an arab charabanc with holes in the floor for ventilation. It got us
to our destination and we began our fabulous tour of Egypt in the very capable
hands of the Travco company. After a tour of the pyramids at Giza and Saqqara
we were put on the overnight train from Cairo to Aswan where we visited the
famous dam, the Philae temple and Abu Simbel. We then took a Nile cruise up to
Luxor stopping to visit the temples of Edfu and Kon-Ombo on the way. We thoroughly
explored the valley of the Kings and Queens and both the temples of Karnak and
Luxor. We flew back for our last couple of days in Cairo before embarking on
our mammoth bus journey back to Israel.
Time to finally leave Israel and on to Lebanon.
Unfortunately due to politics we had to sail all the way back to Larnaca,
Cyprus before setting off for Lebanon as well as pretending we had never been
to Israel. After a few VHF calls to Oscar Charlie (the Lebanese navy) we were
welcomed in to Jounieh marina. The Lebanese people were truly welcoming and
thanked us repeatedly for visiting their country. We had a wonderful time
exploring Beirut and its fabulous national museum. We visited the old port of
Byblos the impressive temples at Baalbek and had fun in the complex of caves at
the Jeita Grotto. In between the hard days of sightseeing we made use of the
Olympic size pool and associated facilities which were free to marina
residents. Time was ticking on and we had to drag ourselves away from this
fascinating country. We were expecting a friend to stay and she was flying into
Turkey later in the month.
We sailed back to Turkey via
Cyprus and Castellorizon and spent the rest of the summer chilling between
Gocek and Fethiye. It had been a long, hot, busy few months and it was nice to
relax for a while. Before heading into Marmaris Yat marina for our third winter
we nipped over to Rhodes to stock up with wine and pork.
