Sherrie's Cruising Blog (Sailing Catamaran Element): Kekova Roads

September 13 - 15

We got up at 6:30 AM the following morning as we had a 65 nautical mile sailing day down to Kekova Roads. We decided to make it a longer day so that our last sailing day into Finike would be less than 20 nautical miles.

I was so proud of myself, we pulled away from the dock and stowed all of the fenders. I got the main sail jack lines pulled back (these are lines that when up allow the main sail to be dropped without a person helping it to flake), all of the jib and code zero sheets all prepped, and the main sheets ready. Once we raised our main sail, I even remembered to pull the jack lines back into place (we always forget to do this). After all of this there was NO wind. Oh well, we made really good time and got to see some flying fish along the way. If you have never seen a flying fish, they are sight to behold. At first you think it is a small birds but then realize that birds aren’t silver and usually don’t submerge into waves.

As we were motoring I noticed that we had more stow aways. This time we had a stink bug and another dragonfly.

stow away number 1

stow away number 2

We arrived into Kekova Roads at 5:00 PM and tried our first choice spot at Pölemos Bükü. There were 2 sail boats and a power boat anchored. We tried to anchor in 13 meters of water and we didn’t have adequate swing room or chain scope so up came the anchor. We headed over to check out another Tersane Bay but it was much smaller than what the pictures showed. Our last choice was another dock situated in Kale Köy.

The winds picked up just as we were trying to dock and it took some very tricky maneuvering to dock. We actually came in moving diagonally into the slip. Once tied up we had a lovely view of the castle ruins towering above us. Also, nestled into the side of the hill were many homes. We hung out for a bit before heading to the restaurant for dinner. We were happy that the food was much better and more reasonable (190 TL which included a bottle of white wine).

first view of Kale Köy

view from the boat

tomb

my beautiful girls

Shaun was so tired at the table that he was falling asleep. He took Jordan at 8:30 PM and went to bed. Paige and I sat and chatted while she was doodling until 9:30 PM. The castle flood lights had been put on and the view up to it was stunning. We had already decided that we would walk up to it in the morning.

nighttime view

We woke up the following morning and ate our breakfast. As we were leaving the boat we noticed a school of fish seeking sanctuary under our boat.

school of fish finding shelter under our boat

It was a Monday, a school day so our hike was going to be part of the girls PE. As we started walking up towards the castle we realized that the woman who had directed us to the castle was also our local tour guide. She was also carrying a basket of head scarves and was wanting us to purchase them. She introduced herself as Amida. Along our hike up the stairs she pointed out basil plants, oregano plants, carib trees, the tomb of someone special to that place, and a 1000 year old olive tree.

Amida, Shaun and the girls

1000 year old olive tree

castle wall

heading to the entrance

view down to the docks

interesting wall

view up to the top of the castle

Shaun filming

our floating home

sarcophagi

pretty view down

stairs to the top of the castle

more sarcophagi

Jordan on the cannon

She walked all the way up to the castle entrance where we were surprised with a fee. We didn’t have our wallet with us and Shaun was about to go back down to the boat when Amida offered to pay for our entry and we could pay her back. Off we went up into the castle. Off to the right along the hilltop were many sarcophagi that were spectacular. As we entered into the castle we were very near a wasp nest. These are not your every day wasps. These buggers were on steroids and angry that we were near their homes. We ran down the stairs with 3-4 chasing us. They finally left us in peace and we headed back down to repay Amida and buy something from her shop. The girls and I decided on head scarfs. The girls chose bandana style and I chose a head scarf style.

Amida and myself trying on the headscarf

We made it back to our boat and started our prep for our departure. We were wanting to anchor in Tersane Bay, but when we arrived it was already jammed with day trip boats. We tried to anchor out but the floor was rock and our anchor would not grab. 2 day trip boats existed and we went in only to be told that big vessels are not allowed. This is untrue, the day trippers want the space for themselves and not private vessels. Off we went to our second choice of Woodhouse Bay. As we were motoring in we spotted a sea turtle surfacing until it dove down out of sight.

We dropped our anchor and stern tied in a lovely part of the bay. The steroid wasps were also present and were really checking us out. At first we were not liking them but soon they left and only came back periodically to check us out.

I had tied a large loop with a bowline and Shaun swam the stern line to shore to secure us from swinging. As he got closer to the shore the water got colder and colder. He spotted a cold water spring entering into the bay right behind us. We then snugged up the anchor to make sure the stern line held.

We then all jumped into the water for a swim. There were hot and cold spots all around us keeping us on our toes. The water seemed blurry with the mixture of fresh and salt water mixing together - so strange to experience.

We noticed the stern line loop was slowly inching its way off the rock until it popped off completely and the boat swung into the wind. We left it like that until another gullet headed into the bay. To be courteous we decided to put the stern line on properly. We dropped the dinghy and Shaun rowed it over to a better rock and tied us on.

Throughout our stay in the bay we spotted the sea turtle surfacing, a shaggy black goat, bats and several fish. One particular flat fish liked to take shelter under a step of our boarding ladder, it was quite funny.

We woke up to a beautiful morning, had breakfast and had a last swim before leaving Woodhouse Bay at 12:00 PM on the final leg to Finike.