Author Archives: Paige
This is Exciting!
So the mid-March “Blahs” are upon me. And I am thinking of sun, sea, and sail. On a whim I sent an email to the charter company we booked through last time – Sailing in Blue – and enquired as to whether or not they chartered in Turkey. Not specifically, but they do charter boats out of the Greek Islands on the Turkish coast, and they said they could charter to us from Samos and ending in Rhodes. A one way charter! Perfect! AND. They said that the boat could be taken into Turkey! I know that there are some serious regulations that surround doing this, and I’ve looked into some of the procedures. After that first night on our first trip to Greece – the one where we were accosted by crazed Coast Guard with guns pointed at us at 1am – we take the issue of conflict and … …..continue reading →
Turkey!
Turkey for the girls and Turkey for the boys My favorite kind of pants Are corduroys Gobble gobble goo and Gobble gobble gickel I wish turkey Only cost a nickel (Adam Sandler) So Kirk has asked his employer if he can bank his holidays and he received a positive response. So this means that we will possibly be heading for Turkey and up to six glorious weeks of sailing in 2013! The only issue I can think of will be finding someone (or someone’s) to live in our condo for the period and look after the monsters. At least that’s the current train of thought! So, time to haul out the charts and the reviews and start planning when and where! If anyone has any suggestions from past visits, do tell! Some starting information on the coast of Turkey from sailingissues.com ……. Sailing in Turkey means cruising along the many gulfs … …..continue reading →
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Thinking Ahead….
….yes…we really only just barely returned….but if you don’t dream life becomes boring and stagnant so we are already thinking ahead to the next trip. So…maybe three years from now…and five weeks of sailing? We are thinking that the Turkish coast might be calling us. We loved the Aegean, and the Ionian wasn’t exactly what we thought it would be, but by the same token, we never dreamed we’d meet people that we would want to travel halfway around the world to sail with again. But that’s what happened. So now we just need to convince them to come to Turkey and hang with us for a vacation….. stranger things have happened…like traveling halfway around the world to meet people we’d met online on a photography site….
Home Again, Home Again….
Well, the trip home was relatively uneventful. We enjoyed a last British meal and a couple of pints of Strongbow at Heathrow and paid twice what we did anywhere else…but it is an airport and they do have you somewhat captive, so there you go. Our plane departed a bit late, but we had a tailwind and made up the time and arrived promptly….if there is one thing I can say about British Airways, they are generally punctual. We did have to sit on the tarmac at Vancouver for a few minutes before being allowed to disembark, they announced that someone wasn’t feeling well and had paramedics coming to help the passenger off….not me! Our luggage all arrived, customs was a breeze and Deb had just pulled in to pick us up when I gave her a call. So grateful to you Deb for the ride home! When we got … …..continue reading →
A Walk in the Forest – Transiting the New Forest and heading for Canada…twice!
After a very heavy sleep we got moving around 7:30 am and I did a quick email check. I seem to have become used to sitting in some strange corner at some odd angle, not breathing, while the computer attempts to connect to some unsecured internet wifi connection….Bournemouth was no different. We headed out to find the New Forest. Oddly, it’s neither New nor really a Forest, but we were heading for breakfast with two more Flickr friends. I have so many pictures since May 29th but I haven’t had time or a good enough connection to load them up….will have to wait until we are home now. On we go, as we turn out of the hotel we immediately take a wrong turn on the first roundabout…not an auspicious start to the day. But we get sorted out and heading in the right direction and the computer takes us … …..continue reading →
Let’s Do That Again! – Around Dorset and meeting some Flickr Friends!
Did I mention traffic circles? Sorry, I stand corrected…roundabouts. Today we got up early, found a place for a breakfast bite to eat, and then were picked up by a Flickr friend, Danny. He really showed us a great time. I honestly can’t even recall all the names of the places he took us, it was such a whirlwind tour. I do know we visited Poole Harbour, the second largest natural harbour in the world, out to Sandbanks which hosts the fourth most expensive properties in the world (apparently John Lennon started the fad when he bought a house for his Auntie…now the likes of Elton John, Ron Howard and others have homes there), stopped to see the “puffers” (steam train), visited Corfe Castle, Wareham and Milton Abbas (Thanks for correcting me Danny!). We stopped in Poole Harbour and watched the ferry to France leave…quite an amazing sight to see … …..continue reading →
The Wonderful World of Traffic Circles! – Truro to Bournemouth – all wrong turns, but what fun!!
Crop circles are so yesterday….now traffic circles…those deserve some serious merit! Canada really needs some serious traffic circles. We don’t need big highways in Vancouver, we need to get rid of traffic lights and then need to install traffic circles, and educate everyone properly on how they work. Edmonton has traffic circles…Halifax has one but it just doesn’t work like any other traffic circle in the world so it doesn’t really count because it really is an international oddity. But when you look at the population of Britain, and then you look at the towns and where the people are concentrated…and you hardly ever encounter a stop sign or a traffic light…and the traffic flows …well! We could learn something here! Anyway, today we had a full day. We hung out at Mary and Derek’s until about 10 am and it was really hard to tear ourselves away. They were … …..continue reading →
Roaming Through England – Avebury to Truro and all points in between
After breakfast and a shower we were on a mission…to find a boat. Funny, to come halfway around the world and end up driving down an unnamed country road, across a tiny bridge, park and clamber down a small path at the side of a river to find a boat. One of my Flickr friends has a boat and as luck would have it, he was currently moored up not too far from where we were staying. That we found him is a testament to GPS navigation! Lady River Mouse is a 50 foot long, 6’10″ wide narrow boat and we wanted to meet up, say hello, and set foot on one of these vessels as we have thought about chartering one at some point in the future. Lady River Mouse is warm and cosy and welcoming, and so is David! David and his feline friend, Cookie, live on Lady … …..continue reading →
We Made it out!
The plane finally landed, an hour late…and when we made Athens things were frantic. We had to shuffle a bit of packing on the airport floor so we wouldn’t be overweight and took a bit out of both bags and into carry on packs. British Airways charges more for weight than Olympic. Security took a round out of Kirk, but we made it through in time to grab a last Greek “twinkie” (the chocolate croissants we love) and the plane was boarding. The flight was uneventful although we did not get to sit together since I couldn’t do a web check in as there was no internet within any reasonable distance from the marina. On arrival we found out luggage (although it was the last to show…we thought we had lost it) and then found our way to the car rental. That took some time, as did waiting to get … …..continue reading →
