All roads lead to Rhodes
26 May 2017 | Mandraki harbour Rhodes Town
Alan enjoying the warm breeze
Well!...after our little tustle with the Turkish navy, we finally headed out of Turkish waters early on Wednesday morning (before coasguard gettng up time). We had a bit of a slog getting over as the previous days perfect north westerlies had been replaced with westerlies...which more or less was the direction we needed to be. Anyway, we finally arrived in Mandraki harbour in Rhodes town, it is a busy little harbour right under the walls of "old rhodes" town.
Entering the harbour, I was unable to get down the Turkish flag that you have to fly whilst sailing in Turkish waters. I did think, this might not go down too well, however, I did not think it would cause such consternation for one old Greek fisherman standing at the entrance only 15 metres away, whose face turned crimson and he started shouting about flying the Turkish flag...lack of respect for the whole Greek nation and all sorts of other misdemeanours. At one point I thought he was going to down fishing rod, strip off and swim over to continue with his ranting and raving....fortunately our mooring turned out to be diagonally opposite where he was clearly close to having a seisure, so mad was he. Greek flag now blowing gently in the breeze by the way, so all well.
As usual , the winds were rattling away as we tried to reverse into our tight little spot on the quay. After much tooing and froing ...and along with worried glances from our neighbours, we finally managed to attach to Greece with a line or two and 40 metres of chain out front. It is a lovely spot, far enough from the main road but within easy reach of all the amenities. Customs and harbour transactions were taken care of by an agent here who, whilst Greek, was born and raised in Narf Landon, as he would say. A really nice bunch of people who have been a great help to us.
Old Rhodes town is stunning. The perfectly preserved walls enclose a beautiful old town with alleyways , old churches and houses. It is largely unspoilt , with only a few areas turned over to trinket selling and nice Greek gentlemen offering you goldfish bowls full of gunk that might blow your socks off. The old town first established during the first crusade is an amazing fortification which you can hardly comprehend being built at the time it was. Let me tell you , todays Barratt houses will not look this good in a thousand years time.
We are enjoying sitting here in the harbour, watching hundreds of people wonder up and down the pretty quayside, we are moored third windmill before lighthouse, if you feel the need to send us a postcard. Our British flag along with our Saltire and Georges cross gets us into conversation with various passers by, its all very jolly.
Greek baklava has been taken as you can imagine, generally, in our experience, Greek baklava is a step up from Turkish baklava...and we should know as we have sampled enough to be considered "Experts".
Day to day living here is also a step up from Turkey with everything being a good deal more expensive, the only thing, oddly, so far that is much cheaper are the moorings in the harbour. A moorng in Gocek, Turkey being around 50 euro a night whereas here it costs 12 euro. Mind you, here, you are sharing your mooring with the world at large.