Photo: Mannequins in a shop window in Istanbul

After taking leave of Wendy in Rhodes, we took a ferry to Marmaris, Turkey, a popular boating center and vacation destination for Turks and Europeans, to begin looking in earnest for a boat to buy. We worked with two yacht brokers who showed us any number of lovely (and a few not-so-lovely) boats, but none with the classic lines and full keel that we were hoping for. In addition, most of the boats were larger than I thought we'd be comfortable handling.

When we needed a break from looking at boats, we took a number of side trips: We spent a week in Istanbul, where we met up with our friend Pickett, who had just finished a pilgrimage in Portugal and Spain and was on her way back to the States. We "did" the usual tourist sites: Topkapi Palace, Aya Sofia, Blue Mosque, Basilica Cistern, Grand Bazaar, etc., but we mainly just enjoyed walking around the city. (Pickett, wearing a pedometer, claims that we walked 17 miles our first day there).

During another lull in our boat-buying pursuit, we took an overnight, 13-hour bus ride to Cappadocia in central Turkey. If you ever find yourself in Turkey, be sure not to miss this area featuring a surreal landscape of fairy chimneys, rock-cut churches, and underground cities! We stayed at the cute Kiwi Pension in Goreme, and toured the ancient underground city of Derinkuyu, with its eleven levels that could shelter up to 50,000 people, together with their livestock! You might enjoy the series of documentary videos on the underground cities dug into the soft volcanic rock where entire populations of Christians hid from marauders.

Yet another side-trip was to ancient Ephesus, the best-preserved classical city in the eastern Med (again, not to be missed!). The ongoing archaeological work here is amazing: the mosaics of the fabulous terrace houses on the hillside are being painstakingly reconstructed, tile by tile -- talk about a 100,000-piece jigsaw puzzle!