Marmaris, Turkey

Just a quickie,
We've arrived at Marmaris, Turkey and managed to check-in despite it
being Friday night and Saturday morning. We were sent all over the place
by well meaning people, and have been rubber stamped by health
department (no death or contagious disease on board), immigration for
visa (€15 each), port police, customs, harbour master (€10). The first
stage is to buy the transit log from the Chamber of Shipping (€50). This
has just moved from the town shopping mall to the cruise port (where
customs and port police are based). Staff in the marina, liveaboards and
the harbour master all sent us to the wrong place!!
It was weird that we were free to wander around town on Friday night,
technically without a visa or passport stamp, as they were all closed.
Everyone is very relaxed about the formalities. Turkish people
everywhere are helpful polite and chatty, with a genuine interest in who
you are and where you are from. There's a fair amount of hussle on the
seafront to compete for restaurant and carpet business, but not
menacing, just funny and time-consuming as you have to chat to every
restaurant owner.
Netsel marina is being very well run by Charlie, the previous manager of
Finike, where we are headed. So that bodes well for us later. He is
really encouraging a liveaboard community, or family as he calls it, in
the marina. For convenience, price and access to the town, theres no
comparison with Marmaris Yat Marine 8km out of town, with just the one
restaurant to choose from. We went along to the end of season liveaboard
BBQ and met a few people who are spending the winter in Netsel.
The weather is really warm (27 degrees) sunny and no wind. Anchored out
in the bay off the 'sunset strip' of nightclubs we thought we might not
get much sleep, but it all closed down by 1am which isn't bad for a
Saturday night.
Off tomorrow to visit another nice anchorage on the way east.
Love
Steph and Stu xx