Datça

The long-range weather forecast spoilt our plans to enjoy a week at pretty anchorages around the Bozburun/ Datça area before heading back to Greece. That said, we’d already achieved our main aim which was the shopping trip to Marmaris. Looking ahead, we wanted to get across to the western side of the Aegean for early September to meet up with our buddy Strevs before he leaves Athens. He only had a few free days and so we needed to get close so that we could spend that time together rather than his spending hours on ferries getting out to us. The issue was that the wind was not looking very pleasant from Thursday through until at least Monday, right when we would, ideally, have been sailing northwest towards Athens. Looking at the medium-term forecast, there would still be some hard sailing but we needed to be moving before the meltemi started to blow again.

Kizil Adasi passage   

Before leaving Turkey we’d also need to complete the standard exit formalities. Bodrum or Datça were the 2 suitable contenders for ports to do that. Bodrum, we’d read, was the more expensive and awkward of the 2 for the bureaucracy but it did have the advantage of being further north. Datça we were familiar with and knew a yacht agency that we could use. We opted for Datça as the next destination.

Leaving Bozburun at 1230 on 26 August we made our way through the lovely Kizil Adasi passage. Shallowing to just 3.5 metres the sandy bottom gives the sea a beautiful turquoise colour.

Last look back at Bozburun   

It would have been nice to have stopped for a swim but we had a westerly wind which would mean some beating to get west to Datça.

But, with the late departure we did have the advantage of a good sailing wind and the wind angles actually worked out as more favourably than we had anticipated.

Approaching Datça   

The direct track to Datça was about 18 miles and we actually sailed only 20.6 miles; we had expected to have to sail quite a lot further. As it happened, the wind was bent into a more southwesterly, up the channel between the Datça peninsula and Sími, which meant that we could sail a much more direct route.

The evening view from our cockpit   

Datça seemed to be very quiet. Arriving at 1615 we thought that we’d struggle to find space on the quay. Only one yacht was anchored off (this time last year there were half a dozen or more in the anchorage) and there was space for about 20 yachts on the quay. The quay did fill up a bit later when more gulets arrived but it was nothing like as busy as during our previous visits.

One or 2 nights in Datça was the question? The updated weather forecast provided the answer: just one night. I filled the water tanks whilst Nicky did some food shopping and dropped off the paperwork with the yacht agent to get the clearance process going. Then we discussed our options. With predominantly northwestly and northerly winds the pilot book suggested that we either worked our way north before crossing west or we sailed a long way southwest before working our way north towards Athens on the western side of the Aegean. We analysed the forecast knowing that looking 5-6 days ahead is a very inexact science. In the end we decided to go north first, mainly because there are more islands to give us overnight stopping options.

BV bathed in blue underwater bling lights courtesy of the motorboat next door   

Datça, Turkey