Canakkale 14 May

Woke up to a beautiful day with plans to visit the Galipoli peninsula with a tour leaving at 11.30.Leslie and Kevin taking a stroll on the marina jetty waiting for the checking in process to be completed. But it took the full morning to get LelleBelle and the crew legally into the country. And until then Carl and Kevin were not allowed to leave the marina. Only after completing this procedure was Leslie allowed to enter onto the boat. Legally that is.

Visited the Naval Museum with an open air exhibitors featuring the naval battle of 18 March 1915. As everywhere else there is a statue of Mustafa Kemal Attaturk, with dates1881- eternity, on the the plaque. So, he never dies!

Canakkale has a wonderful vibrant seafront with cafes and restaurants, a wonderful mix of people, shoeshiners and black mussels on sales as snacks. And TheTroy horse, from the movie, Troy. The town, Troja is close by. Not sure if we will visit it.

The promenade, Marina in the background and the Gallipoli peninsula on the other side.

Have read up a bit about Canakkale. Canakkale is one of the first towns founded by the ottomans. Mehmet the conqueror built a fortress in 1462 and the workers just stayed on. Canakkale is situated on the narrowest point of the Dardanelles. The history of the Dardanelles includes according to Greek mythology, the Argonauts, a band of heroes, who were looking for the Golden Fleece of the ram that helped the escape of the children of Athanas. A long story but ends with that one of the children, Helle, fell of the ram and drowned, thus the original name of the Dardanelles was Hellesspont. Then we have Leander who was in love with Hero, and swam across the straits every night to be with her, but who drowned one stormy night when Heros guiding light blew out. And finally, apparently Lord Byron swam across the straits just for fun.( might have to check that).

Small fish fish market. At least ten cats hanging around waiting for a fish to jump out of the tray. 

We are staying in the Canakkale Marina, which is quite ok, in the middle of the town, and have met a few other travellers. A couple from Switzerland, who left today for Istanbul, an Australian who makes good coffee, and a very nosey American who is sometimes quite helpful. A 15 metre yacht from the UK armed forces school ship. And we are stuck between to rather large boats, one with 4 gentlemen from Croatia and on the other side a young family from Estonia. LB nicely squeezed in between these two boats.