Grand Turkish Travels

Miranda Delmar-Morgan finds paradise on a week's sailing holiday, reaching back and forth between the two spectacular coasts of the Gulf of Gököva aboard a traditional Turkish gullet.

This might sound completely over the top, but I can't help it - I've been overwhelmed by a week in Turkey, on one of Tussock Cruising's gulets. We - myself and 10 other guests, most of whom had not met before - arrived in Bodrum on a Saturday evening to spend a week in the Gulf of Gököva. We were met by minibus at the airport and promptly transported into another world.

Grandi I - a traditionally built wooden gullet - lay stern-to a dock in Tussock's own shipyard at Icmeler, lined up with her sister ships. With her massive 21ft beam she seemed bigger than her 89ft. We stepped into dark balmy air and were dazzled by acres of sparkling varnish. As I stepped aboard, the captain Ümit Çetok, politely asked me to take my shoes off. 'But they're sailing shoes', I protested. 'Ah, but they're dirty,'he replied. Through the cavernous saloon I saw a trail of Turkish rugs that led away up a long passage. I felt guilty: of course I should take my shoes off - the boat was immaculate. I handed them over and kneaded my bare toes on the large mats of coiled lines 'cheesed' on the aft deck. We cast off immediately and charged in flat water at 10 knots around the corner into the bay of Bodrum.

The boat was soundlessly run by Ümit and three crew. After a toot on the horn, the deckhand let out lengths of chain and we settled stern-to the shore with one of the 'cheeses' employed as a stern line around a nearby rock. The steward laid the lengthy cockpit table with a fresh linen cloth and we were served champagne and hors d'oeuvres. We were then instructed that we may join in the sailing if we wished, no paper down the heads, and that one crew member always sleeps in the saloon. 'What for?' said a guest. 'To serve the gin and tonics,' I replied. It became apparent that I was the most seasoned sailor on board, most of the guests being London-based journalists, and I felt a duty to help them at ease. Several drinks later they were very much at ease. We were served a gastronomic delight of squid, butter bean purée, a mixed salad pungent with fresh herbs, mackerel and pasta.

James Collard and Lisa Cummins were keen dancers and produced a range of CDs. The boat had a powerful music system and we were all soon dancing on the vast aft deck. The cook, deckhand and steward hovered shyly on the edges. Ümit gave his permission for them to join us and he was no mean dancer himself. The dancing went on until 0200, but I retired about an hour earlier and lay in my double bunk listening to the laughter and rhythmic thumping that vibrated its way past the engine-room. It looked as if it was going to be a good holiday.

Tussock Cruising is run and owned by a Dutch woman, Loes Douze. Loes spends a week per month on one of her boats. She has a great flare for style and attention to detail. The comprehensive booklets she sent in advance gave a potted history of a country that has experienced 75 different civilizations and has 2,500 sites of archaeological interest. The trips she arranged were a welcome mix of culture and ethnic.

Our guide was Çanan (pronounced 'Jana'), an archaeologist. She was a tiny woman, dark skinned with bright red hennaed hair. She took us on trips around a Carian temple (dating from 400BC) at Euromos and an ancient site at Heraklia, on Lake Bafa. She enthused about the Carians whose script remains undeciphered. The world's first historian, Herodotus, she proudly told us, was not Greek as commonly believed, but Carian - from Halicarnassus (Bodrum).

She showed us the Carians' plundered cradle tombs and explained that they had been raided for the coins that had been placed in the mouths of the dead. The coins were 'bus fares' for their journeys to the 'other side'. I don't know how it came about but she got onto the subject of 'washing genitalia'. There was tittering among us. 'Don't laugh!' she cried in a heavy Turkish accent. 'Washing genitalia is not a laughing matter.'

And we all roared with laughter. We then had a wonderful lunch at the Agora Pension, up the hill in Kapikiri. Another trip ashore was a visit to a mosque in Mazi (female travellers should take long-sleeved shirts, trousers and a head scarf), after an alcohol-free lunch. The water font for washing outside had been donated by Ümit's mother in gratitude for the restoration of her husband's health. He had convalesced here when Ümit was young.

One late afternoon we anchored stern-to a beach in Küffre in Yediadalar (Seven Islands) with the gangplank resting directly on the beach in spite of our 13ft draught. We walked ashore and visited a self-sufficient community living entirely off the land.

The residents were delighted with gifts of soap and toothpaste and happy to spend a few hours chatting since they have no passing traffic. One of them, with his wonderful beard and bright red scarf, was known alternatively as Flykan or Robinson (as in Crusoe).

'I don't need anything other than a little fishing,' he said, 'and some conversation. God is here, God is life.' His peace of mind and the tranquil surroundings were hypnotic. On our return to the boat we were amazed to find that the crew had transported the entire cockpit table onto the beach. It was laid with a fresh cloth, glasses and hurricane lanterns, and a barbecue was in the making.

A trip to the barbers is not to be missed. In Gümüslük Stuart Williams was lathered, shaved with a cut-throat razor, scrutinized for ingrowing hairs and had his nostrils trimmed. The barber then fashioned a 'Q tip', dipped it into paraffin, set it alight and plunged it into his ears. Stuart's face and shoulders were massaged and he sat there looking as though he had gone to heaven.

This charter holiday was so much more than just a cruise on the Turkish coast. It felt like an entire Turkish experience. The 100-ton boat needed 30 knots of wind to get her going and so after breakfast and a skipper's briefing we usually swam and did excursions until the breeze picked up. We sailed in the afternoons and anchored in bays that echoed with birdsong - often the only boat there. It was truly paradise.

Stuart and James had trouble catching a fish. It would have been a shame to disappoint them. I quietly suggest to Ümit that half a bottle of water on the end of the line would tug nicely. Ümit produced an aubergine. We then clutched each other and wept as the 'fishermen' reeled it in to spectators' claims that it was 'a purple fish', and that it was 'putting up a fight'.

Grandi I is a staysail schooner with a wishbone to control the clew of the fisherman. For some extraordinary reason there was a fixed stay halfway down the sidedeck between the running backstay and the aft lower shroud. This meant that you couldn't ease the main for a broad reach so the boat was regularly underpowered.

The main and staysails have no travellers. Their twin sheeting arrangements is unusual and misunderstood. The sails were regularly strapped in on the windward sheet. This set the booms almost fore and aft giving the sails twisted and fluttering leeches. However, any tweaking I did implied a criticism and ran the risk of offending Ümit. So I gave up trying to trim the boat effectively, and instead relaxed and enjoyed being pampered.

Tussock is proud of its sailing gulets because they do actually sail. Guests on other boats told us they were heartily fed up with motoring about on boats with naked spars. Tussock has nine gullets of differing sizes, and one in build. Grandi I has eight double cabins, eight heads and showers, and a 280 hp engine to shove her along in light airs. She also has a 33kW generator for 220v and hot water.

Loes goes to considerable trouble to try to achieve a successful match of people; families with children of similar ages, singles groups, or couples. She is so successful that she has even had marriages between guests. Sometimes she runs themed cruises: meditative, bridge, painting, chess and others.

There are various discounts, and on your fifth trip you can travel free. You are expected to eat ashore a couple of evenings at your own expense. Wine, beer and bottled water sit on ice in a large cool box in the cockpit where you can help yourself. Some companies tack on the drinks as an extra cost and a friend told me her drinks' bill on another gullet had exceeded that of her share of the hire of the boat. This wasn't a practice adopted by Tussock, since all food and drink is included in the price of the booking.

Several excursions ashore cost a mere £20, which included meals. Our itinerary was quite packed and I skipped an afternoon's sailing in order to spend time in Bodrum.

On the final day we all trouped off to one of the oldest Turkish baths ( hamam ) in Bodrum and half a dozen of us were laid out on a hot marble slab. It is unusual for the sexes to be mixed and it was an intimate affair. I was loufahed all over by a dark, handsome Turk, then smothered in lemon-scented bubbles and washed and soaped like a baby by a woman. She massaged my toes and washed my hair. After a cooling-off session outside with Turkish tea, I was given a massage with banana-scented oil. I came out so light-headed and woozy I could hardly stand up.

All of which left me with only one real complaint: I really need a snooze at sea after lunch. But, as a Turkish poet - Cevat Sakir Kabaagaçh, known as 'The Fisherman of Halicarnassus' - said: 'Failure to your journey into the Gulf of Gököva while visiting Bodrum would be like going up to the gate of a palace and not entering', I had entered the gate of the palace and as we reached back and forth between two spectacular coasts it would have been a crime to shut my eyes.

Copy in the box:

The good: the pampering, the scenery, the excursions, the service, the food, the immaculate boat, Turkish hospitality. Flexible itinerary.