Dora Sámos

... harbour became silted over seemed out of sync with the rest of Europe in its time of immersion in the Dark Ages. So much knowledge was lost or suppressed at that time by those who contributed nothing to the rational and wonderful development of the world. The civilisations that created places such as Ephesus and the Acropolis were so advanced and their writings and thoughts were burned in the large libraries they had created by the pagan ignorant and the Christian destroyers. How ...

Kusadasi was a surprise!! We arrived around noon and left the ship for a quick visit up a windy 1500 foot drive up a cliff to the House of the Virgin Mary which is supposed to be her final resting place. It was a small stone building in the pines and a truly beautiful place. We then drove to the ancient ruins of Ephesis which remains an awe-inspiring city in an amazing setting. Beautiful marble colonnades ...

(Steve)

Turkey was an interesting place. Friendly but quite pushy, the merchants literally stood in the street and tried to herd us into their stores, acting as if you were rude for not looking at their wares. We had pre-booked an excursion to see the ancient ruins at Ephesus that was well worth it considering the out of the way location and the commentary of our guide. Once built near a bay and an important trade route, silting turned ...

A day at sea and some time to catch up a little. We were in Kusadasi, Turkey yesterday. As we have been steadyly moving east, the age of the cities and the sites we visit keep getting older. . In Rome we were looking at buildings constructed anywhere from 200 BC to the second century. As we traveled through the Greek islands some sites like the Acropolis at Lindos (Rhodes) were originally built around 800 BC. Turkey and Iran it ...

... and he had booked us somewhere on the front at a bargain price again well done Beebs.

We spent the day doing what many Greeks do nothing much, had a mooch around the shops and Ian spotted a language school so he is now printing his CV off to go and hand it into them. We went for lots of chocolate milk drinks another thing I am addicted to cold chocolate milk with crushed ice its fit and Ian love Frappe ...

... trip so not done too bad. As the waves where nearly 5 foot high it was impossible to swim on this part of the beach but Ian had saw that there was another part of the beach around the harbour where you could swim so we headed there and went for a lovely swim together.

Manchester united where playing Manchester City and we saw that one of the bars next to the harbour had it on so off we went for a few beers ...

... and I had a greek meat plate yum yum. After food we went for a walk along the shore this area has strong winds in September called Meltimi that make the waves really high like being in Cornwall so we were sat watching them when we saw either a shooting star or an UFO we are still not sure what it was it kind of fluttered in the sky for a bit then shot off convinced it was aliens!!!! Anyways after that experience off to bed before they try and come and get us.

... be made on the basis of these in-tact ruins. We then returned to the hotel to freshen up a bit before meeting up again with Jimmy so that he could tell us the 'story' of each carpet we bought. No doubt we can bore you with these stories at a later date. After this ritual was completed we ventured out to the front café area to soak up a few drinks before heading to bed. We have had a full and exhausting but most enjoyable couple of days here. We leave tomorrow to head to Canakkale.

... law was there to carry all of our bags and direct us to their very fine pension. I've always found it funny how everyone in Turkey is related to everyone else. Or how everyone has a cousin or a brother in the states. But I have to give it to them, they are networked better than Amway. The Turks are born business men. Once we got settled in our new place, we went to explore our new surroundings. We climbed along some small mountains around the town and looked at ...

... island, up to the tiny village of Pagondas and then on along high road with fabulous views of the Bay of Marathokampos. Ended up at the Beach at Psili Ammos, had a swim, had some lunch, snoozed for a couple of hours. Moved on to the North of the Island, passing Samos' second port of Karlovasi, a desolate and run-down place open to the elements, and stopped for another swim at Lemonaki beach before ...