"Cruising the Lycian Shore" is our first cruise in Turkey since October 2019, On this occasion, to give an impression of the experience, we are providing a kind of travel diary. Every day we will pick one image we took that day, accompanied by some explanations and thoughts.
Some of our itineraries are action-packed (or content-packed, to be more precise) from the very beginning, others start in a more leisurely fashion. "Cruising the Lycian Shore", as we currently run it, is one of the latter. Today was devoted to settling into the gulet's onboard lifestyle, to learning some basic and initial facts about the region and its history, but most importantly, to enjoying the scenery and the sea!
In practice, this means that our gulet spent the whole day in the Gulf of Fethiye - a large inlet with a convoluted coastline of peninsulas, bays and many small islets, mostly covered in pine forest and wild olives, and overlooked by tall mountains in the distance: a peaceful and attractive combination of sceneries. Having woken up in one lovely cove, ideal for enjoying a traditional Turkish breakfast and a chance to swim, we made our way to another attractive cove, for more swimming and a light lunch (and all manner of conversation), before setting out for a third, even more beautiful cove, where we spent the later afternoon, with a lot more time to swim - and eventually, a delightful dinner.
Swimming in the late summer's Mediterranean is an elementary experience: it can be soothing, refreshing, exciting, fulfilling, inspiring or even all at the same time. Since our boats provide snorkelling equipment, it also offers an occasional chance to see what's beneath. In the case of our evening cove, my photograph shows the typical undersea scene of these parts: a world apart, of rocks, some seagrass and a variety of small to medium-sized fish, all bathed in a deep blue, variegated by the ripples of the surface above and the way they break the sun's rays.
Who knows what we'll find down there in the coming days? Tomorrow, we'll certainly encounter some Byzantine remains, above water!
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