Day 15, Monday - Rhodes, boat to Marmaris, Turkey
The next morning I explored the roof garden to take photographs. A young French woman with blond hair was taking a shower in the nude. She didn't seem to mind my presence. Her friends, both male and female were nearby and took no special notice either. It seems that Europeans really have a different view of nudity than Americans. From the roof garden, one can view several mosques without crescents or minarets. There are castle walls surrounding the city and a fortress in the distance.
There are a significant number of Italians here. They started coming when Tiberias was exiled here by Augustus Ceasar in the first century B.C. After the Knights and the Turks were ousted, the island was under Italian control until the end of World War II. Mousolini built a palace here which we toured.
After breakfast, I told George we were going straight to the shipping line to see about passage to Turkey. He then mentioned that it might be possible to get to Turkey that day if I got to the office early. When we got to the shipping office, the Turks handled our passports in a very routine manner along with at least half a dozen other tourists who were there to make the trip also.
Pam and I still had plenty of time to walk through two museums and see the entire castle fortress. The fortified walls are still intact and surround the entire old city. An enormous moat still surrounds the walls, but is filled with trees and other fauna instead of water. Its not difficult to figure out how the knights of Saint George managed to keep the Turks at bay.
All the medieval stalls within the fortress are filled with modern sellers of trinkets, giving the effect of a real bazaar. There was no dearth of tourists shopping at every stall. In fact, the city of Rhodes has a real traffic problem. Materialism is rampant. People come here to shop. If you are looking for gently swaying trees under a bright sun overlooking a serene seashore, this is not the place.
I don't know why, but I didn't like Rhodes. I liked our room, but not the people who ran it. People here are too glamorous and there are too many of them. They are not nature lovers, they seek the kind of excitement that is usually found in casinos and bars. This might be a nice place to visit in February, but not at the height of the tourist season.
Marmaris, Turkey
The boat ride to Turkey from Rhodes took an hour. As we got closer to the Turkish coast, we could see cascading mountains descending into the sea. As we got even closer, we saw many yachts in the harbor with red Turkish flags flapping in the wind. More red Turkish flags were on the shore presenting a stark contrast to the serene and verdant hills in the background. The town of Marmaris was full of tourist shops.
We took the first hotel we saw at the center of town. After we checked in, we were led up four flights of stairs to a hot and noisy room overlooking the center of town. Pam had a fit after climbing all those stairs and cried for half an hour. While I lay on the bed listening to her, a heavy wooden awning broke and fell six inches from my head. We complained to the owner and got another room.
After Pam calmed down, we went out and walked along the bay to a restaurant. Along the way, there were more flags fluttering in the wind. Of course, we didn't know any Turkish, so it was a little difficult to read the menu. The Turks didn't know English either, but everybody was friendly and trying to communicate. Every patron's table had their national flag. The Turks really have a real liking for flags. The waiter grasped that we spoke English and put the British flag on our table. I put it back on a counter of flags and got an American one. Pam got out the guide book for Turkey and we started learning a few key phrases provided. The Turks are elated when they hear foreigners speaking their language. Fortunately, one of the few Turkish words we knew was Shish Kabob, so guess what we had for dinner?
If you have comments or suggestions, email me at
