Let me sum up an email chain while trying to organize our Turkey trip. Please know this is a very liberal translation, as those emails are hopelessly lost in an email account that was viciously hacked causing me to start over with a new email and all that jazz…but I’m not bitter. At. All.
Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, emailing:
April: I found a tour that encompasses ANZAC day activities and Istanbul and several historic sites like Troy and Ephesus….and…IF we wanted, we could add a yacht cruise through the southern Greek Isles.
Me: Hell yes we want to add a yacht cruise through the southern Greek Isles! Don’t we?
April: yes, of course we do (NOTE: April has much better sea legs than I do, but I have a much better sailor’s mouth than she!!)
Now when I think of yacht, I think:
And I knew KNEW there was no way our yacht was going to look like that. However, I was NOT prepared for the S.S. Minnow. Okay, so it wasn’t that bad…but it was close.
Granted it’s a cute little boat. But it was not a yacht. NOT A YACHT! And it had 10 very tiny cabins. Thankfully the fabulous and wonderful Osgur, our Turkish guide, talked the Captain into letting April & I have our own separate cabins since we were not a couple. Good thing too because these cabins were the tiniest spaces, with beds slightly bigger than a twin.
One thing the yacht boat did have going for it was that we had the best chef. Every meal he prepared was amazing. I even ate eggplant–and liked it! And for the record, I don’t like eggplant and tend to avoid it like the plague…but his eggplant was delectable. Turns out he was using baby eggplant and through a series of gesticulations and a very broken English and Turkish, I believe he said that only baby eggplants were worth eating. Now would be a great time to mention that between the Captain, Chef, and Deck Hand, they spoke maybe 20 words in English, which of course, was much better than our 3 words in Turkish! Sorry, no pictures of the food–we were way too busy eatin’ to even think about snapping pictures!!
Our aft-side cabins smelled like diesel any time the yacht boat was in motion, which was a great motivator to be outside taking in all the fresh air and stunning views of the open waters of the Aegean Sea. More than once I was awoken way too early by the sounds and smells of the motor running, so I would just grab my blankie and went to nap on the deck.
The water was so blue and clear it was stunning. We did have a couple of swim stops, but as the water was fr-r-r-r-r-reezing, April and I abstained.
One final note: we had a fellow tourist who was continually lamenting about how the “haze” was completely messing up his pics…The HAAAAAZE!!!….but I rather think it gave some of our pictures a nice air of shrouded mystery, which I feel is perfectly acceptable when you’re on a yacht boat in the middle of the sea.
The Epicurious Texan 
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