Cesme & Chios

Cesme is a summer resort town just 1 ½ hours by bus from Izmir and Chios is a Greek Island that is just another 1 ½ hours by ferry from Cesme.  This past weekend, October 1 & 2, I visited both. 

I took the bus on Friday evening to Cesme and found a room at a pension listed in the Lonely Planet travel Guide.  Again I had a balcony, air conditioning, wireless and breakfast included.  As a bonus, I had a fantastic view of the harbor which had two huge cargo ships, ferry boats for Greece and Italy, personal yachts and sailboats owned by Turkish and British and Russians, small local wooden fishing boats and big wooden “gullets” for day and weeklong tourist cruises.  Add clear skies, a wind, and temperatures lower than Izmir and I was in heaven! (My room was on the floor with the sign on the balcony.)

On Friday night I found a restaurant that served Italian food and I went all out: a nice big green salad with tomatoes, onions, and (unfortunately) cucumbers; penne pasta with chicken in a cream sauce; bread; and a glass of red wine.  Wonderful.  I love the Turkish cuisine, which is heavy on the veggies, little meat and tomatoes in just about every cooked dish, but it was nice to have something different!

Saturday morning I headed for the ferry around 8:30 and ended up in a long line for passport control.  Lots of people go back and forth between the island and mainland, but this means going from one country to another, so passports have to be checked both on departure and on arrival, making for long lines.  On board the ferry I met two gals; one from the US and the other from London.  Both live and work in Turkey and every three months go to Chios and get new three-month visas upon their return to Turkey.  Jennifer, from California, lives in Istanbul, works for a textile company with their British and Irish accounts, is engaged to a Turkish man from Cesme and speaks Turkish.   Louise lives in Ayden not far from Izmir, teaches English, has been married for 2 ½ years to a Turkish man, is four months pregnant, and also speaks Turkish.  It was great to meet them and visit with them and get their perspectives on a few Turkish things that I did not know.   Since they have made this trip many times, they were also skilled at getting through the line on the Greek side upon arrival.  The Game Plan: Get to the boat exit long before arrival to be the first ones off and RUN to the passport control window as everyone except EU passport holders must go to the same line.  So Jennifer took my hand and we ran to the line and were the second ones there!  What a relief as two boats came in at the same time and I’m sure it took a good hour for some people to get through the line! 

Anyway, we had lunch at a café together and then I was off to my tour.  The tour guide spoke only Turkish, which I knew when I bought the tour, but I wanted to see more than the one town on the island.  It turned out fine, as I found a gal who spoke some English and she was able to tell me the important things like how much time we had in each place and when to be back on the bus!  I also had a booklet about the island written in English, so I was able read about the places we were visiting.  A couple of things about this island: Homer lived and worked on this island for many years and may have been born here as well, although a number of other places also claim to be his birth town.  Christopher Columbus was known to have stopped here on one of his voyages.  There is a tree native to the south end of this island, called mastic, that is known for its sap or “gum” which is used for many purposes, including pharmaceutical, over which there were a number of battles as different ethnic groups wanted ownership of the island and the mastic gum industry.  The Genoese, Greeks, Turks and others all were in control at different times.  Because of this valuable commodity, towns were built within city walls and the pathways through them are like mazes.  I’m sure the tour guide explained a lot more about them, but…   We stopped first at , walked through the town and the church and then had time for lunch in the town center.  I took way to many photos, but had fun trying to get some good shots.  Also, there was free wireless, so I used my iPhone for a photo of me in the town square and uploaded it to Facebook. 

The second town was a bit different in that the streets were wider and in some areas cars could actually drive through.  Also, unique to this village are the decorations of the homes.  They whitewash the building and then scratch away to make geometric designs.  Really cool looking and I haven’t a clue why they do this!  Again, way too many photos!

We returned to the port just in time for the ferry – I think our bus was the last one to get back.  There were not nearly as many people on board on the return; many people stay a few days on the island and make it a holiday.  I visited with Jennifer and Louise again who felt quite successful with their shopping trip and said good bye when we landed back in Turkey.  I went back to the same restaurant as I had the night before, this time for the salad without cucumbers and a steak with a spinach cream sauce over it!  Heaven!  (Now back to the healthy delicious Turkish cuisine this week.)

When I got back to my room, I took a shower and then I could not get the water to turn off!  The owner had told me if I needed anything during my stay, that his father lived on the floor below and I could get him.  So, down I went to try to explain to an elderly gentleman who spoke no English that the water was stuck on.  I tried three words in Turkish: no stop water/hayer dur su, but he couldn’t understand!!!  And here I thought I was doing so good with my Turkish!  He came up, saw the problem and then called his son.  The owner ended up having to come and fix it.  The whole thing probably took about a half hour.  In the mean time, the older gentleman explained through single words and gestures that he had diabetes and has lost all his toes making walking difficult.   Also, the bathroom was one of these things that has been added to the room after the fact, so you must step up into it.  And, it is much like a head on a boat: the shower is not separate and the whole (small) bathroom gets wet when you use it!  So, the toilet paper must be kept outside of the room.

I spent Sunday morning walking through Cesme and the waterfront, visiting the castle and small museum in it, and sitting at a café on the waterfront watching the fishermen and then the tourists walking by.  Many people were wearing sweaters and windbreakers, while I sat there in my tank top thinking that the temperature and slight breeze was perfect!  There really were not many tourists in the town, most of the restaurants were empty and some didn’t even open.  The pension where I stayed was closing for the season as well. 

My bus ride back was a full bus, with a lot of confusion over who belonged in what seat.  When I got on, someone was in my seat, so I sat in the next empty one.  I think everyone on the bus had done that, and the attendant was in a tizzy trying to get everyone to move to the right seats!  The bus ride ended at the southwestern bus terminal and I had no idea had to proceed home from there.  I asked the attendant and another man jumped up and helped as he spoke English.  They told me I needed bus 3000, no, 300 and to go “over there” with a vague wave of the hand!  Two young gals also got off the bus and I approached them and one of them went and asked someone else, and again I was told bus 3 thousand, no 3 hundred and to go “over there”!  There was a huge parking lot with cars parked every which way that I am sure would take hours to untangle and I could see a huge, huge shopping bazaar over to one side.  I blindly made my way through the cars and found that there was a big local bus terminal on the other side.  I couldn’t find the stop for “3000, no 300” so I asked, someone who spoke English was found, and I was pointed in the right direction for bus number 300.  I was at the south side of the bay that the city sits on and I needed to go all the way around the bay to the north side.  I was a bit uncertain about this, as I didn’t know if I would recognize where I needed to get off.  It ended up working perfectly, with the bus following the shoreline as much as it could and I recognized first the Konak area that I stayed the first few days, and then also the way that I had traveled last weekend, and then finally, the waterfront of Kasiyaka, the area that I am staying in!  I knew exactly where I was and how to get home from there!  What luck! 

Abdullah was waiting for me and we played a few games of backgammon in which he proceeded to totally destroy me!  Only in one game was I anywhere near close to him and that was because of his help.  I have a long way to go!