Hazev – Delicious Turkish food in London.

Posted on May 3, 2018 by livingtheturkishdream

It was our 2nd wedding anniversary last week, so we went to a Turkish restaurant to celebrate.

The name of the restaurant is Hazev, a cross between the words ‘haz’ meaning ‘enjoyment’, and ‘ev’ meaning ‘home’. It’s near Canary Wharf, between South Quay and Heron Quay DLR stations, right on the waterside with outdoor and indoor seating, I bet it’s lovely to sit outside in summer!

We have eaten here once before, and was really impressed. The waiters recognised us from before and showed us to a table, right next to the window. Berkay had met me at the station after work, armed with a bunch of flowers, bless him, so they were an added table decoration!

Almost as soon as we sat down we were given complimentary bread, olives and a garlic yogurt dip which were very yummy.

Then came the hard part of choosing what to order! I’d been looking at the menu whilst at work, trying to decide what to chose, there are SO many options I just couldn’t narrow it down! 3 courses or 2, starter or dessert, chicken or red meat… so many delicious dishes on offer (and a very pretty menu with a whirling dervish on!).

We settled on sharing two starters, karides tava (fried king prawns with garlic dip), and borek (pastry triangles filled with spinach and feta cheese) with salad. Both were delicious but a little overpriced for what they were, I think. The prawns were around £6 and the borek £7.

For the main course, I had Iskender, which I’d never had before, not even in Turkey! This looked different to photos I’d seen of a traditional Iskender kebab though, they always look a bit of a sloppy mess! It consisted of a mixed grill of meats covered in tomato sauce and yogurt, on fried bread cubes and served with red cabbage.

Berkay had the ‘havez special’ – oven cooked lamb chunks, served on grilled aubergine puree, mixed with cheese, with red cabbage, peppers and tomato salad. I tried a bit of his and it was nice, especially the smokey aubergine puree, my favourite! I think my dish had more meat than his, and I couldn’t finish it so we swapped bowls and he finished mine as well!

When our plates were cleared, we didn’t even need time to think about what to order for dessert….Berkay’s favourite, Kunefe! Kunefe is a popular, authentic Turkish dessert. It’s made from kadayıf (dried shredded dough which looks like shredded wheat) and cheese. It is covered in syrup and eaten straight out of the oven when hot, so the cheese is stringy and gooey but the pastry is crispy. It’s served with crushed pistachios and is delicious, even though it sounds like a weird mixture! Of course we had a glass of Turkish tea to accompany it.

Hazev serves delicious food, although it is a little more fancy and perhaps less traditional. Considering the quality of the food the prices are reasonable, although there was a story a few years ago about it selling an extra special, most expensive kebab in the world, at £900! (You can read about that and watch a video here https://www.standard.co.uk/go/london/restaurants/pricey-pitta-1000-kebab-goes-on-sale-in-london-a3215546.html )

Hazev isn’t just a restaurant – it’s like 3 separate parts, divided by floor length curtains. The restaurant is in the middle section, with a bar through to the left, and a cafe/deli on the right, which also has a little shop section selling some of our favourite Turkish treats, including sucuk, yummy!

It’s definitely worth a visit if you’re in London.

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30 DAYS, 30 DISHES – DAY 22: Çay (Turkish Tea)

Posted on December 6, 2017 by livingtheturkishdream

Çay is probably the most popular drink in Turkey. It is strong, fragrant black tea, grown in the black sea region. It’s brewed in a special teapot, called a çaydanlık, and you can get really beautiful decorative ones! The tea is served in small tulip shaped glasses, usually a cube or spoon of sugar is added.. It is drunk literally everywhere, in all seasons and at all times of day but especially at breakfast – it’s just not breakfast without a glass of tea! When visiting the village, I am served tea all day long, and it’s considered rude to refuse. By the end of my visit I’m pretty sure I have tea flowing through my veins!

When I first moved to Turkey I didn’t like çay at all, but there’s only so many times you can politely drink something you dislike before actually growing to love it. I absolutely love it now and we often drink it at home here in London, although it just does not taste the same here!

Apple tea has become associated with Turkey too, but it’s mostly a tourist thing, very few Turkish people actually drink this.

Wedding Celebrations – ‘Hen’ Afternoon Tea.

Posted on April 15, 2016 by livingtheturkishdream

Last weekend was the real start of the wedding celebrations as some of my family and friends joined me for a ‘hen-do’.

I know it doesn’t really come accross this way through my posts, but anyone who has met me will tell you I am very shy in person, I hate being the centre of attention and having all eyes on me, people singing happy birthday around a birthday cake is bad enough, so the whole wedding process, including dress fittings and hen-do was always going to make me nervous! Me and mum narrowed down the hen party options to two things, a meal in a Turkish restaurant or afternoon tea, and settled on the latter.

I went to the Orsett Hall over in Essex, joined by mum, aunt, nan, stepmum and three friends. It’s a really nice place and has lovely grounds, it’s quite popular too and whenever I’ve been it’s always busy and booked up in advance, there’s always a lot of baby showers there too!

The tables were nicely decorated and my aunt had bought me along a special balloon as well as the little favours my mum had organised – personalised chocolates and sweet bags. Mum also got me the customary ‘bride to be’ sash with ‘The Future Mrs Degirmenci’ and our wedding date written on it which I loved, it all made everything feel so real!

I’ve been to afternoon tea at the Orsett Hall 3 times before and each time it has been lovely, mostly similar food items but always a slightly different mix. This time we had 4 small finger sandwiches each – smoked salmon, cream cheese and cucumber, ham and mustard and egg and cress, which were nice (apart from the smoked salmon.. yuck) but let’s be honest, the real reason anyone goes to afternoon tea is for the cake, right? We had scones, jam and cream, pistachio cupcakes, macaroons, battenberg cake, chocolate covered strawberries and some kind of lemon and fruit dish in a mini jar which I’ve forgotten the name of! Of course the other main component of afternoon tea is the actual tea, and we had unlimited tea of every variety and flavour, fruit or otherwise, as well as water and coffee. I had strawberry and mango tea, lovely! Mum had booked the champagne afternoon tea so we all got a glass of champagne too which made the afternoon even more of a celebration, and the staff bought out a plate with ‘happy hen’ written on in chocolate for me which was a nice touch.

After the lovely food, I opened a few ‘hen’ presents, including these two bride and groom rubber duckies, my friends know me so well! Everyone that came all signed a special personalised plate that mum had found on the internet. I love this idea, everyone writes a message and then you put it in the oven for half an hour and the writing sets into the porcelain plate and becomes permanent and washproof. Definitely something good to keep and display on a special stand when we ever have our own house.

We spent a couple of hours sat at our table eating and chatting and then when outside into the grounds to take some photos, it was quite cold and it started to rain so we just rushed a few snapshots with everyone.

The funniest thing for me was taking a photo in the throne-like chair inside the Orsett Hall. Back in 2008, I had my senior school prom at this venue and had a photo taken of me sitting in the same exact chair. After a bit of digging through old photos I found that photo, and its quite scary when comparing them side by side, I don’t look too much different (although a bit fatter..). Who would have thought that 8 years later I’d be sitting in that same chair at my hen celebration, eh?

We all (I think..) had a lovely afternoon, and in the words of my friend “it was nice to have afternoon tea for a hen do, something different, everyone else just drinks through penis straws!’ which is totally true. Strippers, straws and cakes shaped like body parts and crude things are just not me, and it was lovely to have a nice quiet celebration with a few of my closest family and friends.

Now I have just 10 days left as a ‘Miss Smith’!!!

Turkey Day 4… Statues, Ducks & Red skies at night..

Posted on April 9, 2016 by livingtheturkishdream

I always say how fond I am of Fethiye town centre and even though I lived in Calis, 15minutes away, for 3 years, Fethiye centrum is absolutely my favourite place.

Whenever we were bored, or just wanted a walk and a drive, we headed off to Fethiye, found a parking space and wandered around. There is so much to see it never really bores me. Every town in Turkey has a statue of Ataturk (I only found this out recently) but Fethiye has a lot more than just one so you’re never very far away from a photo opportunity! This one is directly opposite Pizza Tomato and sits pride of place in the park, accompanied by a couple of lions, although I’m not sure what the reference is to those.

While wandering around the harbour, we came across one of the famous simit sellers. Walking along with lots of those little sesame covered bagel-like breads balancing on a tray on their head is a real art form, and its funny to watch. A part of me watches in awe, and a very small mischievous part of me watches wishing they’d trip over and drop them all on the floor because it would be a perfect comedy moment.

After a quick doner for lunch, we headed off to the fish market – another of the places we always have to visit while we’re in Fethiye. I do like the fish market, but boy does it smell, not only of the obvious, but also of smoke, so much so it makes my eyes sting just walking around it. We bought some fish for dinner and ended up with way more than we intended – the sellers are very persuasive!

On the drive back to Calis we stopped off at the Ördek Adası – duck island, opposite the devlet hospital. There were a lot of ducks around so we climbed over the fence (ignoring the signs…) and tried to feed them, but apparently these ducks don’t like bread as the whole area was full of bits of breads and the ducks just peacefully bobbed away ignoring it! It’s still nice to see the island so full of wildlife though.

It was a little too early for dinner when we arrived back in Calis so we decided to make the most of the sunshine and sit at a beachfront cafe playing backgammon and drinking tea. This is my favourite pastime, it’s so relaxing and even though I always lose, we always have a lot of laughs.

Back at our apartment Berkay cooked dinner for us as usual.. another BBQ, our 2nd of the week! We had fish, jacket potatoes, aubergine salad and crusty bread, believe me when I say it tasted much better than it looks. While he was cooking it, the sun went down over Calis and it created the most beautiful reflection in the pool on our complex, I love that time of day and how pretty the skies always are with the glow of the sunset. The best thing about watching the sunset is knowing you have another whole day in Turkey to wake up to!

Turkey Day 3 – Breakfast on a boat, Göcek and tavla.

Posted on March 29, 2016 by livingtheturkishdream

The morning of my 3rd day in Turkey, and the final day in January, was spent on board a boat! I am going to write a more detailed post on this soon as we enjoyed it so much. We had booked the previous day and were hoping for good weather and how lucky we were, it turned out to be a really beautiful, sunny morning. We boarded the ‘Princes Serap’ boat at 10am, departed at 10.30am and enjoyed an amazing open buffet, unlimited breakfast, with plenty of Turkish tea to accompany it. There was everything you could think of that makes up a Turkish breakfast – boiled eggs, salami, sausage, olives, tomatoes, cucumber, lots of cheeses, cooked vegetables, potatoes, fruit, bread, simit, borek, sigara borek, jams, honey and other spreads. It was so delicious.

Shortly after 10.30am the boat set sail towards Calis and floated along past the beach. It was weird to see Calis from that angle, we’d never been so close to it on a boat before as we usually do the 12 Island boat trips that go further out. We stayed out for around 2 hours, turning the engine off halfway through and stopping for more tea and coffee. It was really relaxing. I love boat trips in the summer months, but this was a totally different experience, all Turkish families just enjoying a family breakfast on their Sunday off, as opposed to a boat full of people in bikinis and sunbathing under the boiling sun.

The boat arrived back at Fethiye harbour around 12.30pm and we made a spontaneous decision to drive to Göcek to visit the Sunday market there. I’d only been to Göcek once before, and that was on a boat trip, so we really didn’t know where to go or what to see. We found the market, bought me a pair of baggy village pants, then got an ice-cream, some doritos and a bottle of coke and sat on the beach having our mini picnic. We walked along the very quiet seafront for a while admiring some of the luxury yachts, and came across a pretty street with multi-coloured bird houses suspended above – similar to the popular multicoloured umbrellas in Fethiye, very simple and very effective, they definitely brighten everything up.

On the way back from Göcek we stopped off at a viewing area where you can see the sea and across to several islands – these islands usually make up the backdrop of my sunset photos from Calis so it’s funny seeing them from a different angle! My photos don’t really do it justice – it’s a great spot to just stop and admire the view.

After going back to our apartment for dinner, we headed out in the evening to a restaurant/bar along the promenade in Fethiye that we’d never been to before – Matisse. I fell in love with this place instantly, and we ended up going back there most evenings. There was a great atmosphere about the place and it was always packed full to the brim – sometimes we even had to wait for table to become free. It was full of young men and women sitting playing tavla (backgammon) and drinking tea, beer etc, while smoking the traditional Turkish water pipe / Nargile. There were tables inside and out, and little sofas. Some of the outside tables were under a plastic covering which meant all the smoke lingered around which I’m not a fan of, so we preferred the sofa tables that were uncovered – they also had little bonfires going to keep us warm which were definitely needed back in January! While the bars/restaurants either side of this one were empty, the staff at Matisse were rushed off their feet and the tables all full. With the added bonus of free wifi and live music, we could have quite happily sat there for hours drinking cay and playing tavla – definitely my new favourite place to go in the evening.

Turkey Day 2 – Paragliders, Emu’s and flowers..

Posted on March 26, 2016 by livingtheturkishdream

Even though I’ve flown to Turkey and back again since then, I’m so far behind with my blog that I have lots of ‘days’ to catch up on!
Back at the end of January I woke up in our apartment on the 2nd day of my visit. After not being with Berkay in person for 9 months, the little things are the important ones. Little things like waking up and cooking breakfast then sitting and eating it together. Our favourite breakfast is sucuk (Turkish spicy sausage) and egg, lovely served with fresh warm crusty bread and orange juice. Yummy.

After breakfast and a long, lazy morning we headed to Fethiye. Fethiye is our favourite place so whenever we’re thinking ‘I’m bored, what shall we do now?’ we usually end up back there. This time we ended up in Saliha Sultan Pastanesi for some lunch of the sweet kind. Saliha Sultan (Previously Sultan Pastanesi) sells amazing cakes, baklava and other sweet treats.. I had profiteroles with a crazy amount of chocolate sauce, and Berkay had a huge banana cake covered in a chocolate and pistachio shell… photos don’t even do them justice! Of course it was washed down with a glass of cay.

After walking around Fethiye in an attempt to work off a mere bite of our lunch, we decided to drive to Oludeniz. It was a fairly warm day, but rather cloudy so the sea didn’t look the usual magnificent shade of turquoise. It was very empty, apart from a bit of building work going on and a few paragliders floating above us. It’s always funny watching out for paragliders coming towards your head, you see the shadow of their parachute on the ground, turn to look up and realise you need to very swiftly move out of the way because its speeding right towards you to land! I giggled at the little reminder on the floor – brilliant.

We rarely venture into Oludeniz, I can count on one hand the amount of times we’ve been there in the past 6 years, and never to the ‘strip’ or any of the bars or restaurants, only to the beach – it’s not really my cup of tea, it’s somewhere that I think looks lovely from above, but a little disappointing once you’re stood looking at it from ground level. On the way back we took the road through kayakoy, just to enjoy the scenery – even the infamous Emu! SO fluffy and SO cute, in a weird way.

Just before sundown we went back to Calis and back to our apartment at Sunset Beach club. I love these apartments and we have stayed there several times – they’re very empty out of the summer season and we were some of the only people staying there – most of the pools had no water in them, but the one right outside our balcony door did which made for some lovely photos when the sun reflected off it.

When I’m visiting Turkey we don’t like to eat out in restaurants, it just feels more personal and more ‘normal’ for us to cook and eat at ‘home’ together. I always say that being in Turkey isn’t really a holiday for me, it just feels like going back home, so we like to do those everyday homely things that everyone else takes for granted. Berkay cooked our dinner this day and it was delicious – love that Turkish rice and homemade ‘real’ chips, yum!

After dinner we went to visit some of our other Turkish friends – on the way we drove past a flower seller who was asking people if they wanted to buy any. Berkay wasn’t going to stop the car so I jokingly said ‘ohh, don’t you want to buy me any?’ to which he responded by abruptly pulling the car over, jumping out, running over to the seller and coming back to the car with a big bouquet. ‘I was joking, you don’t have to buy things just because I ask, if I said I wanted an elephant would you buy me one?’ I asked – ‘If I could find one’ he said …. Bless him. Such a romantic when he wants to be… even if the days when I’d get cheesy roses are long gone.. (:

Our village adventure – Day 1

Posted on November 26, 2014 by livingtheturkishdream

Berkay’s family have been asking us to visit them for a long time and it was just impossible during the summer, however, now that it’s winter and life is moving by at a slower pace, we had the chance to make the trip. His step-mum is quite ill and recovering from an operation so we were hoping our visit would cheer her up a little.

They live in a town called Beyağaç in the Denizli province, it’s a town 1.5-2 hours away from the city centre. Instead of travelling on the bus from Fethiye for 6 hours, we rented a car for a relatively cheap amount (150tl for 3 days) and made the journey in just 4 hours instead, even with the cost of running it taken into consideration, it doesn’t work out much more expensive than the bus tickets, that’s the plus side of having a car that runs on LPG instead of petrol.

We left Fethiye at 1.45 pm on Friday and arrived at the village at around 6.15 pm. I was really looking forward to the drive because I knew it would be beautiful and I wasn’t disappointed, we had amazing views of the mountains and it was a relatively easy journey with nice roads. That’s the beauty of Turkey, you can reach almost any city just by following a single road. When in one place you can see sign posts pointing in all directions, directing you to other cities hundreds of miles away. Imagine being in London and seeing a sign post for ‘Manchester’ – it would be weird, but it’s normal here. So simple.

As we were driving further inland, we began to feel a bit chilly. When we reached a town near Tavas and stopped to fill up on gas, we realised just how cold it was. Freezing. We had to turn the car heater on to defrost ourselves.

Eventually we reached the town of Beyağaç, it’s actually a lot larger than I remember, with a population of 7000 people. Driving through the main town centre I saw a few apartment blocks, a post office, police station, school etc.. and of course the customary Ataturk statue (there’s one of these in every single town in Turkey). It’s very much a working farming town – most of the businesses deal with fixing tractors, delivering and supplying coal, animal food etc..

Berkay’s family live a 5-10 minute car drive from the main town centre, up on a hill surrounded by fields and beautiful scenery. They have wooden shacks behind their house full of animals, sheep, goats, chickens and cows. They use the cows for their milk, eggs and meat. They even make butter from the cow’s milk. Almost every fruit or vegetable they eat they have grown themselves. Everything there is very simple, back to basics.

We went inside and were greeted by his step-mum (from now on I’ll just call her his mum, as he has never met his birth mum), aunt and brother. All gave me a big hug and kisses both sides of my cheeks, as is the norm here in Turkey! ‘Who is that?’ I said to Berkay referring to the neighbours sitting in the living room that also joined in the hugging, ‘no idea’ he said… You have got to love their friendliness! After the welcome greetings were over, I felt a little more relaxed, I’m always nervous about that first ‘hello’ – mainly because I always end up in a panic about the polite way to do it. It’s normal here when greeting someone significantly older than yourself, to kiss their hand and then raise it to touch your forehead. It’s polite and shows that you respect your elders. The only person who really expects this in Berkay’s family is his father (and elderly neighbours etc). As it happened, his father arrived later than us so I had time to prepare for ‘the hand kiss’, I seriously practiced with myself first…

After his father arrived it was time for dinner. Berkay’s aunt is the main carer of the house, she goes every day and cooks, cleans etc, mainly because Berkays mum is ill, but also because her husband died a few years ago and her daughter has her own husband and house to take care of. I think she enjoys going to other people’s houses to spend her time being useful and so that she’s not so lonely.

The village is very traditional, the women do not work, they just stay home, cook, clean and look after the children and animals. I suppose it’s like going back in time 50 odd years in the UK , when housewives were the norm, and not frowned upon like they are today (in my experience, stay at home mums etc are often considered ‘lazy’). If I were to walk around the town centre, I would stick out like a sore thumb and it would be very apparent that I’m not from the area, not because I’m a foreigner, but because I’m a woman. There are just no women wandering around there, ever.

Anyway, the dinner was lovely. We had rice, chicken (fresh from the garden), an aubergine dish, yogurt and some fresh crusty bread. It was served in the traditional way here, in big metal bowls on a large tray on a blanket on the floor. The whole family sits on the floor to eat and shares food from the same bowl/plate, although everyone has their own fork/spoon. I really like this way of eating actually, it used to be a strange concept but now we do it so often it’s normal. It works out well if you don’t like a certain food too, instead of being served a plate of something and feeling under pressure to eat it, you can avoid it and take spoons of something you do like instead, they’ll never even notice! I avoided the yogurt, as I’ve still not quite grasped the concept of having yogurt served with dinner, but very much enjoyed the aubergine as I have become addicted to that since living in Turkey this time!

After dinner, everyone sat down with a glass of Cay and had a gossip, I have no idea what they were saying as I find it really difficult to understand a word. When in Fethiye, I can understand a lot, but there in the village it was different, I don’t know if it’s the dialect or if they just speak at super speed, but I can’t keep up with it. I just sat taking the atmosphere all in instead.

We were then served another large tray of fruit, watermelon, oranges, grapes, apples etc, sunflower seeds, nuts and cake. I didn’t want any but it’s rude to say no so I ended up eating a whole bowl of sunflower seeds, as you do, it’s impossible to eat just one!

We were really tired after the day of travelling so as soon as the neighbours went home at 10pm we headed to bed. Berkay’s mum wouldn’t let us sleep on the sofas in the living room or the cushions in the other bedroom (there’s only one bed in the house)- she made us take her bed instead, even though she’s sick. Bless her. These people might not have much themselves, but they are very welcoming and would give you anything.

Part 2 of our village trip coming soon!

Fethiye, waffles & saying goodbye to summer..

Posted on November 2, 2014 by livingtheturkishdream

It was Berkay’s last day at his summer job on Thursday and although he is already looking for work elsewhere, we are enjoying a well earned few days together.

The hotel is now closed which means Boncuk has taken up residence inside the grounds once again, she absolutely loves being free to wander around, explore and keep the hotel guard company. After breakfast this morning we went to visit her and spent an hour playing fetch and running around, she even had a little swim. She was so happy and kept doing excited little bunny hops. I made a short 1 minute video of clips of her bouncing around and having a dip, click HERE if you want to watch that. I just love how she’s sitting on me with her paws crossed, so elegant!

In the afternoon we caught the bus to Fethiye and headed straight to a place I’d been wanting to try for a few weeks. One of my friends mentioned a few weeks ago how she loves the waffles they sell in Turkey, and I never even realised they existed here or were so popular. Then I saw a new waffle cafe had opened in Fethiye and I knew I had to pay a visit! It’s near the blue culture centre in the Fethiye town square area, and is called ‘Renk Waffle’. They had a small menu to chose from but I’m sure you could adapt the toppings to suit your taste. Berkay chose a waffle covered in chocolate spread with kiwi, banana, strawberries and chopped hazelnuts, drizzled in chocolate sauce, and I had one covered with pistachio spread, banana, kiwi, walnuts, pistachio nuts and drizzled in caramel sauce. They were absolutely huge but delicious, and very unhealthy, probably a lot more than half a days recommended calorie intake! They were priced at 8tl and 8.50tl, which was reasonable considering the size of them. We washed them down with a glass of freshly made lemonade/limonata, and then sat for a while with a glass of Turkish tea. We had a lovely view of the town square where children were playing and people were skateboarding and rollerblading.

After recovering from our huge calorie intake slightly, we thought we best work some of it off so we went for a walk around the marina and through the Paspatur area of Fethiye, along all the little back streets. We once again found ourselves looking up at the brightly coloured umbrellas and taking photos, they are just so beautiful even if they are now a bit faded and battered from recent storms. Some of the umbrellas had even been closed up, I suspect they’ll take them all down soon, sadly – they really brighten up the place.

We made a quick stop off in LC Waikiki as I was in desperate need of some warm clothes as I have none here with me. I only bought a long sleeved jumper and a pair of jogging bottoms, but both will be very useful as I am definitely feeling the change in weather lately, especially in the evenings. Brr. We then took another detour, this time through the fish market where Berkay was hoping to find work in one of the restaurants. He didn’t have much luck, although he did hand out his name and number to some of the bosses, so fingers crossed a position opens up, unsurprisingly nobody really wants to take on new staff during the winter period. While we were there they were unloading some new crates of fish, check out the size of this one! It had the most beautiful, shiny scales, I felt quite sorry for it really… but not too much as we bought a few of his friends for our dinner.

The trees have started to change colour here now, yellow and orange leaves are starting to form and drop, they made a perfect frame for the mosque and I couldn’t resist taking a photo as we were walking back to the bus station.

I say this at the start of every month, but I really can’t believe it’s November already. This time next month I’ll probably be back in England, and in just 3 months time Berkay will be heading off to the army. Let’s just hope the next year passes as quickly as this past one has eh? I suspect it won’t.

Sailing the day away on a Fethiye boat trip..

Posted on September 7, 2014 by livingtheturkishdream

This post is long overdue! 10 days ago we went on a boat trip to the islands around Fethiye. We went along for free with one of the tour groups that visit the hotel Berkay works in – the perks of the job!

The tour group we went with is calls ETS, they go traveling around on excursions from Istanbul and stay in the hotel for 3-4 days, using it as a base while they see the sites of the surrounding areas. We hopped on their coach and headed to Fethiye where we boarded the boat.

The boat’s name was Grand Baris. We set off around 10.30 and went on a different route to most of the other ’12 islands’ trips, which I quite liked, although we seemed to be sailing forever until our first stop, it must have been over an hour.

The first stop was called Olive Island and was near Gocek I think, we had a swim and stopped there for 45 minutes. It was all going well until my foot touched a sea urchin, those things really hurt. I didn’t even step on it, just brushed it with my foot and it hurt for the entire day! I could see a really tiny black dot which I removed, but my foot felt like it had painful pins and needles until the following day – it was so weird, thank goodness I didn’t step on one completely and get the entire spike embedded in my foot, because that would definitely have ruined our day!

After that, we moved onto the next stop, I’ve forgotten the name but it was lovely there, turquoise water and really pretty. This is where lunch was served. Everyone else on the boat had to pay 15tl for their dinner (I assume because they didn’t pay for the boat trip individually, it was just part of the tour group’s excursions) but we got it for free as we knew them. It was fish, chicken or meatballs with spaghetti, salad and bread. It was a big plate full too, I couldn’t eat all mine, but it was lovely. I found the price of the drinks/food on board more expensive than usual. We had a small glass of Turkish tea which were 2tl each, and I noticed the 5tl Cola and Fanta were smaller glass bottles, rather than 33 cl cans. We also paid 5tl for a tiny plate of about 20 chips… I know we can’t really complain as we got everything else for free, but everyone else who were paying customers still had to pay those prices.

After another swim, the next stop was Flat Island. It was a lot busier here but really beautiful. We got off the island and had a walk around, it looks even better from photos above (google search ‘flat island fethiye’ to see some!). The flat part of the island is shaped almost like a number ‘6’ with a calm, shallow area of water in the middle which you can walk through. We walked along the flat strip until we reached the hill and then turned back, it was so hot we didn’t fancy hill climbing! There were some ducks and chickens present on the island hiding in the shade of the bushes – cute. After another quick swim we got back on the boat and headed off to our last stop – Red Island.

Red Island is the name of the island you can see from Calis and which forms the backdrop of most of my sunset photos! Berkay had had no sleep and had been working all night, so he was napping on the boat, but I went for a swim and took my goggles so I could look for some fish. The boat moored near a corner of the island and I was able to swim to it, there were alot of beautiful fish there, I wish I’d taken my iPod in with me to get some good underwater photos, but I forgot! I’m so glad I took my goggles, because towards the side of the island the water became shallow and I could see and feel the rocks underneath – I peeked through my goggles to see if it was safe to step down and there were so many black, spikey sea urchins waiting for my feet… Definitely learned my lesson the first time and kept my feet firmly off the ground! More boats starting arriving at the island so I swam back towards ours and after 45 minutes they pulled the anchor up and set off back towards Fethiye.

This is always my favourite part of the journey, it was around 5pm so the sun wasn’t directly overhead, making it slightly cooler. I love sitting at the back of the boat with my feet dangling in the water watching people fishing – they caught 2 fish and a starfish – Berkay was jealous, wishing he had bought his fishing rod! The sight as you come into Fethiye marina is beautiful, with the mountains and rock tombs in full view – lovely.

The boat itself was nice, clean and well-kept. The women’s toilets were large, clean and well-lit but Berkay said the men’s weren’t so nice – so much so that he actually used the women’s one instead! The staff were really friendly and it was a good day out, but we probably wouldn’t chose to use this boat again ourselves, we preferred the one we were on back in July. (click HERE to read the post about that trip)

Also, I always cringe when British people complain about the lack of fellow Brits in their hotel or on boat trips etc, we are in Turkey afterall… but there was one small family of English people on the boat who booked separately to the huge (over 100 people) entirely Turkish tour group that we went with and I can understand that they may have felt a little awkward mixed in amongst them. I do wonder if they were informed when they booked that a large tour group was booked on the boat for the same day? That being said, the staff made sure everything was announced in Turkish and English and were equally as welcoming to both groups of people from what I saw.

We had a great day and I’m grateful we got the opportunity to go for free (apart from extras like drinks). I recommend the boat, we had nothing but a good experience, but I would suggest making sure there are no large tour group bookings on the day you plan to go if that bothers you.

I just love being at sea, perhaps I should have been a pirate! ~~Or married someone with alot of money and a fancy yacht.~~

Breakfast with a view..

Posted on July 2, 2014 by livingtheturkishdream

On Sunday we went out for breakfast in Fethiye, I hadn’t been out for breakfast in over a year, and this was well worth the wait!

We went to Boğaziçi restaurant along the promenade in Fethiye, who have a big open breakfast buffet every Sunday morning. It cost us 17.50tl each which was a little expensive, but when you consider the amount of food it’s more than worth it. We got free refillable Turkish tea too which is the perfect drink to accompany breakfast.

We sat at a table outside just a few feet from the sea, we had a lovely view of Fethiye and the mountains in the background.

The buffet was HUGE and had almost everything you could think of! First was a selection of Jams, honey and other spreads, I love how you scoop them out into little cups which are like tiny ice-cream cornets.

Next along the buffet table were 6 massive bowls of different kinds of olives – I’m not an olive fan at all so I avoided those! Of course they had plenty of different cheeses on offer, along with salami, cucumber, tomatoes and even some cold spiced potatoes which were delicious.

My favourite part was the pastries – I had one with spinach and white cheese in it and they had some potato filled ones too. Something else that just has to be part of a Turkish breakfast is eggs – they had boiled eggs, fried eggs and my personal choice – fried eggs with sucuk ( a spicy kind of sausage) yum! I just love Turkish breakfast, I love savory breakfasts rather than cereals etc, especially with some slices of fresh bread. I tried not to pile my plate up too high as I was saving myself for all the delicious cakes I had spotted!

There were plates piled full of delicious looking cakes and sweet treats all along the top trays on the buffet stand. Chocolate cake, fruit cake, fairy cakes, chocolate, vanilla and strawberry pudding, biscuits.. there were so many to chose from, we filled a plate with a selection to share and I ended up trying most of them…

We sat for a while and admired the views and done some people-watching while letting our food go down and then Berkay went off to the toilet and came back with another plate full of watermelon!

Needless to say after eating 3 plates of breakfast we were absolutely stuffed so we took a very slow walk along the promenade to Fethiye town centre. It was so hot and we were so full that we had to keep stopping on the shady benches. It’s a beautiful place to walk along – so many palm trees and pretty flowers and I just love seeing all the little fishing boats as well as some of the bigger boats heading out on the day trips.

I recommend this restaurant for breakfast to anyone who is in the area, it’s worth a visit and the food is delicious. I loved it so much I think we’ll be heading back there again next week after payday!