Battering winds and the coming storm

We have just about recovered from last weekend.  The group of students (from Pakistan) and the hen weekend girls kept us on our toes and ate us out of nearly everything in the kitchen!   The desserts particularly went down a treat and after they left on Sunday I had to go home to make more brownie, cheesecake and apple pie.  With my little helper Kaan of course, who loves doing things in the kitchen.

a few of the students trying our hat collection

The weather has actually been wonderful, relatively cool for this time of year.  The breeze is so pleasant that it feels several degrees cooler than it actually is; a couple of guests have been caught out, especially at the beach, getting burned because they didn’t notice how strong the sun was.  Anyone who has visited Çalış knows that we usually enjoy the breeze; it keeps us cool on even the hottest days of summer (much more comfortable than Fethiye or Ölüdeniz) and has made Çalış popular for windsurfing, even enabling it to host the Turkey kite-surf championships a couple of years ago. 

Yet one of the big travel guides used to describe Çalış as a stretch of sand and shingle beach ‘battered by winds’.  Why they want to make one of our selling points sound like a disadvantage I can’t imagine.  We might not fit their idea of homely pensions in rustic Turkish villages, but they could at least mention how popular Çalış is with families and older couples who are looking for a laid-back resort with beautiful scenery, stunning sunsets and a bit of Turkish flavour.

The hotel has been quieter this week, a short lull before the storm. We took the opportunity to empty and refill the pool on Sunday/Monday.  We do this once or twice over the summer as even with our best care, there is a point at which it is better to empty it, scrub it down and start afresh.  The only trouble is that the new water is always freezing when it first goes in.  Here is Emre ‘braving’ it while the pool was filling.  Doesn’t take long at this time of year to heat up though and at least it stops it getting too hot as some of the pools around do.

 Kaan and I went horse riding again. And today we are off to the beach – for the first time this year.  Going to go along to the surf café actually so we can enjoy watching some of the surfers being ‘battered by the wind’!

Where's Basil?

What a week!  It started very well with a party last Saturday for Jan’s birthday.  The funny thing was that there were TWO other guests in the hotel with birthdays the same day so lots of celebrating and lots of birthday cake.  Here is Jan cutting hers. 

The fireworks were Cem’s idea.  I am a bit paranoid about fireworks and was worried we would set fire to the bar roof.  They were fine though and looked very nice.  We also sent up a Chinese lantern which took a while to get going but then floated off well.  Last year, Cem got obsessed with making Chinese Lanterns from bin bags, straws and birthday cake candles.  Some of them flew very well, some of them not so well – at which point Emre would be sent off on his bike to follow it and make sure it didn’t set fire to anything.

Jan, Graham and ‘the gang’ left last night.  Sorry to see them go but I know they’ll be back – this year if Jan has her way!

School finished here last week so Turkish families have started arriving on holiday.  We have had a couple of rooms in this week, though we have also had to turn some away as we had no availability for last night.

And when I say no availability – even the new roof suite was booked, which meant we spent a lot of this week trying to get it finished!  It looks great now, a few finishing touches still to be made but with the bed arriving at about 2pm yesterday and the carpenter still fitting the door at 6pm we were lucky the guests didn’t get here until 2am.

I had actually been dreading yesterday all week.  I knew it would be a frantic day as we had four rooms of British guests arriving and a group of 28 students from İstanbul.  But I could never have imagined quite how crazy it would be.

First, three of the four agency rooms arrived a night early – having made their booking from the 24^th, not thinking that 2am on 24^th counts as the night of the 23^rd!  With a bit of switching of rooms, we were able to take them early.  Wouldn’t have wanted to disappoint them as they are here for just three days on a hen weekend!  Here they are ready to go out last night; needless-to-say they caused quite a stir round Çalış.

So, that was the start of the day.  Mid-morning Kaan called me in one of his little panics, to say there was water pouring out of a pipe in the boiler room. It took a while to locate the pipe and close the valve.  Then we had to wait for the plumber.  In the afternoon, one of the main fuses blew so there was no electricity to SOME parts of the hotel and we were waiting for the electrician.  And finally the carpenter’s circular saw broke down.

It all got fixed, and the guests all arrived (some earlier than planned, and some much later!)  But felt a little like Fawlty Towers round here for a while!

Fleeing voters and flying Turks

We had elections here on Sunday but not the result we would have liked. Note I don’t say ‘the result we hoped for’ because there wasn’t much chance of it happening, but still…The party that has been in power since 2002 won again with close to 50% of the vote. Muğla (our region) is one of only seven in the country where the opposition CHP (Republican People’s Party) won.


The winning party, called the ‘Justice and Development Party’, are politically centre-right and have, admittedly, had a positive effect on the economy. However, though they claim not to be a religious party, many of their members were previously members of an Islamist party and a lot of people are afraid they will undermine the secular nature of Turkish society.

This is why issues such as the wearing of headscarves by students and government workers, to many foreigners a seemingly harmless topic, become the subject of such passion here. One of the latest topics to cause uproar is the plan for censorship of the internet. I am obviously concerned about this too though I don’t know how extensive it will be; what I do know is that it will cause a lot of discussion, protests and demonstrations.

Election day itself is quite a social event here. It is always on a Sunday as schools (and teachers) are used for the elections. I sat outside in the car while Cem’s cousin and a couple of others went in to vote (I was voting at a different place) and watched the people arrive in cars, on scooters, bicycles and on foot, hanging around to chat to friends. There was also some drama as the police had decided it would be a good time to ‘catch up with’ people on their wanted list (we’re not talking bank robbers and murderers, more people with unpaid debts or bounced cheques). We saw one man beat a hasty retreat when he found his name was on the list and one of Cem’s friends was not so lucky and spent the night in the cells.

The good news this week is that we got paid the early booking money. Don’t know whether our threats to head office had any effect but at least it came through.

Better than that, all the guests seem delighted with the newly-decorated apartments. We had a lovely couple staying last week who were booked in for last year – until Goldtrail went bust. They made it to Poppy this year and enjoyed their stay. At the moment we have two ladies, one of whom teaches swimming and says she has seen many, many pools but never one as clean as ours!

We have also had a family from South Africa staying – possibly our furthest-travelled guests. They came partly for the Enduro World Championship leg which was held here last Friday and Saturday. Emre was on duty as a marshal, entrusted with retying the plastic tape when they broke it (often) and waving a flag to attract someone when there was an accident (thankfully not so often). The winners came from Spain, Italy and Finland, with France also doing well but our South African guests, one of whom is a competitor himself, said the overall standard was very high.

There was also a performance by the ‘flying Turk’ (not Cem after a night on the vodka!) The ramps were set up in the marketplace for him to do his acrobatics. See the video below – but don’t try this at home!

Sun sun sun

The rain has gone and it’s sun sun sun from now on – over 30°C degrees (86°F  ) today.  It makes doing the laundry much easier as things dry in just a couple of hours.  Unfortunately it also makes doing the ironing harder as our press iron is in the room next to the boiler and it feels like taking a sauna.  We had a mountain of laundry today as five rooms went home, so I have been doing a bit at a time and coming out for air!

boys and Grant couldn't wait for their dinner

As we move into the busy season, we are having struggles on all sides with agencies.  Still no money from the early bookings (due on 15 May).  I have sent a mail to their central office saying that we won’t accept the discounted rate as they have broken the contract by not paying on time.  No answer yet, but I am not expecting it to be an easy battle.

Another local agency who we have a contract with but who sent exactly NO rooms all last summer, suddenly sent a booking through for two rooms for a time when I cannot accommodate them.  This is officially our mistake for not informing them to stop selling for this period, but working with several agencies who are all taking internet bookings (and sometimes cancellations)  it is hard to keep them informed of the room availability day by day.  I feel under attack as if I don’t want to stop selling early and be left with empty rooms, but if they suddenly take a booking for three rooms that we can’t squeeze in, their answer is always ‘it’s your mistake so you find alternative accommodation and pay the difference’.

We have also experienced a problem we have never had before – again I think resulting from web site sales by small and possibly not very Professional sites.  The guests we were expecting on Saturday (booked in with us from 4 June) arrived in the early hours of Saturday morning (the night of 3 June).  They had booked from 3 June – written on their booking slip – but the reservation we received was for 4 June.  We actually didn’t have a room available and had to put them into the apartments opposite for one night – not a good start to their holiday, though they are settled in here now.

On top of this, we have been having a problem with water pressure which we had never experienced before.  Various plumbers and central heating experts were called, all of whom tried something which seemed to fix the problem – until a day or two later when the pressure would drop again.  Finally, the maddest repairman in town – who we have to keep fuelled with Efes – came and found the problem…a 2m piece of metal piping linking the boiler to the hot water system was so full of limescale that only a trickle was getting through.

Hooray – heaps of hot water again.  Thankyou to our lovely guests who have been so understanding through this small drama.  Hello to Richard and Jenny who went home on Sunday (back again in the summer) and Travis who had his 12th birthday here.

Kaan and friends playing together!

Rain doesn’t stop play

It’s been raining in Fethiye! The weather has been mixed for the last few days, plenty of sunshine but some showers too. Yesterday there were more showers than sun – drizzle actually which is not something we see a lot of here. It was still warm and didn’t really stop guests from doing things – but they did get a bit soggy when they didn’t time it right. As it’s half term week at home there are some families with children out too but the kids don’t seem to care and are in the pool even while it’s raining. It is better today and supposed to get hotter and hotter through the week.


It was unfortunate that the weather was miserable on Saturday morning as that was the day of the fourth Çalış Carnival. Most of the stalls didn’t bother setting up for the exhibition and though the sun came out for the parade in the afternoon, I think quite a few participants and spectators had been put off. Kaan and I made sure we painted a square each in the communal painting as we have each year. Other than that, the best thing was a forestry department helicopter which landed just above the beach (scattering people in every direction as they realized it really was going to land…health and safety at its best!)


painting at the carnival

Saturday was also Grant’s ‘official’ birthday. It isn’t actually his birthday until June but as it’s a big one Dawn thought he would enjoy celebrating it out here. We decorated the bar with the balloons and banners she had brought over – and when he walked in he asked whose birthday it was!! The cake was a masterpiece – with a particularly fetching photo of him balancing a lemon on his nose printed into the icing.

Grant's birthday cake

There was no water in Çalış yesterday. The water board was fixing pipes somewhere and said it would be back on between 5 and 6; actually it was the middle of the night before it came back properly by which time some guests were a little fed up (especially as it had rained most of the day!) and I was seriously stressed.

But everything seems worthwhile at times like this….a guest who arrived at Poppy for the first time a couple of days ago just told me she can’t believe people ‘dare’ (her word) write anything nasty on the internet about us; she loves it here and is going to put on a good recommendation when she gets home. Hopefully Trip Advisor will not start removing our good reviews like they did last year…

Hordes of students and football hooligans

The news for this week….


Fenerbahçe won the football league here. Everything still hung on the last match which was yesterday evening, so with Cem, the boys and many friends and family supporting Fenerbahçe, there was a lot of excitement round here. Personally I wasn’t bothered - my team is Beşiktaş and I only support them to annoy Cem – but I would rather they are all happy and celebrating than miserable and sulking. Some of you know how seriously they take their football here, and how noisy they are about it. Even the municipal tannoy system crackled into life at the end of the match with the Fenerbahçe march…so apologies to any guests who were hoping for an early night!

It was also noisy for a while on Saturday. As I mentioned last week, Turkish guests are not very good at making reservations and here is a good example. Twenty-six sixteen year old girls and nine teachers on a school trip turned up at about 6pm on Saturday night looking for diner and rooms for the night. That would not be SO unreasonable, except for the fact that they stayed here last year and had our phone number! We sorted the rooms out (including evicting Murat from his room) and then Cem went shopping while Yılmaz and I ran around in the kitchen, but it would have been less stressful if they had just telephoned even a couple of hours before to say they were on their way!

Still plenty of bookings coming in and we are full for middle of June and middle of July. We are now having a struggle with the agency, who sold at 15% discount for all bookings up to start of May (that is 15% off OUR money of course not theirs!), on the basis that they would pay 50% of all those bookings on 15 May. Guess what – they haven’t! It is getting so tiring, calling and visiting (and listening to their stories about what a difficult time THEY are having), that we are considering not working with them. The other agency we have a contract with are – apparently (we have only just started working with them) – much more reliable.

But mostly this week I am happy because Frank and Lorraine are here, Grant and Dawn are here (see photo of Kaan and Grant below) and my sister and brother-in-law are coming tomorrow so I’m giving myself the day off!


Kaan and Grant 'bombing'



.Horse riding and other stuff

I’ve been busy with my most hated task – checking all 20 rooms to make sure the taps aren’t dripping, the air conditioning works and they have their full complement of cups, plates, saucepans etc. etc. I hate it because it involves running up and down stairs and in and out of rooms until my feet hurt. I hate it because however many lists I make, there is always something you miss first time round. And I hate it because it is a never-ending task…even when I am satisfied that a room is ‘done’, of course light bulbs blow, cups get broken and people walk off with things, meaning that they need checking before each new guest.


This year I added to my job by buying new pillows, pillow protectors, shower curtains, table cloths and bedspreads, all of which had to be distributed/fitted/hung. One day I would like to get a pedometer and see how far I walk just round the hotel; it must be good fitness training! Happily I’m pretty much finished – for now – and the rooms are looking good.

On Sunday I gave myself the afternoon off and went horse riding with Kaan. It was the first time we had been to the place in Çalış. The horses are not big but they were quite lively and seemed happy to be going out. The great thing about it is that you ride right along the edge of the sea – in the water if you want! Kaan was very good - it’s a couple of years since he’s been riding, but he was confident and in control and really looked the part. I will still send people to the lovely stables in Kaya village for a good ride. Their horses are superb and they cater for all levels of riders from beginners to experienced – giving lessons in the school as well as taking people out around the quiet tracks of the village. But the horses in Çalış are fun for a ride along the beach.



Kaan the cowboy

 19 May is another holiday here – this time Youth and Sport Festival. The children have 5 days off school and I arrived at the hotel this morning to find we have 7 rooms of guests from Ankara, who seem between them, to have about 25 children! It’s certainly woken the place up, especially as the children were all excited on their first morning and therefore extra noisy.

Actually, there are only 3 weeks left until the school summer holiday begins here – even earlier than usual because of the general election. With Ramazan (the month of fasting) starting at the beginning of August, most Turkish people will be looking to take their holiday in late June or July. Unfortunately, many will be disappointed as hotels are pretty full already for that time and Turkish people are notoriously bad at making reservations (like the 7 rooms who turned up here at 7 last night without a booking). Maybe this year they will learn!

how cute is that - a 2-day old foal (and Kaan of course!)