The Shifting Sands

I had spent some time working out the best way to get from Dublin to Kalymnos and, despite Ireland being the home of Ryan Air, the best route was via Istanbul to Bodrum with Turkish Airlines arriving at 3am at my hotel.  This gave me the next morning to engage in "power tourism' as I needed to be on the 4.15 pm ferry to Kos. Bodrum from the Castle with the Theatre of Halicarnassus on the hill in the background I decided to orientate myself by getting out for a run via the major sites and, of course, "collect" the route in Runkeeper.  A nice 7 km loop saw me pick up the harbour foreshore, the 5th century BC Theatre of Halicarnassus which is dug high into the hillside, the ruins of the Tomb of Mausolos and Bodrum Castle. I decided that the Castle and the Maussoleum warranted further investigation as, even though the Theatre was spectacular I saw all there was to see in my run by and iPhone photos. Not much left of one of the 7 Wonders of the An

The view of the Islands from our Pavilion As per normal Kate and I were looking for a Monsoon escape with the usual criteria and we were keen on Thailand.  I had climbed at Railay Beach in Krabi in the mid 90's and loved it but it seemed that the crags were now very busy and the limestone had become very polished on some routes. The longtail ride from Phuket to Koh Yao Noi On the same trip in the mid 90's we stayed at Phi Phi with the hope of getting some climbing done but at the time the bolts on the routes were rusted out and dangerous. It seemed from the net that Phi Phi had been re-bolted which was good but I struggled to find suitable accommodation for a family of four at a reasonable price. Rubber plantations on the ride to the crags After more research, we settled on Koh Yao Noi, an island between Phuket and Krabi but to the north of Phi Phi in Phang Na Bay with a population of around 3, 500. The island is unusual in th

After Rovinj,  I returned to Mumbai to try to earn some money to fund the girl's travel.  Kate, Lucy and Ada continues onto Italy, which is detailed in other posts.  Our plan was to meet again on the Greek Island of Kalymnos for a week of beach and rock climbing. Arriving in Porthia the main town in Kalymnos We picked Kalymnos because of the world class rock climbing, great beaches, good weather, great available accommodation and wonderful Greek food and hospitality. Prior to meeting the girls in Kalymnos, I had a work conference in Dublin and then traveled via Bodrum, in Turkey, to Kos, neighbouring Greek Island where we all met before traveling on to Kalymnos. Dublin and Bodrum/Kos are covered in separate posts. We met in Mastichari, the site of the ferry to Kos and enjoys a sunny but slightly bumpy crossing to Kalymnos.  We disembarked at the main town, Porthia, which was quaint but left Lucy asking why we had not gone to Santorini or Mykonas.  We met