S/V BeBe

This is the reason we will miss Turkey so much.  The people!  Turks are such giving people, both gifts of material things and gifts of friendship.  This morning we received an email from Riza.  He is the third generation owner of Emek Marine.  This is what he sent:

And moments later one of his staff arrived at our boat laden with gifts.  Most of which are illustrated in the above images.   A huge box of oranges and lemons from the family orchard. A large jar of olives from the family trees.  Freshly laid eggs.  A selection of freshly picked herbs.  Plus a shirt with the Amel logo on the front; Bill had admired this type shirt one day when Riza was wearing one.  Riza remembered and gifted one to Bill today.

Gifts from the Cadges family

This was totally unexpected and we are humbled by the family's thoughtfulness.

As a token of appreciation I baked a loaf of banana bread and asked Riza to share with his mom.  I explained to him that Turkey has walnuts, pistachios and almonds; but this was made with pecans from our home state of Texas.  I also tried to bake a lemon pie because Riza had once mentioned that he had heard of such a thing and would like to taste it someday.  Unfortunately, it did not come out right -- more like lemon thick soup in a baked pie crust.  I am our of American style corn starch and tried making this pie using the Turkish kind.  Not the same thing...and did not set up nice and thick as the lemon filling should.  Apologies to Riza; he will have to taste lemon pie some other time and place.

One of my favorites!!

Later, fellow Amel owners Maria and Willy on S/V Pitu dropped by and gifted us with a bottle of Moet and Chandon.  What a lovely surprise!  This was to say 'thank you' for all our advice to them and (mostly Bill's) sharing of information on the Amel Owner's Group online.  I had given Maria a pullover Polartech jacket with the Amel logo on the front.  It was on the boat when we bought her and has been stowed away ever since because it was a size small.  Never worn; and since this is Maria's size I thought she might enjoy having it.  I did not expect anything in return; just wanted her to have it.  How nice of them to give us the bottle of champagne!

Backing plate for cockpit floor

The gelcoat repairs were finished this afternoon.  Stainless steel plates were added to the supports beneath the cockpit floor to spread the stress load.  The cockpit floor raises for entry into the engine room and those supports were causing the floor to bulge upward in those 2 spots.  We have heard this is a common problem on this model boat.  The backing plates should solve that problem. 

New stainless plate to protect from anchor chain hitting

Stainless protector over rub rail
for Med lazy lines

The stainless steel plate was put in place at the bow to protect from future chips caused by the anchor chain.  

New SS mounting post for GPS
The plastic ones crack and
disintegrate from UV.

The paint arrived which I will someday use to repaint the deck stripes.  It is vacuum sealed until I eventually get around to that project when my knee no longer hurts.  Still suffering from that fall in the mountains early last November.  

And, last but certainly not least, the new flares arrived and they carted away the expired ones for disposal.