Sitting here killing time before going up to 6k plus feet for a nice little paraglide over the Med coast in Oledeniz. We were going to try the double of paraglide in the AM with a nice 30 meter dive in the afternoon, but weren't the logistics wizs we thought.
So far Oledeniz has been a blast, and with our outdoor activities and new accomodation, I'll write more about the shithole campsite we stayed in the 1st night here later, things are looking quite rosy...more later.

Bodrum is to Turkey as nothing I have seen before is to anywhere else I have been. This is only in the nightlife, for during the day it is a simple, mildly smarmy resort town. To illustrate this point I will give you a play by play of the other evening. We crawled out into the heat to grab a bite to eat around 9:00 or so, and then headed out for a few drinks at a nice little place called Cafe Del Mar, even though we hate the band of the same name with a passion. As we sat sipping caihparinias near the water the waiter walked over to see if we knew about their boat. Of course I had no idea, so asked him to give the lowdown. He explained that the boat, which we could see just off the shore and looked vaguely like a Louisiana shrimp trawler, was decorated much the same way as the bar, with cushions, lamps, and such. It was then explained that the boat left at 1:00 and returned somewhere around 5:30...hmmm?? Neal began to explain that we were leaving Bodrum the next afternoon, so couldn't make it, but thanks. I cut in explaining that I thought perhaps this wasn't a daytrip and this was verified by the waiter who looked at us and clearly regretted having proposed the idea to two such provincial american slobs as ourselves...needless to say we missed the trip.
Yesterday we hoped the bus to split the hedonism for Bodrum and continue our journey for a more backpacker/less package tourist existence. Destination Oleduniz, the beginning of the Med section of Turkey and home to the worlds best paragliding...haven't made a decision on whether or not to partake yet. Actually, we didn't make it all the way, and spent the night at a nice little penysion in Fetyih, run by a former 5 star hotel chef who makes a mean mutha of a trout. Today we have been exploring our dive options (not so fucking good unless we want to spend all day on a boat and a load of cash) before grabbing a dolmus for Oludeniz...more from there.

Also, we saw a restaurant in Bodrum which I believe was named after my fine younger brother, Man-Cheese.

Kusadasý ýs a být of a surreal wonderland, both good and bad. The bad is the cruise ship culture that pervades the tourist center of its' universe. The good is just about everything else. We have been here a few days staying at a nice little panysion on top of a hill overlooking the town and the harbor that our friends Amy and Volkan set us up in. The place is nice if unspectacular other than two facets. First, the woman who runs the place is the single most amazing communicator on the face of the planet, speaking no english (knowing a word or two in the same way I know a word or two of Turkish) she can effectively get you to understand anything she needs to. I understand that this isn't something that translates well into a description, but I assure you it is truly amazing and bewildering. I am not sure what it is she even does that makes it so easy, but there is clearly some strange Aegean magic she has. The other really excellent thing about this particular panysion is the terrace. To sit up on a whitewashed roof while playing backgammon and looking over the Aegean in the sun is truly a brilliant sight. The only other thing I can say about the panysion is the one truly wierd thing I have encountered. It is the only place on the entire planet that I have stayed, and I have now stayed in a lot of places, that had hot water, but no cold water at times. This actually makes for more difficulty than having only cold water as you can go balls to the wall in a cold shower if you really have to, but scalding hot water is a slightly different story.
Onto Efes (aka Ephesus), home of the Temple of Artmeis (Diana), one of the wonders of the ancient world with only a recreated column left...a bit of a disappointment, and the fully ass kicking ruins of the city that once prospered there as the capital of Roman Asia (take that Neal...Mistah Historian). We made our way there via a tour bus that Amy and Volkan were kind enough to let us hop on (on a side note they have been way too hospitable for the shaggy likes of us!) and then split off from the tour to lounge in a garden for lunch and then check out the beautiful remnants of the city, that are to valuable to leave out in the sun and gawking eyes of the "boatpeople"*, in the museum. The boatpeople I refer to are not the Vietnamese or Cambodian kind, but rather much worse, the American cruiseship kind. Neal I expect, will expound on this a bit more, but it was eerie to watch the freaks at work. Other than the boatpeople, the site was truly fucking magnificent and worthy of all the praise it receives.
Today it is south to Bodrum, a seemingly killer destination, for some diving, more quality nightlife, and the other wonder of the Ancient world in Turkey, the Mausoleum of Halicarnasus. This too, is where we will once again plunge beneath the seas for a glimpse of an ancient shipwreck, we hope, and come up to a full glass of beer and a plate of grilled flesh.
A few observations from our time in Turkey thusfar:

Turkish touts are pussies compared to the vultures in India

A freind of ours back in Malaysia (dick you know who you are) was right about the Russian women in Turkey...they may not all be hookers, but they all pretty much dress the part.

As we strolled down bar street here (the bourbon street shithole area of cheesy bars in Kusadasi) I saw a fucking congo line of drunken 15 year old brits and actually, physically gave an unvoluntary shiver...

Finally, and I suspect this will be relevant throughout the med region. Couples in which the man wears either a grapesmuggler (aka bananahammock, aka weenerbeekener) and the woman wears cut off jean shorts that would allow certain doctors to make a prognosis from 5' away (okay, not the best description, but any other might be too crude even for me!) should be locked away on some island with other similar couple so that I might be able to sleep again at some point without that nightmare image burned into my brain.