Dalyan – 22nd November

On Friday 22nd November it looked like the rain and storms were over and we had a glimpse of some sunshine. As I had my cup of tea and some cornflakes, I read a little about an alternative destination in Lapland, called Oulu. Usually visitors at Christmas flock to Rovaniemi but it can be busy and pricey so Oulu was looking like a good option for anyone wanting to go to Finland at Christmas. I’d always fancied it although I thought it would be for kids but this city looked like it had lots to do. It was on my list for the future!
Unfortunately, Captain Caveman’s Bridge Club was cancelled so he wasn’t too happy but I managed to find something to keep him from despair! Someone we knew well, wanted us to go and look at a property that was for sale and I needed Captain Caveman to help me find it. I had my reservations as to whether it had been advertised correctly so we decided to go and look without the agent to get an idea of location and condition, just from the outside. It turned out to be very similar to one we had looked at before Captain Caveman had bought Fire Opal. We thought it would be too small for the potential buyers and that it might be overpriced.

It started to rain while we were out but not nearly as bad as it had been yesterday so we persevered and called at the shops. Here’s what we bought and the prices in lira;

Yaman Büfe 2
1 Idol white wine 215.00
1 Idol red wine 215.00
Total spent 430.00 lira (£9.93)

A101 Supermarket
2 packs mini wraps 30.00 lira (69p)

Migros Supermarket
1 pack spaghetti 11.75
2 packs pasta 23.50
1 pack broken rice 24.95
580g Chicken thighs 91.35
1.6kg whole chicken 108.98
1kg Chicken breasts 196.03
Parmesan cheese 199.90
Total spent 656.46 lira (£15.16)

As we passed the bus station, Captain Caveman took a photo of the new timetable for the bus to the beach. There was only the one winter service now, going at 12 noon and returning at 5pm. We bought the usual fresh bread from the bakery across from the bus station and fresh bread is still so cheap in Turkey. We paid just 10 lira (23p) and the bread is very good.
As Captain Caveman had free time on his hands, he made us a chicken salad sandwich with sweet potatoes done in the air fryer, for lunch.
We messaged back to the UK with photos and videos to the potential property buyers and I asked if they fancied a video call to discuss – they didn’t as they were busy and had also had snow where they were in England.

I carried on with work while Captain Caveman played Bridge on his phone. Tonight our team meeting had been moved from Wednesday so I had invited Jamie round so that we could do it together. Our boss had given strict instructions that, as we were at a team meeting on a Friday night, we should bring a bottle of wine from the country we were in. Jamie and I had no problem with that and he had a bottle of Rituel and I had chosen Idol, both red. Norman and Edna came too and they had cuddles with Captain Caveman while we tried not to get too merry for the team meeting. I’d done a curry in the slow cooker and I’d also made some curried sweet potato samosas to have as a starter with a cucumber, mint, lemon juice and quark dip. Jamie was on a health kick too so I’d made everything Slimming World friendly. We had the samosas before the meeting as Captain Caveman couldn’t wait and I was getting peckish.
The meeting went well and we had an update from the bosses about a new website for villas which anyone with luxury holiday villas, in any part of the world, could add on to the site, as a host, to attract customers through Resort Experts.
After the meeting we snaffled down the chicken, sweet potato, chickpea and spinach curry with steamed rice and başlamak bread, then finished off the wine. It turned in to quite a night – Jamie, Norman and Edna didn’t leave until gone midnight!