The Blue Cruise also known as the Blue Journey – translated from Turkish Mavi Yolculuk – is a boat trip along the spectacular southwest coast of Turkey.
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The term Blue Cruise is used for these tours, but has its origins in Turkish literature. A handful of famous Turkish writers have recounted the journey. These include Cevat Şakir Kabaağaçlı, better known as the Fisherman of Halicarnassus (modern-day Bodrum), Sabahattin Eyüboğlu and Azra Erhat, the Turkish translator of Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.
According to tradition, the Blue Cruise happened by chance. Shortly after the establishment of the Turkish Republic, the political writer Cevat Şakir Kabaağaçlı was exiled to Bodrum. The incumbent government was outraged after he wrote a story about mutinous soldiers.
But the judges who sent Cevat Sakir to Bodrum for a few years were apparently ignorant of the beauty of their own country. Sakir immediately felt at home in the beautiful surroundings full of pine forests, beautiful views and the enormous archaeological wealth.
He was nicknamed Fisherman of Halicarnassus because he wrote stories about the city and its inhabitants, who were mainly fishermen. He regularly accompanied the sponge fishermen and gradually he knew all the bays and coves of the Gulf of Gokova. Even if his intellectual friends are out Istanbul visited him, he took them on a trip and showed them how the fishermen lived.
His friends from faraway Istanbul were ecstatic and continued to visit Cevat Sakir. The simple lifestyle that required nothing more than watermelons to eat, some ice for chilled drinks, and bait for fishing pleased the authors. The stories they wrote made the Gulf of Gokova famous. They named their trip – because of the color of the water – Mavi Yolculuk – or Blue Cruise.
There is now a statue in Bodrum of the Cevat Sakir, the man who Blue Cruise and thus also made the city great.
To prepare
Arrive
sailing route
A full Blue Cruise start in didyma or even Kusadası and ends in Antalya. Nowadays, however, the tours start much more often from Bodrum, marmaris and Fetiyhe.
Organized operation of the cruise
The tourism industry has also embraced the term 'Blue Cruise'. Traditional sailing boats – called Gulets – take guests around the jagged shores of the Aegean Sea.
Dutch providers of the Blue Cruise can be found under the name ZonnigZeilen op [1] and Blue Cruise Turkey [2].Foreign providers of the Blue Cruise include Mizana[3] and Alestay consideration[4]