Boating Turkey www.boatingturkey.net

We've chartered with Boating Turkey twice. Last year (May 2012) it was great, since the charter was handled by EGG Yachts out of Goeck. (Boating Turkey is a broker). Absolutely first class in every respect, including the facilities in D-Marine at Goeck. This year (June 2013), however, we were very disappointed, mainly because the boat was was very dirty and was missing a lot of equipment when it was delivered to us. Apparently the boat had just been purchased and moved to the municipal marina in Goeck (not a great marina).

1. We arrived at the boat and it had not been cleaned. A very superficial job had been done, but clearly not a complete cleaning. (Totally unlike last year when EGG was in charge). The fellow handling logistics was aware that the boat was dirty, and said it was their fault as he had been told that the boat would be cleaned prior to arrive at the municipal marina. There was plenty of time to clean the boat, but nothing was arranged before we were given the boat. He was planning to give us a very dirty boat.

We complained about this, and a person came on the boat to do a very quick cleaning. When we came back to the boat after the quick cleanup, it was still insufficiently clean. We called again and complained. A person came to the boat again and did a more thorough cleaning (but not complete). In sum, we had to insist twice on better cleaning for the boat. (BTW: the heads were not clean and shiny, the galley was not clean and had oil streaks on the cabinets and counters, the inside cushions were filthy, etc. Very distressing.) Another example, there were bags of garbage stored from the last charter still in a stern storage compartment.

This, of course, is unacceptable. No pride of providing a clean boat to customers was evident, and no attempt to clean the boat was made until we insisted.

2. The boat was not checked out before we arrived. Going through the checklist we noticed many things missing or not complete: no gas for the dingy, life buoy missing, no coffee maker, no water hose, no hand compass, no cleaning supplies, etc. It was clear that the boat was not checked out carefully prior to our arrival.

3. The dingy had a puncture and there was no repair kit. I suspect that they knew about the leak (a large one) prior to giving us the boat, since he had the dingy hoisted off of the deck with a halyard line. We couldn't use it for several outings, and we could not tie up outside of marinas because of the faulty dingy. This constrained our day trips and options.

4. For the check out I was handed a long generic list of boat equipment, not specific to this boat, and told to fill it in. The fellow in charge said he would return in a couple of hours. I spent a lot of time going through every item on the list, and noting that many items were missing. In every previous charter that I've had, in Turkey, Sweden, the USA and elsewhere, the company representative goes through the checklist with the customer together, showing the customer where the items are. Fortunately, another person came on the boat later and showed me where many of the items were located on the boat.

5. No information on emergency contacts or other useful tips were provided. I had to ask them what to do if problems arose. He wasn't sure what to do, but then gave me his mobile phone number. It was uncomfortable knowing that I had to take the initiative and worry about these things.

6. The facilities at the municipal marina were far short of what we had come to expect at D-Marine.

In sum, the entire experience was very unprofessional and disappointing.

I have enjoyed renting sailboats from the Moorings for over 30 years, but I must say BOATING TURKEY www.boatingturkey.net was every bit as professional and provided more personal attention to my needs and questions. The boat was in excellent condition with everything as promised. Since I am getting on in age and did not know the waters, I asked for a captain to help us. His sea knowledge was exceptional and he actually became part of our "sailing family" and greatly enhanced our Turkish experience.

BOATING TURKEY (Mr Artar) and he would be a strong recommendation for any of our friends chartering in Turkey

Andrew Hayward