2022 ILCA 7 Master Worlds - Practice Day

 by Pam

Practice Day and Opening Ceremony.  Doug's room is on the bottom floor and walking out his front door puts him about 6 feet from the boats.  The yacht club and launch ramp are just a few steps away.

They were under a postponement waiting for the breeze to come in. Doug decided to retreat to his room and take a nap and wait for the horn and the postponement flag going down. He thinks he is a light sleeper (he's not) and would hear the horn.  

Needless to say, he woke up and realized it was kind of quiet, stepped outside and all the boats were gone. So, he rushed to launch and said there was a strong breeze and he actually tipped in the harbor trying to get out. Next, he encountered 4 to 5 foot waves, not rollers but full on waves. He said more than once he had the thought 'I shouldn't be out here.'  I'm a little worried for him.

I was talking with him as he headed out to the Opening Ceremony and he had to immediately double back and get his mask. He said it's really impressive, everyone is wearing a mask. When checking in and waiting in line, they actually have people going through and telling people to back up for social distancing. Quite a change from the United States, especially Texas. I'm thankful for it.

Really wish I was there. Here is a video of one of the tigers at the hotel carrying around its newly acquired purse. I guess someone got too close?

Oman Open Worlds Videos - Day 7

By Doug

This is the final race and all eyes were on Robert Scheidt (BRA 205239) who was just one point ahead of Olympic silver medalist Pavlos Kontides (CYP 205124). The match racing that many anticipated did not occur and Pavlos was not a factor in this start.

Brett does a great job focusing on Robert who at 0:40 is in a crowd near the pin trying to create some space by working Sam Meech (NZL 196871) above him. This group is being watched closely by a judge boat that is right behind them. It's a great example of how the best Laser sailor ever starts in a crowd.

General recall.

In a previous post, I showed this picture that Brett captured from the final start of the Worlds. It seemed to make the sailors around Robert look slow:

This next video shows that with one minute to go, Robert creates a good hole below him although it did not last. Everyone pulls the trigger at about the same time, it's just that Robert pulls his a fraction of a second sooner. But for me the really interesting part is just after the start when he lets his main out a little to foot and gets speed. Note that the end of his boom goes up instead of out, showing that he did not have lots of vang. You can see the result by looking at the shadow on Robert's sail - it shows just how much faster he was going compared to the boat to windward of him.

Pulling the trigger a fraction of a second early + great boatspeed = a great start. Add to this reading the breeze and shifts better than anyone else, world class downwind speed, and the result was inevitable. Robert wins this race and his 9th Laser worlds.

Thanks again to Brett for these awesome videos.

Oman Open Worlds Videos - Day 6

By Doug

This is another good video, this time because of who is in this gold fleet start. We're at the pin and 15 seconds into the video, we have Rutger van Schaardenburg (NED 204567), Emil Cedergardh (SWE 204437), Philipp Buhl (GER 203170), Nick Thompson (GBR 201402), and Kristian (NOR 204758). To give you an idea of the talent, Rutger finished 4th overall, Philipp finished 3, and Nick had 7 top-five finishes but finished 17 (had to count an RET). It ended up being a general recall.

Note that Robert Scheidt chose not to start at this risky end of the line.

Restart, and we're watching another person Brett is coaching. James Espey (IRL 192703) gets sandwiched between David Wright (CAN 199330) and Francesco Marrai (ITA 205243). There's a big gap above Francesco but no one takes it. James survives and pinches off Francesco.

The camera moves up the line and we see Bruno Fontes (BRA 203765) and Tom Burton (AUS 199012) just below Kristian. Both James and Kristian get good starts.

The next start is committee boat favored, and we see Kristian starting with Philipp Buhl, David Wright, Tom Burton, Charlie Buckingham (USA 182345), Nick Thompson, Matthew Wearn (AUS 203770), Sergey Komissarov (RUS 202692), Marco Gallo ITA (196685), and former world champ Gustavo Lima (POR 202210). We hear Brett talk about how starting here is too high a risk. General recall. 

Note again that Robert again was not at this risky end of the line.

Next start, and we start watching James and Kristian line up under Lee Parkhill (CAN 197120). Kristian stays put while James goes further down the line and finds a nice hole that disappears when Joaquin Blanco Albalat (ESP 197295) to leeward pushes out his boom and works the tiller at 0:45 in the video.

This is a is a technique used (invented?) by Ben Ainslie that was considered legal because if tiller does not cross the centerline then technically it's not sculling. Now, it's illegal. There is no judge boat in the immediate area and Blanco gets away with it, although he was yellow flagged for a second time in race 9 and had to retire.

We see hear Brett asking James to squeeze up to close the gap to windward.

We then switch to the right to watch Kristian battling with David Wright with a lot of tiller movement that could have been yellow flagged. Kristian starts with top-five finisher Jesper Stalheim (SWE 204666) right below and is saved by another general recall.

This sequence starts with 1 1/2 minutes to go. We briefly see Robert (BRA 205239) heading further down the line. His starting technique is quite unique because he waits as long as possible to decide where he wants to start. In another start, I saw him standing on his transom, planing on port down the line, looking upwind with less than 2 minutes to go.

At 0.50 we see Tom Burton (AUS 199012) tack twice to close the gap below James. There a judge boat right behind and everyone is well behaved. We can hear Brett talk about a last-minute shift and how James is squeezed and rolled at the same time because of a mistake that he made.

Further to windward, we see Kristian with a good lane and start.

Oman Open Worlds Videos - Day 5

By Doug

There was less wind on day 5 and this was a really interesting start.

Brett is coaching Kristian Ruth (NOR 204758) and focuses on him for the entire sequence. It's committee boat favored and the boats lined up before one minute at the crowded windward end of the line. Kristian is between Tobias Schadewaldt (GER 203739) and Ashley Brunning (AUS 206037).

There's a judge boat watching closely that they would have been aware of, so we get to see the amount of tiller movement before the start and kinetics after the start that the sailors feel are permitted at a world's event. They all pull the trigger with five seconds to go and Ashley was fortunate not to get yellow-flagged at 1:30 in the video.

While the start was clean, none of the boats in this sequence had a good finish in this race.

Oman Open Worlds Videos - Day 3

By Doug

The videos that I took were with a pocket camera from a small, unstable boat. We're fortunate to have much better videos courtesy of Brett Beyer who had a much better camera and a bigger boat. This is pretty cool because we get to see how some of the best small boat sailors in the world position themselves on such a competitive starting line.

And as a bonus, we get to hear Brett's comments about the two sailors that he was coaching: Kristian Ruth (NOR) and James Espey (IRL). These two are easy to see on the line because they both have sponsor markings on their sails. We have Brett's videos from 4 days, and will end with the gold medal race won by Robert Scheidt.

We start with James (192703) fighting for a position at a very crowded pin. He jibes and then tacks further up the line to find a hole. General recall.

Next, we see James getting out of a jam to get a bad start, and there's another recall.

Here, James has an OK start, gets off the line well, and finished the race in 12th.

In this next video, we have Kristian Ruth (204758) holding his position and getting a good start. General recall.

Here we have Robert Scheidt (205239) sailing on port behind Kristian and then starting 3 boats to windward. Both started well. Kristian finished 15th and Robert 2nd.

In the second race of the day, we see Kristian fighting for his place, and another recall.

This start is from the committee boat end under a black flag. As Brett says, Kristian does not get a great start. He finished 28th in this race.

In this start, we see Robert sailing on port looking for a hole that he found about 10 boats to windward. Kristian starts well but is unable to hold his lane and has to tack. He finished 28th. Towards the end, we can see Robert with the yellow hat. He had a good lane off the line and went on to win the race.

Robert Scheidt at the Oman Worlds

By Doug

On the final day of competition, everyone was kept onshore as there was less than the 5 knots needed to start a race. Robert had a one-point lead over Pavlos Kontides but looked relaxed as he hung out with other members of the Brazilian team. I thought our blog readers would be interested to learn from him, so I asked if I could take some pictures and have him explain his rigging and strategy.

He started by saying his setup was pretty simple. He was one of the last to switch from the old vang to the new vang, and had taken one of the loops out because the new vang is too powerful. The result is a 10:1 rather than a 15:1. You'll see that there were some markings on the vang rope.

The rest of his rigging looked like any other boat:

Looking at Robert's setup, it's clear that it's not the boat.

Robert does not sail with a compass and has not since the 2000 Sydney Olympics, which apparently did not allow them. He did say that there were times in Oman when he missed having one because the windward legs were sailed towards the open water and there were no land references.

I asked what he's looking for when he stands up 2 minutes before the start. He usually does this from the leeward end of the line but I saw him once planing down the line on port standing on the transom with the tiller between his legs. He explained that he likes to plan the first 2-3 minutes of the race and then starts accordingly. He added that in light air as we had in Oman, starting in the middle of the line is risky because if anything goes wrong, there's no escape.

After the awards ceremony, I bumped into him as he was heading back to the hotel with an armful of trophies. I told him that a lot of people were happy that he had won. He responded in his usual gracious way, "You brought me good luck."

I assured him that it was not me and it was not luck.

Doug's World

by Pam

The Laser Master Worlds in Oman right now is a bit of a throw back regatta for Doug. With the oil in his good eye, his vision is such that he's struggling to see and recognize people. 

When I first met him (before his multiple eye surgeries), he seemed so very odd because he would say hello to the same person repeatedly on the docks as if he'd just seen them for the first time that day. Come to find out, everyone was a blur and he didn't know who he was talking to until he either recognized their voice, the subject they were talking about or some distinctive hat or clothing color. Added to the vision problem is that his hearing isn't the best so when someone would talk to him and he couldn't see their lips moving, he wasn't sure who was talking, if they were talking to him, or what they were saying so he'd just start talking about random subjects that seemed to have no connection to the conversation taking place. Until I realized what was happening, I thought he was just the strangest guy.

We were talking by Skype this evening and he tells me he's finding himself avoiding eye contact with folks in Oman (like he use to) because of the whole 'who is that, are they talking to me and what the heck did they just say?'  So, if you're in Oman and you read this blog, help Doug out by putting a hand on his shoulder, talking loudly and identifying yourself every time you strike up a conversation. He does much better once he's on the water. To him, people have distinctive ways of sailing, be it their posture, where they sit, hiking style, their boat handling, sail trim, etc. Even though he has much better recognition on the water, he still can't hear very well. So if he ignores you, he isn't being rude on purpose. All that said, do not cut him any slack on the water or you'll regret it. 

After several eye surgeries, Doug's vision was better than 20/20 in his good eye (which it will be again when the oil comes out in a couple of months).  For reference, we were once looking at some blurry pictures and I asked him to point out which ones were close to what his vision use to be. Check it out ... it just blows my mind!

Doug's vision in 2006 when he won the Worlds in Korea

Doug's vision in 2009 when he came 6th at the Worlds in Halifax but he claims his weight was the biggest problem

Oman Worlds - Who's Ready?

by Doug

Good evening ma'am

The competitors have had up to five training days including the practice race that we just finished. It's interesting to listen to people speak about their experiences so far. There is a consensus that it will be light, it's hard to see the wind patterns on water, there are some very strange variations in pressure, big shifts, and even talk of how current may be a factor. Some countries with lighter competitors could do very well.

Here's an example: yesterday I was sailing with a fellow from SUI on my hip just 10 meters away. In the light breeze, he was faster and he started to roll me. I thought, no problem, I'll get the breeze in a moment. Well, he rolled me and I never did get that breeze. Just 10 meters away!!! I told this story to a quick Aussie and she said that I had done this to her the day before. Go figure!

Normally light conditions are familiar to me because I sail in Dallas which is inland and only has small lakes. But nothing that works in Dallas works here - it's like learning all over again. This really gives you an appreciation of how consistently good Robert Scheidt was last week.

Our practice race confirmed what the conditions will be like - changes in pressure, shifty, and very tactical. And there are some people in our fleet with some real speed. One thing for sure - it will be important to look around to watch others for clues on the water.

I may have to use others to spot the pressure because of something that happened on Thursday evening. The US team had a Thanksgiving dinner, and at the entrance I was polite, smiled, and said 'Hi' to our hostess standing at the entrance ... only to realize is was a wooden mannequin. Boy, am I glad that no one was watching.

Laser Masters Thanksgiving in Oman

Team USA Thanksgiving in Oman

More Pictures from Oman

by Doug

Pictures from Oman

by Doug

Local entertainment

Boats and hotel

Breakfast

Breakfast

Breakfast

Breakfast

Breakfast

Oman Open Worlds - Day 7 - Scheidt Wins!

by Doug

They held everyone on shore waiting for the breeze to fill in. We went out at about 1:00 and then sat and waited some more. With a few minutes before the 3:00 cutoff, the gold fleet finally got off. Here's the moment just before the gun taken by Brett from a different angle. It's a great example of why Robert, in the middle, gets off the line so well.

Robert went left with good height, tacked on the first shift, and led at every mark to win. There are a lot of people very happy to see him win. It was really an honor to have him back sailing Lasers.

Robert wins the last race and his 9th Worlds.  I took lots of video, hope some of it's usable.

Oman Open Worlds - Day 6

by Doug

More torrential rain overnight and some rooms in the hotel actually got flooded. The little boat I've been using had about 8" of water in it. I wouldn't be surprised if the local farmers try to get another Laser Worlds ASAP because of all the rain that we bring.

There was lots more talk about yesterday's racing. The key part of the race was being in the right place when a shift hit, and of course the first shift is really important. With all those boats with good speed, being on the outside of a circle really hurt, especially at the top of the course. The last shift is always persistent and being on the wrong side cost many people many places. So the most important shift for many was the last shift of the first beat.

The other thing that I noticed was how Robert managed the top of the first run. He was on the left and the outside of a rightie at the first mark and rounded in 14th place. Robert is known for his downwind skills, so it was interesting to see at the end of the top reach that he continued past the mark for about 20 seconds. This looked more like trying to stay in clear air than looking for pressure. Playing the right worked until the bottom of the run because the boats in the middle had a better angle with the breeze. But the right/clear air certainly worked for most of the run.

                 

With so much to learn, I focused again on Robert today and saw something I had not seen before in a race. With 2 minutes to go, he wanted to check upwind from the boat end of the line, so sailing on port while planing, he stood on the back of the deck for about 8 seconds looking upwind. He must have liked what we saw on the right. With a good lead and being conservative, he started in the middle of the line. After a few recalls, you'll see Robert set up and defend. A minute after the start, he tacked and won the first race.

In the second, you'll see another way that he defends by tacking twice. In this race, he had a bad first leg and finished 26th.

Pavlos sailed really well and had finishes of 3 and 6, so he is now just 1 point back with one more day to go.

  

Oman Open Worlds - Day 5

by Doug

The fleets were split into gold and silver and, of course, all of the coach boats wanted to watch the gold fleet. This video is not going to win any Academy Awards - the conditions for videoing were good but with the slop, I had trouble holding the camera still as you'll see. 

Picking the correct side was important and the leaders played the right on the first beat. I talked briefly with race winner Nick Thompson (GBR) and he played the middle right and led at each mark. It's amazing how important the first beat is as the positions rarely change much after that. The rich get richer... 

Neither Robert or Pavlos had a stellar first leg or finish. 

We only got in the one race because of the big front that came through. You'll see a part of it at the end of the video. One of our roommates is Colin Leonard and after standing on our balcony he said, "that is the quickest I got soaked ever." And he's from Ireland!!! 

Like the locals say about the weather at so many Laser Worlds: it's never like this.

Oman Open Worlds - Day 4

by Doug

A lot of people are enjoying Robert Scheidt (BRA) in this competition and he's well-known for his speed, especially downwind. Here's something that may not be as well-known - his reading of the wind going upwind.

One of my roommates is Kristian Ruth (NOR) and he told me an interesting story about Race 5 yesterday. He and Robert were about even in the mid-teens on the run, and for the first part of the next beat. There was no speed difference between them. Robert then tacked away for 30 seconds and then tacked back again to catch the edge of a wind line that put him in more pressure sooner and longer. When Kristian tacked, Robert was 50 meters in front and went on to finish 2nd. Kristian finished 15th. I asked Kristian if he saw what Robert saw and he said no.

The breeze today shifted to the north and was lighter. The first race started in about 4 knots and this increased to about 8 knots. The waves are the gentle chop you can expect in open water. The shifts were 20º and pretty random. People feel that rolled sails are an advantage in these conditions. There were about 20 yellow flags handed out today and you'll hear the whistles in the video.

Robert had a 28, his drop, and another bullet. I tried to focus on him and between races, you'll see a short close-up video of his setup for these conditions. You'll also wee a video of him starting the next race near the boat, waiting for a port-tack lane to develop, and then tack and duck one boat to go right and win the race.

One other thing to report... others are carving, jibing, and trying to catch waves going downwind. In the conditions today, Robert heads straight downwind.

Olympic Silver Medalist Pavlos Kontides (CYP) has sailed with great consistency and is 5 points back but has a drop of only 10, which is pretty amazing. I've watched him start and he likes being near the pin and always seems to get away with a good lane.

[Warning - this video might make you seasick]

Rain on the way ...

Oman Open Worlds - Day 3

By Doug

The size of my little boat for veiwing

The forecast was the same but it felt windier because the waves were bigger and I had a lot of trouble taking videos while being bounced around. And I was under doctor's orders not to have much sudden movement after my eye surgery last week. And the boat did not have an anchor. So the videos are pretty bad, but I learned that even bad videos can be useful as you will see.

I'm always looking for something different, something special to remember, but this can difficult in an event that lasts for 7 days. I saw something at the end of the first race today that I thought would be the highlight of the day. It was the bottom reach in the first race and at the beginning the two leading boats had a comfortable lead and were very close. By the end of the reach, one had pulled ahead by what looked like about 100 meters. I thought, both are world-class sailors... how can one be soooo much faster? And who was it?

Two minutes later, they finished and it was Robert Scheidt (BRA) who had pulled away from Nick Thompson (GBR), who is not at all slow. I thought wow, that was fantastic!

Nick is also in this report because in the next race there was a collision and he was disqualified. While unfortunate, that's not news. What is news is that he was in the 40's, which shows how brutal the conditions can be. Here's your new phrase of the day, spoken by an Aussie: anyone can have a shitter of a race.

But what made this day memorable happened back on shore. There was an unsolicited comment from one of the coaches about a US sailor who was 'yellow flagged' twice today. Translation - too much kinetics. Translation - cheating. The comment was made in the context of coaching. I added how US coaching at the college level is a disgrace because of the illegal (by international standards) kinetics that are actually encouraged. The international judges aren't stupid and know this, so the US coach here has a tough job having to un-train their sailors of the techniques that helped them get here. It's unfair, and the results were seen today. The coach I was talking with summed it up by saying that talented US sailors are nowhere close to their potential.

Robert had a great day with a 1, 2, 1. I congratulated him after the racing and the first thing he said was "I got a 2." From anyone else in the fleet, this would have been a statement of pure joy. From Robert, it sounded more like an apology.

The highlight from this memorable day happened after dark. There was an incident at the end of race 4 when Kristian Ruth (NOR) was fouled on the finishing line by another boat and I happened to video the incident. So my video was used as evidence which several people have told me is very rare because it has to be conclusive. The other boat also had a witness from Korea. We waited several hours before the protest hearing was held which Kristian won. It was the Korean's word against my video.

Here's the funny part - it could be the first time in sporting history when it was the Asian who did not have the camera.

[Warning - this video might make you seasick]

Oman Open Worlds - Day 2

by Doug

My first day in Oman happened to be His Majesty's birthday and the customs fellow at the airport said that I should be very happy. He was right, but perhaps for a different reason. I got to the hotel at 5:30 AM local time, having taken more than 50 hours to get to there. It was great to see Brett again, meet the fellows from Norway and Ireland he's coaching, check out the hotel (very nice), food (excellent), and start to get settled in.

Coach boats are extremely rare and Brett was unable to get his own, so he is sharing one with the Japanese coach. Everyone was a bit shocked when I was offered my own tiny boat by simply asking. The offshore breeze dies before the sea breeze kicks in, so there was a delay. We headed out just after noon.

So, here's my first Oman trivia question: what's the one thing that should never be hard to find in this part of the world?

Answer: Gas!! My boat had perhaps a liter and the coach from Tunisia had none and, get this, they stop selling gas at the marina at noon!!

It was one of those we-didn't-come-this-far-to-sit-on-the-shore moments, so I asked my new Tunisian friend if he would like to jump in, go 2 km upwind, drop the anchor, watch the starts and finishes, and then come (drift?) back to the harbor. He had no other option.

There's a joke amongst Laser sailors that the conditions for the Worlds are never what's expected. It only rains here 5 days a year and, sure enough, the outdoor opening ceremonies gala on Saturday was marred by, you guessed it, lots of rain. And the winds here have not been above 12 for the last month, so the first day was "fresh" as the Aussies like to say.

This second day was also windy - perhaps building to 15. But it's shallow so some the waves make it feel stronger. The waves reminded me a little of the Melbourne Worlds that was also in shallow water.

A rule is that no coach/media/spectator boat is permitted within 100 meters of where a competitor could sail, so getting good pictures is always a challenge. Add to this the bouncing around in our little boat, using a hand-held camera, using the zoom, and the sunlight reflecting off the tiny screen all made it hard to imagine what I was capturing ... but then I was having trouble seeing anyway.

We limped out to the starting area where all of the coach boats park behind the starting line. There were none at the pin so I suggested we park there, so here's the pin-end report.

The 120 competitors are split into 2 fleets for the first few days, so there are 2 starts.

Robert Scheidt (BRA) is back in Lasers and he has a very predictable starting sequence that I first noticed at the Ireland Worlds. He stands up with 2-3 minutes to go at the pin (part of the reason I wanted to be there), watches for about 20 seconds, and only then makes his final decision about where to start. No ones else does this.

The first fleet had 4 recalls and under a black flag about a dozen were disqualified including leader Nick Thompson (GBR). It's interesting to note that the middle of the line is where a lot of boats started early - there was no line sag. I also got a video of the end of the run of the second fleet, and you'll see Robert in the lead. He went on to win his race which is the second-to-last part of this video. On the way in, the fleet converged at the harbor entrance and a sailor beside was sailing hard by-the-lee, so I grabbed the camera and got a few seconds of that as well.

Thanks to a Chicago Mechanic

By Doug

I got a really good deal with my Turkish Airlines ticket to Oman in part because it permitted up to 120 pounds of luggage at no cost. This is a sailor's dream come true, especially for the return trip in case there is wet clothing. And it was not until after I had booked the ticket that my friend, Laban, told me that it was a real shame that I would be connecting through Istanbul without seeing the city. I had a feeling that leaving Chicago late because of a mechanical problem would put my connecting flight to Muscat in jeopardy. So yes, I got to see that great city.

Most people would think that having to kill 22 hours with only carry-on items as a bummer, but I had the feeling that it would be an adventure. So here's what a Laser sailor's one-day can look like with the help of a young Turkish guide whose name I could not pronounce, but thankfully whose friends called Dolphin.

The first thing I decided was to travel by bus and tram rather than take cabs. Not many people spoke English, but everyone was really friendly. After checking out the layout of the Old City, my first stop was the Blue Mosque. It was huge and when I stopped to marvel at it, a voice beside me said, 'that's the Blue Mosque.' To my left was a 17-year old fellow on his way to prayers, and he offered to take me through it. Not knowing any of the customs, I accepted. Thus began an extraordinary 5-hour friendship where he would show me his city in return for me helping with his English. I guessed he thought that doing someone a favor was worth skipping prayers.

A 2-car traffic jam. Neither one wanted to back up.

After the Blue Mosque, we circled behind it to see one of the smaller bazaars and then headed for something Laban said I would love - the nearby Hagia Sophia. It's a 1,500 year-old church that was later a mosque and is now a museum. But on the way we passed the Underground Cistern and Dolphin insisted that I check it out. It was an underground cave built in the 6th century, then forgotten for 900 years, and then discovered again in 1545. Walking through it was list like being in a James Bond movie, and holding up the Old City were row after row after row of columns ... very cool.

Dolphin's uncle owns several shops nearby so we had to drop in to say Hi. I'm not a coffee drinker but could not pass up a chance to have a Turkish coffee and talk religion, politics, and economics in the middle of hundreds of Turkish rugs. When I convinced him that I was not going to buy one, we moved to the jewelry store next door where it was harder saying no to a surprise gift for Pam (I tried that once in the Dominican Republic without success).

So when the uncle realized that I would not be buying anything, then he said, "Time is money" and led me to the door. Only then did I realized that Dolphin was nowhere to be seen. "He had to go," so off I went. And sure enough, he was waiting for me a block away.

We walked though the Hagia Sophia and I can sum it up with it's massive, it's beautiful, and well, it's massive. I was impressed that it's a museum and open to people of all faiths ... and not to be missed!

My friend Laban told me that one of the first things he would do was walk to the old harbor and have a freshly-caught fish sandwich. So that's Dolphin and I did. The meal for two including drinks was 15 lira, or about $8 US.

Right next door was the Spice Bazaar which felt it was out of the same James Bond movie. I kept telling myself, "got to get something for Pam and Laban," but what? At one shop a fellow gave Dolphin a big hug and invited us in. For the next half hour, we were treated to some of the most exotic treats and tea that I have ever tasted. Finding gifts wound no longer be a problem!

We had one more hour to kill and Dolphin told me that he liked to play  Backgammon, so we found a small outdoor cafe at the end of a tiny alley and we had more tea and played lots of games. Let's just say that I'll stick to competitive sailing!

The hotel where I had checked my carry-on luggage was a 1km uphill walk and I knew that this was out of Dolphin's way, but he insisted on walking with me. When we got there I was half expecting the kind of handout request that you see in so many other cities, but Dolphin asked for my Facebook address, shook my hand, and thanked me for the English lesson. What an awesome young man!

My only regret was that the Grand Bazaar was closed on Sunday so we could not see it, and the only thing missing after a long day of walking around the Old City was a really friendly German fellow insisting on buying me a cold beer at the airport. Which of course is what happened. Thank you Chris!

And of course a special thanks to a mechanic in Chicago who could not quite get the problem on our plane fixed in time. So, now it's on to Oman.