We continue our round up of the local news from Fethiye, Muğla and surrounding area; the last of 2011.

Treasure Hunters Strike it Lucky on the Beach

Local press reported that, following the recent storms and rains, the men with metal detectors were out on Ölüdeniz Beach searching for last season's 'lost jewellery'.

Working in teams of two (one with detector, one to dig) it was reported that most of them ran away at the approach of the press.

However, one young man called Ercan (he refused to give his surname) did tell the reporter that he found 3 – 4 rings per day, and his efforts should be seen as 'helping clean the beach'.

Dash, Splash But Who Won?

The Çalış Boxing Day Splash was also widely reported in the local press with photographs of the snowmen, penguins, angels and robots (amazing what you can do with cardboard boxes and kitchen foil) frolicking in the sea.

Unfortunately the local reporter doesn't seem to have grasped that it is a competition, so we don't know who won.

Perhaps a reader who was present can let us know and we'll pass it on in the next news snippets?

It’s No Joke Grandad Needs the Cash to Get Married

Tarık Kuru, a young man who runs a shop in Üzümlü, put an advert on a Turkish car sales website that said

“This is not a joke. I am forced to sell this car so we have money for my grandad to get married”.

He was inundated with offers from all over the country, sold the car for his asking price, and used the money to pay for his 75-year-old widowed grandfather to marry.

Bet we all wish we had a grandson like Tarık.

Stats in Fine Health

The annual statistics are already appearing (though we would hope, for accuracy's sake, that this final week of the year will be added in, before they submit their accounting to the government) with the State Hospital announcing it has had a fourfold increase in patients over 2011.

The hospital has 223 beds and this past year treated 12,000 in-patients of whom 20,000 underwent surgery.

Furthermore, they also saw almost half a million out patients.

Not to be outdone the 22 Health Centres in and around Fethiye said they had seen 482,903 patients during the year.

And Finally......

Finally AKUT, the Turkish Search & Rescue Organization, that set up a permanent base in

Fethiye in June 2010, announced that it had carried out 15 successful operations during 2011.

These involved fallen paragliders and lost walkers, and they had also rescued a goat that fell in a rock slide near Minare village and got stuck between two large rocks.

What with the grandad's wedding above, and now the saving of the goat, it would seem we have two 'Ah Bless' moments this week.

Happy New Year to all!