Category: Turkey
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Going East Part 7: Syria and Jordan
Read more: Going East Part 7: Syria and JordanWe are pleased to announce that the first part of our Going East book – which is actually Part 7 of our trip – is now available on Amazon as an eBook. Our plan is to publish various sections of the longer story as they are ready as smaller mini-books to make up a complete…
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Another day another freighter!
Read more: Another day another freighter!One of our new Izmir friends, Mustafa, works for the government and is somehow associated with Ulusoy Freighters. He was able to get us passage on a small (180m) roll-on-roll-off freighter from Cesme Turkey to Trieste Italy. This has been a huge help, and meant that we could spend an extra week in the Middle…
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A brief visit with our friends
Read more: A brief visit with our friendsAfter a short visit to Aleppo to see Fadi and pick up our bikes (2-nights), a short taxi ride from Aleppo to Antakya (3-hours), and a long bus ride to Izmir (18-hours) we were glad to be greeted at the otogar (bus station) by Metin. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain, so our ride back to…
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Busing in Syria
Read more: Busing in SyriaTaking a long-distance bus in Turkey is a very civilized experience. Buses in Syria are less refined, but much more of a cultural experience. We never know quite what we’re getting into. We have not yet (and likely won’t) perfect the ability to catch the best bus between two places. We did managed to avoid…
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Convoy to Syria
Read more: Convoy to Syria48 km, 3.5 hr We decided to team up with Wendy and Peter for our ride between Antakya and Aleppo. From our various discussions, it appears that we move at about the same speed (that is in km per day), and they were willing to take the ride to Aleppo slowly to account for our…
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Inertia
Read more: InertiaAny time you are off the bike for a while and don’t have a kick to get back on (like being dumped off of a boat in the middle of a foreign country!), you must overcome a certain level of inertia. Way back on July 5th, before we left home, we posted about how we…
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A few days in Antakya
Read more: A few days in Antakya10km Our first hotel in Antakya (the Seker Palas Oteli) tested us. It was clean and we asked what we thought were all the important questions – the one question we forgot however was “do you have heat?” The answer apparently was no! They also did not have Internet, and all the Internet cafes in…
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Iyi Bayramlar
Read more: Iyi BayramlarAfter a brief bus ride, we arrived in Kayseri – home of Metin’s parents. We were met at the bus station by Metin and Mehmet, who had arrived in Kayseri earlier that morning after a 12-hour drive. They had brought their three mountain bikes on a rack on their rental car, but unfortunately only one…