Kuşadası

I got up around 7pm and slowly started packing my stuff. My couchsurfing host Aleyna got up around 7:30am and made us coffee, which we had while chatting until 11am. 😅 So I left her place quite late for my route plans but anyways. :D I then quickly got some breakfast from the bakery down the road and started cycling along the coast towards an old village called Old Doğanbey first, which was recommended to me by Kamil. It was a nice route through little villages and there was a lot of farming going on along the way. Around 2pm, I locked my bike at a car park in Old Doğanbey and was friendly with tourists and locals who wanted to take pictures of me with them. 😅 Especially in Turkey people are interested in me a lot in a very friendly way when I show up by myself with a bicycle. 😅 I then walked around the village for an hour with its beautiful old Ottoman style stone houses! Such a cute place and totally worth it the climb up the hill to get there! 😊 After I had some lunch that I brought, I continued cycling around 3:15pm with another 50km ahead. I don't know why, but since Turkey I generally start cycling a lot later while not having as much daylight anymore, not the best combination. 😅 When I was on the way down from the village, I was barked at by a dog on a property on the side of the road. It happened to me quite a few times that they shoot out at me kind of aggressively. Nothing ever happend though. This time I managed to get a short clip of the dog barking at me. He was wiggling his tail though at the same time. 😅 Still, it took me some time to get past him and he did approach me quite closely barking at me when I walked past..
It was pretty flat first until Söke, where I had a short rest for another snack. It was pretty late already and still another 20km to go and a huge 300m elevation hill ahead, which I was a little worried about regarding my achilles tendon (more on that when I finally catch up on Greece). Just before approaching the climb past Söke, I wanted to add some air to my backtyre to make it a little easier. In doing so, I almost ruined the valve when unplugging the pump hose, so I left it screwed on the valve and decided to fix it later. 😅 I slowly made my way up the hill amd got to see a beautiful sunset on the way down. Still had 15km to go though, really not the best timing today.. I arrived at couchsurfer Erhan in the dark and pretty exhausted. 😅 He immediately understood my need for a shower and some food and quickly cooked a delicious meal for us (he has a cooking education)! :) We had dinner and some glasses of wine on the balcony with beautiful views onto Kuşadası together, it was really nice. :) Being super exhausted and him having to get up early the next morning to go to Istanbul, I went to bed around 11pm. I initially planned to wake up early since he also had to leave super early. He left me the keys though and told me multiple times that I should stay longer and enjoy having the apartment for myself for the next day. 😅

Well, I did not get up early and stayed in bed around 9:30am. So I decided to take the offer of another day of rest in Kuşadası. ;) I then got breakfast at the bakery close by which I enjoyed on the balcony with a beautiful view! 😊 I could see the city properly now during daylight and also three huge cruise ships in the harbour. 🙈Before exploring the city together with another couchsurfer I was in touch with, I fixed my tyre issuepn the bicycle. 👌 Çağlar picked me up by around 2pm and we went for coffee together at the seafront. :) He's a nice guy and I enjoyed the conversation with him about Turkey and its people a lot. He showed me around the city, which was super busy with lots of events (live music, dances, stages) since it was independence day! 😁 That also explained the overwhelming amount of flags hanging everywhere!! We walked around inner city, onto a peninsula with a castle called bird island and the drove up a hill to an Atatürk statue next to seen the sunset from up there. :) Next we went to a place called ladies beach and other beaches locals would go to, which was nice. He dropped me off at home by 7pm. I did some grocery shopping and cooked some pasta for dinner. :)
Then, I slowly packed stuff and made a little present for Erhan as a thank you for when he gets back from Istanbul. Initially, Çağlar and me wanted to go out again in the evening but I was really exhausted with a big day ahead of me. So I stayed in and wanted to sleep earlier for a change (obviously didn't happen..). 😅Read more