Aliağa
9 de novembro de 2022, Turquia
I got up early this morning to say goodbye and to thank David, who had to leave early for work. Me and Ilkin had some porridge with fruits and a coffee for breakfast in the morning (well, we had to make two rounds of coffee since I spilt the entire thing in the kitchen, lucky David got a free full kitchen cleaning with my stay. :D ). I then slowly packed my stuff together and Ilkin helped me setting up my bicycle infront of the building. I left around 10am towards Aliağa (pronounced aˈlja.ɣ̞a, so no g) with around 57km and only 240m elevation ahead of me, so an easy day of cycling ahead of me and the weather seemed to be fine again, too. It did get a lot cooler though compared to the temperatures in Bodrum when I arrived just two weeks ago. But I was fine with my wind jacket and long pants still). Unfortunately, it wasn't the nicest route at all but I didn't want to take the scenic but much longer route along the coast due to my tensor issues.
It was riding along the main highway for at least 30km all the way out of Izmir to Menemen, where I made a stop for lunch break. The exits of the highway with an extra exiting line on the right of the road turned out to be super dangerous to pass: I had two options, either staying on the line going straight but kind of in the middle of the highway and risking being overtaken by cars on both sides, or staying on the side of the road but than having to cross the exiting line with cars driving super fast. I went with the latter option most of the time.
I stopped for some lunch in Menemen and locked my bike with luggage on somewhere near to what looked like the city center. It was a nice little authentic village that didn't seem touristy at all. However, this time of the year hardly any city (except for Istanbul maybe) is touristy. :D I also tried to find new headphone earplugs, I finally lost one of mine even though I planned on glueing it for weeks.. I couldn't find any so I ended up buying new headphones with suitable earplugs that fit my old headphones. Again the locals were super helpful, the first phone shop I went to didn't have anything like that but sent me to a different store, that guy didn't speak English but soon found someone who did. This guy then contacted another store to bring over some headphones because the current store also didn't have any. :D I loved it, buying headphones turned into such a fun activity. ;)
From Menemen I then continued my trip to Aliağa, where I would stay at Yuksels place for one night who I contacted through Couchsurfing. :)
One thing that kind of became an issue from there on: Days were getting a lot shorter pretty fast, even more because I was travelling north and many times I'd arrive just with or after sunset because I took my time during the day thinking I'd still have a another hour before sunset.. :D
That's also what happened at Yuksel's place, I arrived there at 6pm with the sun already down. He was super nice and welcoming, showed me his appartment and my room, quickly got changed and we went out for dinner to a really nice authentic place in the city center. Yuksel is going there often, the waitress knew him well and was glad to see him. :) We ordered a delicious lentil soup each and lahmacun with fresh greens, salad, lemons, and ayran on the side - I really enjoyed at least one ayran a day, preferrably the selfmade ones. ;)
After dinner, during which he told me a lot about his life in Morocco where he usually lives. His family is also located there and he came back to Turkey for some months for business reasons. He's working as an interior designer to customize cars in Morocco. After dinner we went for a stroll around the city. Once the sun has set it got really cold and even more windy, but we made the most out if walking around the harbour and inner city. :) It seemed like a beautiful quiet little city, you'd again find a lot of statures of Atatürk, the flags of the previous celebration were still hanging on most buildings.
Back at his place we made some tea and were chatting in the living room. Since both his sisters are professional sports and him having a lot of experience in physiotherapy, he offered me to check on my foot again which he did. Also he cracked my back, which was pretty sore from the positioning on the bike and the cold wind during the ride. I felt so much better after that but he told me that I have to take a lot more breaks during my rides which I promised to do. :)
I slept okay that night even though my bicycle was locked outside at the front door. Usually it was possible to lock it somewhere inside but not where he lives, which was fine with me though. I kind of always felt like trusting Turkish people and nothing bad ever happened. :)Leia mais
Dikili
10 de novembro de 2022, Turquia ⋅ ⛅ 13 °C
The next moring, Yuksel had to leave early for work, I quickly got up to say goodbye but he had already offered me in the evening to stay as long as I want in the moring and just close the door behind me when I leave. :)
Around 9am I texted Yuksel that I'm about to leave to find a bakery for some breakfast, and he responded to me: "Well, not now. It's Atatürk's moment of death soon everything will be closed." 9:05am, I heard prayers from the mosque, followed by people singing, and I could see people on the street suddenly stopping for a minute of silence. Everyone in the entire country put down work for some time, in the school close by I could hear that there was a big event going on due to his death. I went outside to look around and watch the happening. My bicycle was there still by the way. ;) Around 10am, I was back on my bicycle to grab some breakfast and water from a supermarket on the way out of Aliağa - honestly, I spent hours on this trip just sitting or standing infront of supermarkets eating something. It's not always a beautiful spot by the water but most of the time just some random place.. :D
After having such a horrible ride along the main highway, I really wanted to get off the main road on a beautiful little road along coast and through the countryside. I wasn't sure though whether it's possible with my foot to go along the coast regarding kilometers, elevation, and road conditions to go along the coast. So I decided to stop in Çandarlı first, which is kind of half way to Dikili and see from there which of the two options (along the coast or through the country) I would take. Çandarlı is a beautiful little city, maybe even more like a big village, that seemed pretty authentic and not touristy at all when I got there. I got there around 1pm and walked around the center a little, before having lunch in a nice little place serving pide (Note: it got pretty hard to stick to my vegetarian diet in Turkey, anytime it was possible for me to get veggie options I'd choose those, but sometimes people have already cooked something for me so of course I'd eat it as part of the cultural experience. Also, like this time, I ordered pide without meat, but got meat anyways..). I then searched for a nice sunny coffee shop by the water to have a çay and ask locals about the road conditions of my planned route. I found a pretty cool bar with the owner sitting in it playing guitar. He didn't speak English but again, thanks to translation apps, we managed to comunicate and he told me that the route along the coast is super steep in parts but the views are absolutely beautiful. Also he insisted on not letting me pay for my çay, we took a photo and I promised to leave him a great google reference, which I did. ;)
So I went for the scenic, steep route along the coast and it was really worth it!! It was quite steep though but I managed to get up in zig zags without having to push my bicycle. :)) The views on top were amazing, it was a sunny day and you could see some tiny islands just off the coast - the only islands that belong to Turkey, the others all belong to Greece even though they're so close to Turkey mainland. On top of the hill, I took a break on the side of the road in a gravel pitch to enjoy the view. I think that's when I puntured my back tyre.. I continued riding on the ridge of the hill with my headphones in but soon felt like somethings's weird. After travelling with my bicycle for so long, you can feel any little change in riding, and of course usually the sound of it. Annoyed by another back tyre puncture, I stopped to fix it. Just a few minutes after I stopped, a guy in a van coming the other way stopped asking whether I'd need help. It wasn't a busy road at all and the only one who came past during that time, but you can really count on people being super supportive whenever you need help in Turkey and the Balkan countries!! :) I didn't need help but enjoyed the talk and company. Volkan owns a kitesurfing school, which is only open during summer. He's on the way to travel south with his cat in the van to escape the cold winter weather. He helped me fixing the tyre and we chatted a little. I found a tiny little piece of metal wire stuck in the outer tyre, it probably punctured the inner tube. Lucky I found it, if I hadn't found it, it would have punctured the new inner tube, too. :D The back tyres take a lot longer to fix due to chain, so I gave my host in Dikili a heads up that (again) I would arrive just around sunset. :D
The last part of the ride was the most beautiful of the day though! First of all, it was a lot of downhill riding, also there were amazing views on the island and the sun slowly setting over the ocean. I was mostly riding through olive yards with the locals being busy with the harvest: The woman would sit on tarps on the floor under the trees and removing the leaves and sorting the olives that had fallen to the ground, while the man get the olives off the tree by shaking the branches.
I arrived in Dikili with the sun just setting and bumped into Mujdat on the street, my host for the night who I approached through the app "Warmshowers". He seemed to have immediately recognized me and invited me to his campervan first who was parked in the city center for some homemade traditional food that his mum gave him. :) Mujdat has lived in the UK and other parts of Europe for many years, working as a talent scout for soccer clubs. We had some nice conversations while eating and went to his appartment close by after, where he gave me the choice between two of the guest rooms - such a luxury. :)
I then had a shower and settled in one of the rooms (which turned out to have a traditional bed with only 1.60m in lenght), while he went out again. Later, we enjoyed some more conversation over a çay. He also invited me on a tour with his motorcycle to explore the area the next morning. The route for the next day was comparably easy and short, it wouldn't take me all day so I was happy about the offer to see more of the area this way. :) I went to bed around 11pm and slept quite fine for the size of the bed, surprisingly. :DLeia mais
Ayvalık
11 de novembro de 2022, Turquia
The next morning, Mujdat prepared some traditional Turkish breakfast called Kahvaltı, with fried egg, self-harvested olives, cheese, and a salat. I love Kahvaltı. :)) We then went back to his van, where the motorcycle is parked. Mujdat also plans to travel south with his van during winter time, apparently that's a thing in Turkey. Wearing a helmet at least, Mujdat showed me around the area of Dikili first: We went outside the city to the village where he was born and where his family still owns some land to grow olives. Then, we went inlands into the Kozak region on a narrow winding road up the mountains.
Along the way, we stopped somewhere near Nebiler to go for a little hike to a remote cave and waterfall. We were the only people walking this way. You had to follow up the stream of a river, and after just 20min of walking on a little hiking trail we found a pretty nice little cave with beautiful stone formations. The shallow water inside the cave was warm from thermal activity in the underground. After taking some pictures and exploring the cave, we continued our hike along the river. We had to cross on stones and fallen trees a few times. At some point, we heard a really weird sound near by, like a grunt of a bear. We stared at each other, confused, and weren't sure what to do. Mujdat said that he has no idea if there's bears in this area, also, we couldn't look it up because neither of us had reception on the phone. We decided to slowly continue and soon heard the sound again - this time it was clearly coming form the other side of the little hill and sounded more like an engine. :D I think we both freaked a little for no reason before. :D Continuing our hike, we soon arrived at a beautiful waterfall where we also spent some time, before heading back to the second waterfall near the motorbike. After about 1.5h of hiking, we continued our trip up the Kozak mountains.
We drove through endless pinetree forest, if I remember correctly it's even the largest connected pinetree forests in Turkey, with stunning views into the valleys. Not many people living up there in a few little villages that are all spread around the area. Mujdat still has relatives in some of the villages, so we stopped in Kaplanköy and went for a Turkish coffee and çay under an amazing 100+ year old tree. Funnily, Mujdat's uncle and some other people he knew were also sitting there enjoying a coffee, so they joined us. I didn't understand a word, but Mujdat translated anything interesting for me. :) Apparently, the Kozak people owning some land in the region were rather wealthy people, since pine nuts are pretty expensive on the market. However, for many years now, the pinetrees have stopped producing and they haven't figured out the reasons yet.
After almost an hour, we continued our trip up the mountain (by that, I was already a little worried that we won't make it back in time for me to continue cycling the same day..), but it was just such a beautiful area. We stopped in another little village soon again, where we visited an older lady who's also part of his familiy. It was really hard to convince her that we really had no time to stay unfortunately, she wanted to invite us for food but Mujdat said, it would take hours to leave again if we accept the invitation. :D So after a quick talk, we went through the neighbours garden to a viewpoint of the area. It was already past 2pm and I had to start riding by 3pm, otherwise I wouldn't make it in the daylight. So we decided to head back to his place. :)
I'm usually not this much in a rush, but since I had to plan a day or two in advance for finding couchsurfers or people through warmshowers to stay with, I didn't want to change plans all the time. Turkish people go above and beyond when it comes to hospitality and I didn't want to cause any inconvenience in changing plans. ;) Also, winter was slowly catching up on me, so if I wanted to make it to Istanbul still, I had to keep on moving.
I started cycling to Ayvalık just shortly past 3pm, where I would stay with a gril called Seda through couchsurfing. I was pretty hungry when I left Dikili though and beakfast seemed like a long time ago. Being in a rush, I just bought some sort of baguette and ate it while cycling. :D Fresh bread is incredibly tasty in Turkey, so I didn't mind having plain bread.
The ride was pretty easygoing, 38km, almost no elevation but partly along the main road again. It wasn't busy though. I arrived in Ayvalik with the most beautiful sunset I've seen along the trip. I locked my bike near the harbour and joined a crowd of people who were also amazed by the colours and taking pictures. Seda lives right next to the harbour, in a beautiful loft-like appartment with her three cats and a beautiful stunning view onto the water from both the living and the bedroom. :) She insisted on me having her bedroom, since she and her boyfriend, who came by later, mostly sleep in the guest room anyways. Seda and me got along super well from the start, she's such a fun person and with a lot of stories to share! She's the daughter of a police officer, like me. She told me that she had to move every couple of years within Turkey since her dad's relocation. Apparently, depending on the rank within the police, officers are being relocated every three years to prevent corruption and maintain an authority. Very different to Germany..
We ordered some pizza and chatted until late, while Seda was packing for her travels the next day. She was going to the Greek islands for a week but offered me to stay in her place anyways - second time in Turkey I'm having an appartment for myself. :D Since I had plans for the next six days, I was continuing my trip the next day though.Leia mais
Altınoluk
12 de novembro de 2022, Turquia ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C
I was really looking forward seeing Peri and Wolfgang again, a German/Turkish older couple that I met on a campground in Igoumentisa (Greece). We kept in touch throughout my travels and was really looking forward staying at there place in Altınoluk for six days. :)) Taking some days of rest again would also benefit my achilles tensor.. Peri and Wolfgang were always really worried about me travelling by myself and me riding a bicycle in Turkey (for no reason, honestly). ;) So today I planned to cycle from Ayvalık to Altınoluk, however, they called me before I have even left around noon, telling me they would come to Burhaniye Iskele for the day, which is along my ways, and will pick me up there "so that I don't have to ride the entire way". :D They are just so cute and I eventually gave up on telling them that I actually chose to travel this way. :D
When I woke up in the morning, Seda was already gone to the airport and I was alone in the appartment with her three lovely cats. ;) I planned to have a look around Ayvalık in the moring before leaving this place again. So went out, grabbed some breakfast in a bakery, and walked around. It's cute little seaside city (or as Seda put it: sooo many retired people here :D), with lots of little shops, markets, and craft shops. I liked its vibe and strolled around the city for some hours.
Around noon, I got a call from Wolfgang and Peri, the German/Turkish older couple that I met on a campground in Igoumentisa (Greece). I was planning on heading to their place in Altınoluk today to stay there for six days. :) We kept in touch throughout my travels and was really looking forward seeing them again so I gladly accepted their invitation to stay as long as I want. :) Also, taking some days of rest again would also benefit my achilles tensor.. Peri and Wolfgang were always really worried about me travelling by myself and me riding a bicycle in Turkey (for no reason, honestly). ;) They called to tell me that they would come to Küçükköy for the day, which is on my route to Altınoluk, and will pick me up there "so that I don't have to ride the entire way". :D They are just so cute and I eventually gave up on telling them that I actually chose to travel this way. :D
After the call, I sat down in a little restaurant by the sea serving Ayvalık toast - a specialty you can buy even in Istanbul as I figured later. It's a special type of toast (no veggie options again unfortunately.. -.-) with veggies, meat and cheese in it that originates from this city. It tasted pretty good and I enjoyed a Turkish coffee with it. I then went back to Seda's place which was close by, packed my bags back on the bicycle and went to Seda's boyfriend's coffee shop, which was on the way out of the city. He invited me to come by before I leave. Together with a friend, he owns a coffee shop/art exhibition for art made by queer artists. The place is pretty cool and I enjoyed talking to the people hanging out there. They told me that it's not easy being queer in Turkey and they are super glad about places like this we're they can socialize and hang out. :) After some time, I headed off towards Burhaniye Iskele, which was about 30km away.
I didn't want to go back to the main road, so I tried to cycle on the small road along the coast as long as I could before going back on the main road. However, the small road turned out to be a terrible gravel road, sometimes there was no road at all. It took forever to cycle on it, also there were too many dogs. When a bunch of dogs started running towards me barking, I decided to change my route. :D I had to go back the same way to find a road connected to the highway, in total the detour took me almost an hour. Finally being back on the highway, it was super windy from the front and really hard to cycle. In Gömeç, I took a little break to get some snacks in a village I passed (I'm so sure I paid too much for the bakery goods but never mind). Arriving in Burhaniye Iskele, I was actually really glad that Peri and Wolfang picked me up. :) We put my stuff in the care and drove towards Altınoluk. We went straight for a really nice little cafeteria/restaurant where you can choose different veggies and rice from a precooked buffet. I loved the food. :)
We then went back to their place which is on top of the hill, overlooking the entire bay and the island of Lesbos. I was pretty exhausted from the day and glad to be in one place for a little longer. I had a shower and we sat together drinking tea, watching German news, and planning on things to do in the next few days. :)Leia mais
Assos, Yeşilyurt, and Adatepe
13 de novembro de 2022, Turquia
Peri, Wolfgang, were doing daytrips in the area by car in the next couple of days. It was great chance to see some more of Turkey, it would have been really hard or impossible to get to some of these places by bicycle during this trip.
On the first day, we went to the ancient greek city Assos, and the two mountain villages Yeşilyurt and Adatepe. We had breakfast around 8:30am and started driving to Assos around 10am. Since I have seen many of the ancient greek remains in the last weeks, I was fine walking around the village and having glimpses on the greek theater and some pillars. The village was really beautiful though with old stone houses. Its villagers were selling selfmade goods, such as carpets, bracelets, and things for decoration. We walked around a little and had a really nice and special type of Turkish coffee on a sunny terrace before driving down to the ancient harbour of Assos. :) We also had a walk around the harbour, however, it was a little more touristy and busy than the village and we didn't stay for too long. It was worth the visit though, haven't been right by the sea for a while, it's crystal clear water but too cold to swim for me at this time of the year. :D
We then continued our trip to the mountain village Yeşilyurt, which is on the way back to Altınoluk. Apparently, it is used as a film set for many traditional Turkish movies due to its old stone houses. With Wolfgang and Peri speaking Turkish, I was able to have a look into one of the private traditional houses right next to the market square. The owner was so friendly and explained us how his former relatives used to live up here (all sleeping in one room, the kitchen was the only option to heat). I loved strolling around this village and found a lot of beautiful little hidden places. :)
After spending some time in Yeşilyurt, we drove further to Adatepe. This village has also been used as a film set many times, also due to the stone houses. People living in both Yeşilyurt and Adatepe are rather rich people who come up here during the summer time, when it's too hot to stay down at the coast. However, the locals who have been living in the villages all their live are pretty happy about them buying the old houses so that they're not just falling apart over time, it's quite expensive to renovate these houses.. We also had a stroll around Adatepe, exploring the little streets and gardens before heading back home in the late afternoon.
On the way back, we bought some fresh fish from the market, where I watched a cat stealing the little fish right off the counter anytime the shopman was busy not looking. :D Cats generally really live a good life in Turkey. :D Back home, Peri showed me her delicious self-made hummus recipe, which we had togeter with the fish and some salad.
In the evening, we sat togehter and watched TV - there was a terrorist attack on the İstiklal Avenue in Istanbul today and it was all over the news. This street is the main shopping street on the European side of Istanbul causing many deaths and wounded people. I remember one sentence of a Turkish person I met really well with respect to the bombing: "Anytime an election is coming up, bombs blow up in Istanbul". It was crazy how fast they have found the person, who had allegedly dropped a bag with explosives on a bench. They showed the same short video of the woman walking in a crowd on almost every channel for hours. The next day, the government-controlled media (which is a huge majority of all media channels in Turkey) wasn't allowed to report on it for at least 24h. Talking to Turkish people in the days after the bombing, there was a lot of suspicion and distrust towards what was reported in the news and some stated that they wouldn't be surprised if the government had something to do with it to present themselves as heroes having everything under control with a quick arrest of the alleged perpetrator.Leia mais
Kozak region, Bergama, Cunda island
14 de novembro de 2022, Turquia ⋅ 🌙 16 °C
After breakfast, Peri, Wolfgang and started driving towards Bergama, a city about 30km inlands from Dikili. Again, I drove through the beautiful Kozak region, this time on a different road though. :) Along the road, we stopped in a little coffee shop where locals also sell their home produced goods. I also tried Adaçay for the first time: it is some kind of sage tea, in which you pour fresh lemon. The tea then changes colour from yellow to rather white.
We continued our drive to Bergama and went up the Akropolis first, from there we had a really nice view on the city and even better - a huge lake with dam on the other side of the hill. We then drove back into the city, parked the car somewhere and strolled around exploring the area. I liked Bergama, the streets were pretty alive with lots of coffee shops where people were socializing, lots of stores for traditional goods (carpets, etc.), and Peri and Wolfgang would tell me a lot about the people's life in this less touristy place off the coast.
In the afternoon, we drove back towards the coast, basically on the road from Dikili to Ayvalık that I already cycled, more specifically to Cunda island which is just off the city but connected through bridges. I didn't go there by bicycle so Peri insisted on showing me this place. ;) On the way there, we also stopped a nice viewpoint onto Ayvalık and the city. Initially, we planned on having a Turkish coffee or tea up there at the restaurant terrace, but it was incredibly windy and actually even cold. The first time realizing that I might have to buy some more warmer clothes and/or a warmer jacket at some point, I only had my thin wind jacket.
Cunca island, like the mountain villages from the previous day, are places were rather wealthy people own their summer houses. However, Cunda city (that's were we went) is still quite nice with a little bazaar, little coffee shops and a nice seafront. I would have enjoyed the latter if it had been less windy. :D Peri was a little tired, so they stayed in the car while I was strolling around. I also enjoyed having some time for myself again. As much as I love meeting people and having company, after being a guest throughout my entire time in Turkey so far it's nice being by yourself sometimes. Usually, that's the time I spent cycling during the day but I wasn't cycling much while staying in Altınoluk. ;)
Once we were back in Altınoluk, we went for a Mantı restaurant close by the couple's place and enjoyed having tea and conversations back at their place in the evening.Leia mais