Dublin to Nepal, On Tour, Turkey

Day 56: Istanbul to Lake Sapanca

The rain had cleared up when we woke up, though it was still windy and overcast. The small building had done a great job sheltering us from the worst of the storm but everything had still managed to get a bit damp. One of the big drawbacks of camping in a park is that a lot more people tend to come by in the morning. We got a bit lucky this morning actually, we were up and out with the Bivvy gone just before a park keeper came over. It was quite clear we had slept there but since he didn’t find us fast asleep in the tents he didn’t really say anything,must made us move away from the building.
The moving was spent riding out of Istanbul and that took a good two hours, the place is so big and just sprawls on and on forever. The morning began on a great cycle along a bike track beside a quiet enough road on the coast right next to the sea. We rode on that for half and hour with a huge tailwind practically pushing us along, it was fantastic. Once the coast road merged with the bigger route D 100 though, the cycle track disappears and we had to cycle in the, thankfully ample, hard shoulder.

you can see how strong the wind was by the trees

The problem with the D100 wasn’t that it was big (three lanes) or busy (lots of trucks) but that, since it was going through the city still there were constant on and off ramps that interrupted the hard shoulder and were a bit of a headache to navigate.
Things got better the farther we got from the city though. By the time we were out of the greater Istanbul area the road was down to two lanes and was right next to the sea which we really enjoyed. We pulled off for lunch in the town of Körfez, as we were approaching it had started to rain a bit but almost as soon as we pulled in and got off the bikes and into shelter a massive downpour started, we were quite pleased with our timing.

this bridge was being constructed about 40km outside Istanbul to join the two sides of the bay.

Lake Sapanca wasn’t too far from Körfez, and seemed like a nice place to camp so we decided to aim there as a finishing point. We were still on the D100, not ideal but there isn’t really any other option if you want to get out of Istanbul in the direction of Ankara. The rain continued most of the rest of the cycle and cleared up perhaps an hour before we finished. After passing through Izimit, the city at the curve of the bay we climbed up to the lake. We spent a while riding along beside the lake, not quite by the shore but close enough. There were no good spots to camp at for some time. Finally we spotted a small grassy peninsula sticking out into the water.

this sort of extravagant pedestrian bridges crossed the road through Izimit

Pulling off the busy road and down to the peninsula was a nice relief and it turned out to be a great camp spot overlooking the whole lake. What with all the rain we put up the tarp for the first time since Austria, but it was a dry night in the end.

Dublin to Nepal, Turkey

Istanbul, gateway to a continent

Since arriving in Istanbul marked for us the end of our European leg of the trip we had decided to spend one whole week there. A whole week not cycling seemed a bit crazy and in fact after only a couple of days off the bikes it started to feel like we’d never cycled at all! But the break was much appreciated.

taking the boat back to the European side to the historic peninsula. the palace is on the right, the Aya Sofia the mosque in the center

The night we arrived in Ozgurs he was having some of his friends over. They were all out on his balcony playing Turkish folk songs and we were able to just sit back and relax, just the ticket after the hectic cycle into the city.
We had promised ourselves long ago that when we got into Istanbul we were going to go for a Hammam, a Turkish bath. A quick bit of research (browsing the requisite section of the Lonely Planet) revealed that one of the best was to be found back in the Sultanamate, right near the Aya Sofia. Next day we took the boat back over to the European side and made an appointment for one of their more luxurious bath options.
But before that, we met up with Josh and Abey and Josh’s mum for lunch. It was nice seeing them one last time, and kind of funny, thinking about how their trips were over and we were barely half way. Once lunch was over we said our last goodbyes and went for the Hammam.
Opting for the higher end bath was one of the better decisions we’ve made. It was definitely appreciated all the more having cycled the whole way. The building was a 500 year old Ottoman bath house that had been restored and reopened in 2012. It was like something out of Arabian nights, big domes and marble floors and opulent couches and cushions. The bath itself was a bit odd at first, but once you got over being washed by another (hairy Turkish) man it was fantastic. After changing we were each handed a tasseled, purple wrap to cover up during the bath and then led into another domed, marble floor room with a big slab in the centre and little alcoves out to each side where boiling hot water poured from gold taps.

i got these shots from their site, this is the entrance and changing area

one of the washing alcoves

Here we were told to wash (and that we should leave the purple wraps on). When we felt sufficiently clean we walked back out to the domed area and said hello to two other guys also bathing. Turns out these were the dudes who were going to wash us. First, a vigorous scrub with a rough exfoliating glove – after washing in rivers with a flannel for the last few months this was probably necessary. Then a soap soak, which was where you lay face down on the big marble slab in the middle of the room and get cover head to toe in warm suds and the massaged.

the main bathing area, with the marble slab om the middle

After all this washing was done we were taken back into the main hall and wrapped up in towels and shown to a futon to rest on. The two guys fed us this great line on the walk out of te bathing area: “today, you are Sultan”.After this little break it was time for a final massage (focus on the legs!) before the whole things was over. It took about an hour and is probably the best way to feel rejuvenated after cycling across a continent.
We did go see a lot of the sights during our stay, but I never really like writing about visiting famous landmarks, there’s not a whole lot to say really.

Aya Sofia is big and cool if you like history and probably worth a visit even if you don’t. It’s a bit price to get in (30 Turkish Lire, about €10) but you’re not going to go to Istanbul and not see the Aya Sofia.

The Blue Mosque is nice, but it was close to closing when I went and totally packed, it felt like a zoo. Lots of impressive Islamic decorations inside though. I’d say go early morning.

outside the Blue mosque, its called blue because of the interior not the outside

inside with the blue windows, since it is still a functioning mosque only practising Muslims can enter the centre (the area under the lights)

the main dome of the mosque

The Topkapi Palace is a great concentration of Ottoman architecture and the harem shows off just how luxurious the living quarters were for the Sultan and the court, it’s sort of like an oriental Versailles. When we went though it was right in the middle of Bayran, a multi day Muslim holiday and national holiday in Turkey so it was packed out and absolutely roasting too. It would have been nice to stay and wander longer than I could hack the crowds for.

entrance to the Palace

this building was where the Queen Mother, or I suppose Sultans mother lived.

part of the palace garden

The Grand Bazaar was very cool in some parts, namely the areas for Antiques, Jewllery and Carpets. These were focused in the centre of the Bazzar. The surrounding areas were spoiled somewhat by vendors peddling useless shite. Worth a visit for sure, but the Spice bazaar is much livelier and with more interesting stalls. Big buckets of spices, you could buy a kilo of saffron for 300TL. There were lokum (Turkish delight) stalls and all sorts of other weird treats.
There’s a bunch of other stuff too, the Taksim area north of the Galata tower is quite cool with a long boulevard running from the Tower North up to Taksim square and numerous little alleys and side streets to wander off into.
Kadiköy, the neighbourhood on the Asian side of the city where Ozgur lived was really nice too, and I’d probably recommend to stay there if you were heading out to Istanbul. Not only is it a bit quieter, a bit more sane compared to the hustled and bustle of the European side, since this is a neighbourhood where a lot of normal people (as in not super rich) actually live there’s loads of nice place to eat and drink that are affordable. Plus you get to ride back and forth across the Bosphorus every day and see the city from the water.

taking the boat back to Kadikoy from the European side of the city

some nice wall art around Kadikoy

Now since this holiday Bayran was going on a lot of people were leaving Istanbul or coming to Istanbul to see their family. The were two things we had to buy while in the city, a good winter sleeping bag and a map of Turkey. Unfortunately it turned out that all the book shops and camping stores were closed overt the holiday, which ran from Wednesday to Sunday. Fortunately Ozgur was complete relaxed and welcoming and let us stay with him much longer than we planned. We waited out the holiday for four days until the shops were back open and we could get what we needed.
We had a good time waiting it out though. Ozgur place was jammed over Bayran: he had us two, his friend Šefaq who was hanging out for a couple of weeks, his two cousins Yevuz and Görgen and at one point two more Couchsurfers from Germany, but they decided (probably wisely) to go with one of their friends to the Black Sea instead. So we had a great time, even if our plans were delayed a bit.

photo with Ozgur on our last day

We did manage to pick up everything we wanted in the end, we even found an English Lonely Planet for Iran. The days leading up to our departure and the day of were windy and rainy. The day we left started out overcast and blustery in the morning but by late afternoon it was drizzling and the wind blowing hard. We had spent most of the morning reorganising how our bags were packed since we now had a huge winter sleeping bag to contend with. We also finally fixed the tent poles (the tent poles that broke on the first night in Wales).
We seem to have a curse on this tour, no matter how hard we try we can never leave a city in a timely manner. The day of departure finds delayed somehow and in the end we only ever make it a couple of kilometres out of the city, if at all (see: Munich, Split, Sarajevo, Belgrade and Sofia). This time it wasn’t a freak storm (though the weather was bad) or bikes breaking, we just plain got lost. Or rather, we lost eachother. At a certain junction I went right while Finn went straight and it took two hours before we found eachother again.
The rain and wind were still going strong and it was getting late, daylight was starting to fade. There was a big park by the coast beside the road out of town so we made our way down there and waited for it to get dark before riding in and camping behind a building to get some shelter from the rain. We were woken in the middle of he night by a guard in a big black rain poncho with the rain still pissing down. Once he heard us spouting English though he smiled and let us be.

drying our gear out after the rain, the building we sheltered behind on the right

Dublin to Nepal, On Tour, Turkey

Cycling into Istanbul

Istanbul was a fascinating city where we took a big break and ended up staying longerthan anticipated due to a religious holiday. But before we get into our stay there I have to go over the cycle into the city.
As I mentioned yesterday we had teamed up with English tourer Josh and American tourer Abey just outside Silivri. Both of them were on their first big tour. Today was their last day and they were excited to arrive in Istanbul. We were excited too as we knew a nice long break awaited us once we got in.
We left the BP we had camped at, 40km outside the city and started the run into the centre. As soon as we were in the road we were in developed, urban area and it didn’t let up all the way in. The road was, of course, bust and only got busier the closer we got to Istanbul. We had avoided the motorway into the city, opting instead for the quieter highway D100 (which was still, at its peak, five lanes wide on either side). The difficult part of the ride wasn’t the traffic or the size of the road, in fact navigating this was fun in itself. The real difficulty was the frequency of two lane wide on and off ramps that required a lot of concentration and speed to get across safely.

taking a break, this was before the road really got busy

Josh was supposed to meet his mother at the airport at noon today but he also really didn’t want to miss cycling into the centre of the city with us. The airport was right on the route into Istanbul for us so we figured, he why not check out Istanbul airport. It also served as a nice break from the traffic.
After the brief rendezvous with Josh’s mother in arrivals we were back on the road. During our time at the airport we had looked up what we presumed would be a nice ride into the centre than the road we had been on. We joined up with a road that ran by the coast which was considerably less busy and actually we soon found a park next to the sea with a cycle path through it. Suddenly we could relax and enjoy the ride and watch as we got closer to the centre with the mouth of the Bospherous drawing ever nearer.

The cycle lane ran out abruptly and dumped us back on the road. Fortunately, or perhaps by design, the cycle track ended just opposite the turn off for the Sultanamet, the centre of the historic old peninsula on the European side that house the Aya Sofia and the Grand Bazaar. This was perfect and we made our way up to the Aya Sofia to get some end of trip photos of the two guys and some end of Europe photos for us two.

getting ready for the photoshoot

at Istanbul at last

We said goodbye to Abey here and then waved Josh off after we got to the Galata bridge on the the other side of the Sultanahmet. Our cycle through Istanbul wasn’t over yet though, we still had to get over the Bosphorous and onto the Asian side of the city.
Clearly, the best way to get across would be to cycle across the big bridge that spanned the two continents so we made our way towards it. Our plan of following the bank of the Bosphorous until we came to the bridge didn’t really work out as the by the time we arrived at the bridge it was far above us.
Trying to cycle back up the hills away from the river to get on the bridge didn’t really work out either. A bit of a struggle up some steep roads took us away from where we presumed we could get onto the bridge, but did lead us to a lovely panoramic viewpoint where we had a great chat with the guys working in the car park.

looking across to Asia, thats the bridge were trying to get on

It was another hour navigating on ramps, overpasses and roundabouts before we finally made it onto the road that would take us to the bridge! We were very pleased with ourselves and were soon riding downhill, the Bosphorous and the bridge spread out before us.
At the last merging lane before the bridge we were stopped by the police. Even though the sign before the bridge said we could ride over it on a bike, they didn’t want us to. But we were at a but of an impasse. We couldn’t go forward, the police wouldn’t allow it, but we couldn’t really go backwards either. They didn’t really know what to do, and we were kind of hoping they’d just let us go and be done with it but that didn’t look likely.
In the end we got lucky, a friendly guy in a van pulled onto the little triangle island between the merging Kane and the main road and offered us and the bikes a lift over the bridge! So we didn’t get to ride it, but we did get to cross the bridge a way which was a little victory in itself.
Our driver brought us over the bridge and all the way to the turn off for the neighbourhood where we Couchsurfing, the very pleasant Kadiköy. Anyway, to cut a long post short we finally made it to our hosts Ozgurs place. It was a long day cycling into Istanbul, but I wouldn’t really expect any less.

Dublin to Nepal, On Tour, Turkey

Day 55: Lülbergaz to Outside Istanbul

The riding today was the same as yesterday, a bit flatter but through a lot of industrial areas which signalled the started of the sprawl spreading out of Istanbul and the surrounding towns. Once again I ended up only taking a couple of photos that signify what the riding was like for most of the morning.

you can see the start of thr industrial sprawl on the horizon

There was going to be a significant event today though: reaching the sea, we’d been away from the coast since leaving Split almost a month ago. We got the first glimpse of the sea shortly after we stopped for lunch. We had covered a lot of distance again this morning, and we were planning on continuing our practice of camping a little bit outside the city we intended to stay at so that next day we could spend most of the day in the city and not riding to it.

first glimpse of the sea

Istanbul was not only 50km away and it was mid afternoon so we had some time to kill and decided to ride into and spend some time at the costal town of Silivri.
Silivri was a busy place right by the sea, it had a nice promenade right by the coast that was packed with people and a main square a few streets up that was equally busy. We posted up in a cafe by the sea, I had got a puncture at some point riding into town so I went to fix it. While fixing it a group of kids came over and watched, enthralled by the act of patching a tyre. One kid had shown up on a pretty nice bike and once I had finished, followed me back into the cafe and sat down with me and Finn.

the Silivri waterfront

After some google translate conversation we learned he was from town, it was summer break and he wanted to ride his bike around with us. He wasn’t very impressed with the leisurely break Finn and I were taking. The poor guy just wanted to cycle , but we here we were lounging about a cafe! We did, eventually, get going and he had a great time following along on his bike and leading us back to the road to Istanbul.

getting our little buddy an ice cream

Here we said goodbye to our little friend and not thirty seconds had we said goodbye to him did we see two cycle tourers riding along on the road we were about to join. We shouted some hellos and the rode up to them.
These two tourers were Josh from England and Abey from the US. They were both on tour individually across Europe and had ran into eachother in Albania and decided to team up for the remainder of their ride, which was finishing in Istanbul. All of us were in the same page, looking for somewhere to camp before heading into Istanbul tomorrow so we decide to team up for this last night and day of their journey.

rolling out with the Josh (in the hat) and Abey

We rode out of Silivri together looking for, once again, a petrol station to stop at. We found one maybe thirty minutes later, a BP that had a small area off to the side with a canvas roof and a couple of tables – the little area seemed made for our purpose. We cooked dinner for Josh and Abey with the remainder of out pasta and talked about, well pretty much one, thing for hours: how darn fantastic cycle touring is. Josh and Abey were noticeably excited to be finishing their tour tomorrow, it was great to spend some time with other tourers after so long cycling and camping just the two of us.

Dublin to Nepal, On Tour, Turkey

Day 54: Edirne to Lülbergaz

This will probably be a short post as not much really happened except towards the end of the day and the cycling wasn’t all that interesting.
Leaving the Shell after a morning of taking photos with Erdem we got onto the main road that we took out of Edirne yesterday. We were going to be in this road for the next two days until we got into Istanbul, we didn’t have a map of Turkey yet and it was the quickest route to the city. So it was good road, direct and well signposted. The downside was the the riding was dull and the scenery too. It was all rolling land for miles, and the road not exactly busy but certainly not quiet either. I took on photo and it looked like this for the rest of the day, so that’s about it for the days cycling.

In condition like that you tend to just cycle without stopping much and as such cover a lot of ground quickly. By lunch we had reached the city of Lülbergaz about 70km away and pulled in for lunch and then a look around the city.
It was smaller than Edirne, but nice in its own way with a very busy Main Street that we walked around. At some point we realised that the first Ireland game of the World Cup was on so we spent some time looking for that.
There was one sports bar in the city that didn’t really understand what rugby was or what we wants to watch so we couldn’t get them to look for it on the tv. After a bit of wifi research we found out what channel was showing the rugby World Cup in Turkey and returned to the bar asking them to switch over to ‘tivibu sport 2’. This channel was showing the match so we sat down to watch at, and were soon joined by most of the staff. These were a bunch of young guys who were really curious as to what was going in and got a real kick out of trying to figure out the game.
By the time we left the city it was late enough and the sun was setting. We had figured out while riding that there probably wouldn’t be any good camping spots so we figured the best option would be to check at the petrol stations we passed if we could camp there.
It was dusk by the time we found one that had enough space we felt we could comfortably camp at (if they allowed it). We asked one of the staff if we could camp the night there and he seemed ok with it, but then said he couldn’t since his boss wasn’t around to ask. We didn’t want to push him so made to leave after using the toilet. As we were about to go he came over and pointed to an empty lot beside the station and told us we could camp there is we left in the morning. This was great news, we knew it was going to be hard to find camping so we could now go to sleep easily. We spent the evening in an empty lot next to the busy road to Istanbul.

waking up at the petrol station lot

Entering Serbie this is the only photo we could take as the gaurds moved us on when we tried to get a picture beside the sign

5 minutes into Serbia and we see this sign

The cars and roads changed as soon as we got into Serbia

There are fountains at the towns and people filing up big bottles and bringing them home

Camping in a little running park

Goooood morning

View from my bivy

3 euro for this huge club sandwich , great way to start the day

Milatary boats transporting tanks up the river

Not the most mobile home

Cycling into Belgrade

This place looked nice so we stopped

luckily it had airconditioning and we were able to relax

Old Belgrade

This building was a hunred metres away from a camp of Syrian refugees

Unfinished skyrise in the middle of belgrade

Old fort at night

Statue of the old fort

There are a load of tennis and basteball courts in the old walls of the fort

Evening riding

Another night spent under a bridge. This time the river was dried up so we camped in the riverbed

Dreary cycling on our way to the mountains

Learning cyrillic become pretty important

Flat roads leading from sofia to the mountains

Nearly at the mountains

These obituaries can be found in every town.

Nice orthodox church

The reason for this sign was obvious after we cycled around the corner to see a barracks full of tanks

After the barracks we coastred into a valley which housed some sort of idyllic holiday resort completely different to the poor house we were used to passing

This was the nice road after spending the morbibon an disused farming road. Less a road and more a collection of large and mis-shapen rocks.

Nice to have the good road for the descent

After lugging our bikes over an old tractor road we stopped at the first restaurant we found. We ordered “something good and were presented with the biggest burgers we’ve ever seen. The timing couldn’t have been better

Enjoying the smooth road after the old farm roads of the morning

A nice descent as well

More obituaries

Typical Serbian town

Riversides always make for a nice spots

Every town big or small has huge piles of wood

Glad to be off flat straight roads

Getting into the Serbian mountains was a nice break after the flat riding into belgrade

Typical graves, which were all along the roadsides

One of the many small towns we passed through

Thank you PE for making our ride a little smoother

We may have 20 km still to do but look at that waterfall.

Camping here was a no brainer

We spent so Long time relaxing after our shower under the waterfall we had to cook in the dark

Morning in the mountains was full of people cutting wood in villages like these

A nice descent out of the mountains into the planes leading to Sofia

Most rural houses looked similar to this

A lot of old industrial buildings near Bulgaria

Rolling up to border control into bulgaria

Dublin to Nepal, Finnian's Galleries, Serbia

Serbia

Bulgaria, Dublin to Nepal, On Tour, Turkey

Day 53: Popvets to Edirne (Border Crossing: Into Turkey)

Border crossing day is always exciting, but today’s crossing into Turkey was particularly significant: we were finally leaving Europe! It was also the first count that we had to get a visa for, though it was an e-visa we just had to purchase online and didn’t even need any additional documents for.
We were following signs (in Cyrillic) for the town nearest the Turkish border called Svilengrad. The ride was much like yesterday evenings, along quiet roads by farms and pastures and through leafy woods. At one point we passed an old Bosnian roady in the full bib and Jersey who had suffered a flat tyre out here in the comparative isolation of the Bulgarian countryside. We offered him a patch to fix his tyre but all he needed was the little bit of sandpaper to prepare the tube.

not pictured here: the swarms of flies that followed us whenever we were climbing

It wasn’t long after this encounter that we came to Svilengrad and we passed through quickly, pausing only briefly to spend the last of our Bulgarian coins on some ice cream.
Leaving Svilengrad was a bit of a challenge. A motorway bypassed the town and went straight to the border, but we had entered the town expecting to pick up a smaller road that would take us to the border without having to ride on the motorway. We got to the edge of town and onto the smaller road to the border only to find it closed and in an awful state.

We could have doubled back into Svilengrad and tried to get on the motorway from there, but we could see it from where we were now, plus we had already cycled a not insignificant distance from Svilengrad, so we didn’t really want to double back. We pushed on along the old road and it curved promisingly towards the motorway and then…passed over it. Now that we we here though, right on top of it we could see it was pretty much devoid of traffic save for the occasional truck so it seemed like the best option get on it for the last few kilometres left before the border.
There was one way to get on, and that was by wheeling our bikes through a gap in the fence and down the embankment onto the road. This process was delayed slightly when one of my front rack bolts sheared off and had to be replaced as we were shimmying through the fence but after that short delay we were on the road and finally making progress again.

trying to get onto the road to the border

We got to the border maybe half an hour later. We saw the huge tail back of trucks before we even glimpsed the border, the queue for the trucks tailed back for almost three kilometres, but was limited to only a lane of traffic. Getting over the border was a relatively painless procedure, we had to unload our bikes and open the bags for customs but we didn’t have to dump the contents out which would have been a real pain.

It was dusty highway from the border to the city of Edirne 30km away where we were going to finish early for the day and take a look around. As the old capital of the Ottoman Empire it warranted a stop.

Approaching Edirne with the Selimiye

The ride to Edirne was pretty uninteresting but the city itself was amazing. I don’t doubt part of the appeal for us was it being the first Turkish city we had visited. Edirne was the old capital of the Ottoman Empire before they captured Istanbul and has some impressive buildings. We only spent a couple of hours there and got to walk around the old town but what was really impressive was the Selimiye Mosque built by architect Mimar Sinan who seems to be a national hero. As the first mosque we visited on the trip it was really something special.

the interior of the dome

in the courtyard

sunset over Edirne as we left the mosque

It was getting dark as we left Edirne. Early when we arrived we had looked up Warmshowers to see if anyone was around to host and came across a post by the staff of Shell Gas Station Edirne. They had set up what they called the first bike-touring station where tourers could camp in a small lot out back and make use of the facilities offered by the station. It was only 20km outside the city on the Istanbul side so was perfect for our needs.
We arrived and knew we had found the right place thanks to the kids bikes placed on poles all outside the station, around the area where the tall board displaying the prices was. Then as we wheeled up to the shop we saw a touring bike propped up outside it. We knew we had found the right place, but who to talk to about staying here? Almost immediately a smiley, portly Turkish guy came out with a huge grin in a red She’ll shirt (unbuttoned to the chest) and introduced himself as Erdem.

these photos were taken in the morning, it was dark by the time we arrived

Erdem led us around back where there was a small grassy area with a couple of short trees where we could put our tent up. He then brought us back around front where he showed the staff kitchen and shower we could use. His English wasn’t great but we communicated just fine and he was so smiley and friendly it was hard not to get along with the guy.

the spot out back where we camped

us with Edrem

After a very welcome shower we shared photos and talked as best we could with Erdem. He was a bike tourer himself and enamoured with the new service his workplace now provided. He even, when we were about to cook dinner, sat us back down and brought out a delicious impromptu spread: bread, rice, yogurt and Kofte (a kind of sausage). We had never camped at a petrol station before but this was a great introduction to the practice and wouldn’t be our last time either.

Bulgaria, Dublin to Nepal, On Tour

Day 52: Leshtak to Popovets

Today’s ride was one of two distinctive parts: Our final morning cycling in the Rhodope Mountains (the name of the range we were cycling through in southern Bulgaria) culminating in a long descent out of the range and then the second part of our ride along the arable foothills that fringed the Rhodopes.
So it was more beautiful mountain riding in the morining, we were told by Bibor yesterday that where we were cycling now was the region of Turkish majority, but there wasn’t that much difference to be noticed, although the settlements that we passed through featured more mosques than churches.

We finished one last switchback filled climb and then it was one of the longest downhill runs we had so far, coming out of the mountains and back down to the lowlands. For an hour we coasted along without pedalling enjoying the exercise-free cycling.

Reaching the bottom we found ourselves in the city of Kardzali, the most sizeable place we’d passed through since leaving Sofia. We stopped for lunch and then did perhaps our final Lidl shop of the trip, it was a momentous occasion, the chain had fuelled our progress over most of Europe.
Following a lengthy lunch break we set off in a golden and very warm late afternoon sun. This was the second and decidedly very different half of today’s ride, with the mountains behind us we found ourselves cycling between the rolling foothills by farms and through small hamlets.

At one of these hamlets we pulled up to fill our bottles at the water fountains. On the opposite side of the road stood the sole shop/eatery whose patrons sitting outside were all busy watching us roll in with curiosity. As we filled up our bottles one dude came over to chat. Once he gleaned we were cycling to Istanbul he gave us directions to the border via what I think he had sussed was the shortest route between the various towns between here and Turkey. He kept repeating it and it was only later we figured out he thought we didn’t understand as we kept nodding our heads – which means ‘no’ in Bulgaria.

Before we left Finn ran over to the shop to grab bread for the morning and ran into a Turkish guy visiting who had a bit of English. Himself and shopkeeper invite us over for some sausage they were cooking and a beer. The Turkish dude was the only person with any English so he did a bit of translating while we sat at a table in the shop waiting for the food. Our friend who had been giving us directions before came over and sat with us while we ate this surprise dinner.

the little shop where we ate

Eating something that isn’t pasta for dinner is always welcome and even though it took a bit of time to cook and it was getting dark when we left it was well worth the stop. Leaving this little town of Popvets we were looking out for somewhere to camp right away. Most of the land near the road was farmland or pasture, in fact we passed a number of shepherds herding their flocks as we cycle through. Before too long we found a little hill just of the road with some scrubby bushes we could set up behind.

From here there was a great view of road ahead of us that wound out to the horizon. It was a completely clear night and as the sun went down above was one of the most star filled skies I’ve seen with that big swath of across it of the Milky Way you only really see when it’s properly dark.

camp the next moring at dawn

Bulgaria, Dublin to Nepal, On Tour

Day 51: Borino to Leshtak

In the morning we got to continue riding downhill along the gorge through the narrow alley of rock that the river had carved. The fast flowing water and towering rock face combined to keep us nice and cool until we arrived at the bottom.
We knew that after this first descent we would be climbing up again, and this time up to the highest point of our whole mountain passage across Bulgaria. The climb followed a winding river up most of the way. It was a really pleasant ride beside the water and shaded by the tall trees that grew on the sides of the slopes.

a bridge at one of the towns we passed through on the way up

As we began to reach the summit we started noticing more and more hotel and holiday home development. It seemed like every kilometre or so we passed a new building site. Ski resorts were being developed on a wide scale all through the mountains.

Out here, up in the highlands the trees that lined the road further down were more dispersed and we could see out across the the tops of the mountains. We stopped in a newly finished hotel for a lunch where we were the only people aside from the staff.
After lunch we started on a nice long descent. It began with a lot of switchbacks cutting across the mountain face and then evened off to a gradual downward slope as the road picked up the course of a river. We had a short stop during this descent while Finn repaired a picture after a huge piece of shrapnel lodged itself in his tyre.

We were once again riding beside one of the numerous rivers that course through the mountains in Bulgaria. These streams and rivers have led to a feature where every couple of kilometres a tap has been hooked up to some of the water courses that flow underground and fresh spring water flows out by the side of the road. We were therefore never thirsty during the cycle across Bulgaria.

Towards the end of the evening ride after we had followed the winding river for a while we had stopped outside beside a house which had irritated the owners dog. A young guy came out to it and after hearing us speaking English started talking to us.
This was Bibor, a young Bulgarian guy who was back in his parents house in the countryside for the summer. We talked to him for a while by the gate until his mother invited us over for some tea and coffee. We very graciously accepted and sat outside on their house porch. Bibors parents gave us coffee and water and even some chocolate. They were all out of the porch seeding and coring a load of peppers.

“We grow the peppers and now we are making Bulgarian Ketchup!” Said Bibor.

We found out from them later that this was Ljutenica, a Bulgarian relish/sauce that’s made out of Peppers, tomatoes and carrots mostly.

“You want to try some?”

Of course we said yes, and Bibors mother brought us out two slices of bread with the home made Ljutenica spread over and it was delicious. Once we finished that she brought out more again, and then his father brought over a bowl of fresh watermelon gown on their farm. It was a fantastic little break and we stayed a while and chatted to the family.
After this great pit stop with Bibor and his family it was time to go and find somewhere to camp. Before we finished we had to pick up some bread for the morning and stopped into a little hole in the wall shop in the next small village we arrived at.
A coupe of curious guys who had been hanging around outside the shop and one of them had some good English (he had spent a couple of years in Aberdeen). We picked up the bread and then the shopkeeper chuckled and told us he had seen us yesterday when he was driving a bus.

crossing the river on the way out of the village

Leaving the village bread in hand we rode out along the banks of the river until we came to a wide sandy meander where we could set up for the night. We did some laundry in the river and slept soundly under a clear sky.

if you squint hard you might be able to spot Finn

Bulgaria, Dublin to Nepal, On Tour

Day 50: Gospodintsi to Borino

The day started with us finishing the descent from yesterday down into the outskirts of the city Gotse Delchev. We were very near the the border with Greece now and infant a lot of people we had come across (the fisherman from yesterday, the shopkeeper we bought our bread from this morning) had been asking us if that’s where we were headed to Greece, it was only 50km away from Gotse Delchev.
We weren’t heading for Greece though, we were heading for Istanbul so we took the turn off East instead of South and started climbing again. We rode up some hills, through small villages and passed by horse drawn carts and the back into the mountains.

Here the road was lined for a couple of kilometres with numerous masons breaking up sandstone into tiles of somewhat equal dimension and then packed them onto pallets in perfect cubes. Loads of pallets lined the road, waiting to be picked up, and most of the masons gave us a friendly wave as we passed by.

At lunch we came into the town of Satovcha, a nice sleepy little place with a busy square. We went up to one of the cafes to get some food. Of course we had a bit of trouble communicating with our waitress but a gregarious Bulgarian with a big grin on his face came over and helped us out with translating.
When it came time to pay our friendly translator had left, but another guy came by and helped us out, and even left a little note saying the waitress had his number if we needed any help. What a guy.

There was a lot of climbing after lunch but it was really nice, now that we were up in the mountains we were riding along the peaks and through the shallow valleys that separated them. Sometimes the trees had been cleared for agriculture giving as a great view, other times we rode through thick forest on either side. We rode along, going up and down most of the rest of the day until we finally made the last steep descent into a gorge.