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Monthly Archive for October, 2005

Day 89: Ankara – Capital of Turkiye

Leaving Osmaneli, we started our climb up to the main Anatolian plateau, heading for Ankara at 900m above sea level. A couple of days down we arrived at Eskisehir – a lovely (and surprisingly modern!) university city with a canal and riverside cafes and parks, tramlines, and western shops of all kinds. Even the people [...]

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Day 84: Route Update

Recap: We planned the route back during the preparation days, taking into consideration the terrain we knew about and the advice from others, however the reality once we were on the road shows that even the best made plans of mice and men have to change! Leg 1 fortunately remained pretty much true to our [...]

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Day 81: First Newsletter Out!

‘Better late than never’ as the saying goes! It took us longer than we realised to write the newsletter, and even longer to compile the distribution list for it! Sorry if we’ve missed anyone off, in the words of James Brown ‘please, please, please’ email us if you would like us to include you for [...]

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Two days out of Istanbul, we arrived at Osmaneli – a small town at the bottom of a tough climb up to the city of Bilecik – where we stopped to replenish our energy with lunch. Whilst looking for a restaurant in town (most of which were closed for Ramadan) we were accosted by Ozan, [...]

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After our experiences in several places like Roma and Greece, we should have learnt that it is never a wise thing to post about ´last night in…’ until after you have left!!! Well it happened again and we had to stay not only one additional night but two nights in Istanbul waiting for our Indian [...]

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Having spent the night in the famous seaside resort of Kusadasi, we emerged early in the morning bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, to take in the sights of the famous ancient city Ephesos. The history of the city of Ephesos, which today lies at the silted-up harbour at the mouth of the Kaystros (Küçük Menderes), stretches back [...]

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Day 75: Walking on clouds: Pamukkale

One of the visas we had applied for in Istanbul would take a few days to arrive, so we decided to fill the time with a quick visit down to West Turkey to see two amazing sights: Pamukkale, a natural formation of white limestone cliffs, and the nearby Ephesos, the extremely well preserved ruins of [...]

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Days 69-74: Break in Istanbul

Having got our domestic chores out of the way, we set off to enjoy the sights and smells of ancient Konstantinople (as the Greeks still call it!). Sedef acted as the tour guide and interpreter, and Nic acted as the official taster in every food stall! We were miffed to find that Nic had to [...]

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Day 68: Istanbul! Leg 1 Complete

The road to Istanbul proved to be a real trial on our nerves and muscles: the quiet provincial road turned into a two lane heavily used main road with speeding lorries, series of ramps, and ever increasing headwind as we approached Istanbul. Progress slowed the nearer we got to Istanbul – on one evening we [...]

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Day 64: Mmmm… Turkish coffee

Finally we were on the way to leave Greece and cross the border into Turkey.. Fearing the Monday morning traffic and the miles long custom queues on the Greek/Turkish border we got on the road early. After cycling along the Greek aegean coast through lovely landscapes and bird sanctuaries, we were dismayed to find that [...]

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