Rolling Potatoes: turkey

Cappadocia was a highlight from our journey in Turkey.

Because of wonderful landscape that the nature spent millions of years to shape, where hundred of underground cities were built since 5th century BC

Because of nice people we crossed on our way: Flo, Cedric and Bernard - the Belgian trio who shared a memorable Couch Surfing experience with us (we may need an entire article for that :-) ) and much nicer experience visiting around the region.

Ambre and Baptiste the two French, on their hitchhiking way home, we spent just a lunch break together but we do appreciate them a lot.

Pierre and Lucie aka The Soft Knees (Les mous du genou!!!) http://lesmousdugenoux.com, with their France- Mongolia one year cycling trip. Such a sweet and creative and fun couple. Even if you don't speak French, you absolutely need to have a glance on their videos, they are sooooooo great, we laughed out so much every time we saw them!!!!

And of great people who helped and hosted us.

Cansu, who me just met randomly and then who stayed with us the whole evening, brought us to a great restaurant, unknown from tourists. The next early morning, he took us for a hike and to the perfect spot to see the balloons.

(With the Belgian team :-) )

Cem, a real gem! We liked him even before meeting him: his messages were a proof of a very kind person and we were fond of him the first moment we saw his friendly face! It was a pleasure spending time with him (not enough for us) and cooking for him.

We left Cappadocia with Lucie and Pierre, after we realized the wow of camping in a cave with a camp fire. Wonderful moment of us 4 and Thibault, an another crazy Belgian cyclist.

(Photo: Thibault)

We had a difficult morning with strong wind on the face, at sides.... everywhere except from the back!!!! Head down, we kept moving on at 7km/h, sometimes less. At the top of a 10% pass, we stopped for a soupe, such a precious relaxing moment!!!!!

After the rain, the sunlight and after uphill, we were on the flat again. At some point, we turned right to the way to Kayseri, expecting the wind would blow behind us. But irony of fate, it just stopped!!! Well, at least, we had the flat!!!!

We arrived to Kayseri finally at 2:30PM. Trying to catch up with Tim and Karina, the German couple we met in Thessaloniki - Greece, we took a bus to Sivas and an another one from Sivas to Ordu. It was a frustrating time at the bus station where people almost harassed us to come with them then chased us away "sorry, bus full!!!! Next bus full!!!!". Finally we made it safe to Ordu, without paying extra charge for our two bikes but we skipped the chance of rolling 200km with wind from the back with Pierre and Lucie. We spent little time together but it was great time. We enjoyed very much the time spending with them and got even some influences: we started using our water filter now and bought a new horn to my bike, one like Pierre has :-) :-). Apparently, we also have some influences on them who started now getting up early like we do, having a soupe break as we do :-):-)

We stayed with Mehmet, a very sweet english teacher for 2 nights, near Giresun. Mehmet, his family and friends waited on us on hand and foot. It was a great moment experiencing the turkish hospitality and living a little bit the turkish life from the inside.

We caught up with Tim and Karina at Gorele, at Berkay's place, a warm shower who also host Fred and Brigitte, the "Bretonsuisse" and Guidons Guedins - the 4 French we heard about.

We reached Trabzon without any trouble: the road was flat and the sun was bright, almost like a summer day. We had here an another memorable Couch Surfing experience. Fortunately, we met other nice travelers with whom we shared fun moments together.

We tried, without success to apply for the Iran visa in Trabzon. Without the reference number, obtained mostly only through a travel agency with some 35E/person, you don't even pass the door!!! The lady at the Iranian consulate, with 2 eyes of 2 different colors (I heard about that but it was for the first time ever that I saw it in real!!!! Very strange, I tell ya!!!) and, despite her shaving and tons of foundation, a beard "worse than mine" dixit Alessio, almost chased us away....Hm!!!!

Here we had our first hitchhiking experience with Tatyana from Russia and Nikita from Ukraine to visit the Sumela monastery. It was sunny in Trabzon :-) :-)

With Tim and Karina, we left Trabzon the 11th feb. The road was flat and boring :-( Fortunately the sun accompanied us for half of the day. We had a wonderful break by the Black Sea with almost a summer weather :-)

But then, it got worse and worse. We stopped around 4:30 PM under a heavy sky. We found a lovely place, quite protected from the rising wind and knocked randomly at a door nearby to ask whether we could set our tent. And surprise, the man, speaking perfectly german, invited us in, offered us his house so we could cook and have a warm place to eat. As he had to leave this evening, he was even sorry not to be able to host us (!!!!)
8PM, we were about the leave when a neighbor just appeared and after exchanging 3 words, he generously offered us his place. He showed us the place, then left, leaving us alone in his vacation apartment by the sea. Wow!!!!

The next day, it rained almost the whole day. It was soon annoying. But well, that's part of the journey! AND WE SCORED THE 5000KM!!!!!! Yeah!!! It was a great moment :-) :-)
And when we sought for a place to camp, the magic of the Turkish hospitality happened again!!! We knocked at a door, asking for some wood to make a fire. And they offered us a whole heated room and didn't stop bringing fruits, dessert, even a big breakfast the next morning.... Wonderful Turkey!!! We are constantly amazed by the people hospitality!!! And we do wish that more people could see what we see, feel what we feel :-) :-)

13th fed, we crossed finally the Turkey-Georgia border. Goodbye Turkey!!! We will keep in mind all those wonderful moments!!!! Thank you all again!!!!!

2015 january 2d

We lelf the warm bed of our hotel in Alexandroupoli when the weather outside was -8C. Brrrrrhhh
Approaching the border, we had to take the highway for the third time, just because there was no other way..... As usual, greek highway is empty, we crossed at most 20 cars :-)

We were excited because not only we arrived to a new country but also it was our first reel border crossing when we got the passport stamped!!!! Moreover, we left Europe for a new continent, please!!!! We got almost frozen while waiting on line. At some point, Alessio just shouted over my shoulders "heeey guys!!!!" : on the other side, were leaving Turkey and entering Greece 2 Asian cyclists: a Korean and a Japanese guy. Sooo funny!!! We had a little chat, exchanged our maps and wished one another a safe trip :-)

The fırst night in Turkey, we followed the advices of Esen from Warm Showers and camped in the park of Kesan. İt was damned cold but we experienced the first turkish kindness: the night guard invited us to his lodge to get warm, offered us tea and shared his dinner with us....

The cold weather stayed for almost all the time we are in Turkey so far, but the generosity, the kindness of Tuırkish people warmed us up. Everywhere we went, they were simply amazing, always eager to help, to offer. We had free "çay" (tea) more than what we drank during the last 15 years :-) :-)

Once, we arrived in an empty village (it was early in the cold morning when one has better things to do ie stay at home, by the fire... than running around in the cold).We stopped to play wıth some dogs when two old men came out from nowhere and invited us çay. We followed them in the "salonu" - from outside one could never suspect that 10 men were sitting inside, reading newspapers, watching TV and drinking çay. Our conversation was very limited as usual but we were glad to see a bit a part of the turkish culture that normal tourısts could not see and feel.

Sometimes, people stopped us on the road to offer us çay, food and are happy to have a little chat with us. We thought that this Shepard would post the pictures taken with us on his facebook :-)

Or those two men, selling potatoes by the road

And turkısh food is an another surprise for us. We got the chance to stay with Melike's family in İstanbul and her mom cooks like a goddess!!!! We happily gained some weight after a week trying everday some new dishes :-) :-)