takin' turkey and bulgaria by storm...literally!!

so we last left of with a quick note about istanbul carpet sales men, but i didnt have time to write about the rest of turkey and the stories that went to those 4 random photos didnt post with the photos. so real quickly- that "smelly" looking guy is another bike tourer who is on his way to vietnam via "stanlandia". we took that photo before a tearful departure. we mat skot! in olimpos and rode for about 90km with him to antalya where he kepr on the coast and pipe and tim went north for egridir. we shared one of the best camp spots ever. a quiet nook 10meters above the sea overlooking crystal blue waters and the city lights. we even had our own private mediteranian beach. awesome. good luck skot!!

so from the historic down town of antalya we shot north towards egridir, a tiny lake town that the tourists seem to over look. we peddled for about 40 miles into a head wind before this random turkish guy pulled over and offered us a ride. we must have looked pretty desperate because we didnt even have to thumb for this ride. so we accepted and this nice guy who spoke absolutly no english took us about 25 miles up the road to our turn off. after showing us photos of his entire family, twice, and reviewing the maps with us, twice we parted ways. tim can still hear his voice in his head "blah blah blah blah, o.k. timmy?" thats about all tim could get from this guy, and boy did he like to talk. it was as if he thought that the more he spoke, the more we understood...not the case.

on our ways to egridir we climbed and climbed and climbed...we coined a new term: brutifull. beautifull and brutal combined. let me explain. everywhere in turkey is beautifull, but on the way to egridir we climbed for 5 miles at a 10% grade and then descended for 2 miles at a 5% grade...thats brutal!!! but all together the day was brutifull:)

when in egridir we decided to change all of our turkey plans and take a bus to cappadocia for a few nights. cappadocia is one of the tourist highlights of turkey-surreal cone like rock formations, homes built into the walls of the hills and underground cities. so we went, checked it out, took some photos, and then jumped the bus back to egridir and then to istanbul. with puffy ankles ( from all the bussing ) we hopped off the bus in istanbul and began biking into the city.

istanbul was great. pipe and I are already planning to go back. with the exception of pushy sales men it was awesome. clean, old, new, exotic. the Aya sophia nd blue mosqe were definatly not let downs and in taksim square we found some turkish hiphop:) i'll mail it to you soon bert. slip it in the mix.

from istanbul we rode some 156 miles along some of the most beautifull rolling country hillsides we have ever seen to the bulgarian border. we realized that turkey and turkish hospitality would soon be behind us and so we decided that we would not say no to any offers for tea or lunch, which has pretty much been a daily occurence. in one day we shared lunch with a family of bread makers and coffee with a town drunk and his female companions, one of which did an impression of a whirling dirvish. bravo!! we met 2 bike tourers along the way as well: one going to istanbul and another going to india!! we wish them good luck. we crossed the border on tims moms birthday. (happy 21st mom!!) and were introduced to bulgarian roads. bumpy as hell!!! more pot holes than nyc!! up and down we trundled through a bird reserve, very scenic. so now we are spending bulgarian leva and stotinki instead of turkish lera. and the fashion has gone from consertive turks to flashy east bloks.

through the reserve there were many slow uphills where the fly's feasted on pipe and tim. they were going fro our eyes, nose and ears, as if they were looking for a new home. pipe and i both agreed that we wished that we had a pet frog to sit on our shoulder to eat up the flies. but Tim wished that he had a pirate frog. kinda like a pirates parot. this frog would be dressed as a pirate nas well. pegleg and all. Tim dosent want him hopping away!!

we also rode through and lunched at the tiny village of bulgari where every june there is a "fire dancing festival" where the locals, dipping into their ancient bulgarian history, throw a huge party and walk on hot coals. we didnt see that, but we saw a picture, and when we were eating lunch this nice old lady came to sit with us and made some weird gesturing of fire and walking. so we are pretty sure that she was a fire dancer. of course:)

we finally made it to the bulgarian black sea coast and shared a huge plastic bottle of beer ( for 2.50 lv!! ) on the peacefull serene beach at our camp. and in the middle of the night, whats this? gale force winds? bullets of rain comming down in buckets?? and wait... BOOM!!!!!!!...thunder as loud as i can hear right over head?? yup. it rained and stormed all night. at one point we had a pond under the tent. watching the lights turn on and off with the flickering of lightning was pretty sweet and luckily by morning we were still relativly dry and ready for the day, but the storm wasnt ready to let go yet. we eventually jumped ship for a ratty little bungalow that was a warm welcome for our soaked bones. the tent eventually buckled under the pressure of the wind and we decided that trying to keep the walls up all day was not how we wanted to spend our day off. once in the bungalow life got much better:)

and we are off for more of the coast tomorrow. hopefully the wind stops soon, its still blowing like mad outside. we did laundry and the clothes "blew dry". seriously.