Arrival in Istanbul, Turkey, and change of trajectory...

The change is impressive. Just after the border, I'm seeing a big mosque in the horizon. For me, I left Europe, I'm now flying on roads where the buses are hand-painted, where the old men in the villages are playing backgammon outside and drinking tea. During the day the mosque fill the air with their songs and call the prayers to come.

Just after the border, CNN Turkey is welcoming me and is making a big interview of me and especially of my bicycle. I'm trying to make room in the incredible traffic, today it's especially insane, this is the end of the Ramadan and all the people are in the streets, they are all greeting me, the cars honk, the people are even taking pictures of me. I’m camping in a closed camping (because the season is now over) and the wife of the boss is offering me food. The day after, I’m eating my first kebab for 1'000'000 of Turkish Liras (85 centimes or 55 cents. The first country I went where it's really easy to be multimillionaire. Finally they are offering me 3 tchais (tea), a yoghurt (the national drink), one hour of internet and access to the public toilet, 3 times more than I paid... That's my first contact with the incredible Turkish hospitality. Everyday this kind of situation happens to me.

The 2 last days before I get to Istanbul are the worst. The climate is getting really hard and the wind is almost pushing me out of the road. I’m trying to drive with an empty head and not think too much. Or yes, I’m thinking a lot: I’m thinking to what I'm going to drink and to eat in Istanbul.

When someone told me that I arrived in Istanbul, I exploded with happiness! I'm ready to make twenty times Zurich-Istanbul just to feel this joy I got. This is for this kind of situations that my journey takes all its value and especially its savour. Well, I needed to drive two more hours to reach the quarter of Sultanhamet in the centre of Istanbul (what a huge city and traffic!) but that wasn’t really important. I was on a cloud and nothing could affect me.
Farer away I see a suspended bridge; this is the Bosphorus Bridge, the connection between Europe and Asia. The first big stage of my journey, but this bridge it's for later.
Now I feel like in an completely other world, eastern perfume in the air and oriental music… to be continued....
***
I am spending 2 weeks in Istanbul, I’m resting and discovering the city which givesme The most insane contrasts. While walking in a small street, you feel you're in the Middle East and a little further, you feel you're in a modern and large western Metropolis. Somptuous city of the thousand and one mosquees. The snow is now recovering the city and in Erzeroum (near the border to Iran). It's already -25 degree. and the winter is just starting. I’m wondering in which state the roads will be.
I am leaving Istanbul and now I know that I will suffer. It’s taking me 3 hours to leave Istanbul, a gigantic city. In all it’s taking me 5 hours to cross it in a crazy traffic. I learn how to impose my vehicle on the road, the "normal" rules of circulation have changed (and before, I believed that in Montenegro I had met the most insane ones..) I’m passing over the bridge of the Bosphorus. In reality, it's a motorway and some police officers are stopping me, two times, but I find a way to continue my ride.... I don't want go in Asia by boat.

It’s taking me 4 days from Istanbul to Ankara. At the top of the collars, snow is everywhere and it is starting to be really cold. I don't know what to wear: If I have too many clothes, I'm sweating as soon as I have to go up and if I have less clothes, I'm really freezing when the road goes down. In Ankara, I'm not sure what to do, but finally I decide to take my chance. With difficulty I’m leaving Ankara under the snow. The first hour, I find it very nice. The second hour, when my clothes is starting to get wet, I think it's not really nice. The third hour, when my clothes are freezing because of the humidity and the cold, I think that now it's no more funny at all.

On the road, everything is different. The cars and the trucks are now continully honking at me. Sometimes to tell me that they're passing by me sometimes to tell me to make place and drive out of the road and sometimes only to great me. People are always very nice. Often the truck drivers stop on the lonely road I use to give me hot tea, water or something to eat. Sometimes they even invite me in a restaurant. The weather is so cold, that I almost never use my tent. For almost the next 3 weeks, the average temperature during the day is between -10 and -15 degree. I am sleeping everywhere: in cheap hostels where the construction workers sleep (in petrole station near the stove, to people who invite me and even one time in a police station, on the ground and behind an office. Before I am arriving in Cappadoccia, my water is freezing one time to much (every morning I heat my water's bottles but after 2 hours, the water starts to freeze again and I drink more ice than water), I am deciding that I'm not gonna to east anymore, I will join the coast (a bit warmer) and go to Syria! I am leaving my bicycle in Goereme and I'm taking a bus back to Ankara. After a long discussion with the diplomats and after having solved a lot of others administration's problems, the bus is bringing me back to Goereme. I am remaining a few days in this magic place. The landscapes are just amazing and there's an incredible peace, small villages are carved in the volcanic's moutains. A long time ago, the christians made holes in the rocks and lived inside during the moslem's persecussion time. They closed the entrance and could wait months. They even got underground city, which the biggest goes until 70 meters below the ground, 12 floors. What makes this place amazing is probably because I'm in the very low season. There are a very few tourists, the prices are really low and the snow covering the landscape gives me such a good feeling when during my explorations, I walk by foot in a total silence in a pure nature. I am leaving this paradise and I'm starting again to fight again in my white hell. I'm passing a collar at almost 2600 meters and am starting to dream of a nice beach: me, drinking a fruit juice under a coconut tree and looking at a beautiful sunset. I am stopping in a restaurant and am having a great night with the truck's drivers. They are inviting me again to eat and I am sleeping in a corner in the restaurant.

What I still haven't explained, it's my very intimate relation I have with the dogs. Sometimes wild dogs (or more or less) or sometimes watchdogs. I don't know why but apparently running after bicycles must be for them like a challenge, which shows to the others dogs who is the strongest. As soon as they see me, they start running after me. A lonely dog almost never runs after me, but it’s more the "team spirit" which motivates them. And of course, they never run after me when the road is going down. Only when it's going up, they choose to attack. In Anatolia the dogs are really huge, larger and more aggressive than elsewhere. A crazy one bit the left bag of behind for about 50 meters and that, in spite of my good speed. It's always a celebration when they stop running. The day after is superb, because from Istanbul, after a bit more than 3 weeks, there were almost no trees. The valley before the sea is green, green of trees, mostly tangerines. Everywhere this dark green makes your heart warm. Only the heart because it’s still very cold and a lot of snow remains, but I feel that my martyr's role will end soon. I'm spending a night in a family and they're tellingme that now the road goes only down to the sea. It’s sounds good but in reality, it's always different, because when you are in a free wheel during 70 kilometers with a temperature around 0 degree, it's terrible. On the coast, I am finding the insane circulation I left in Istanbul or in Ankara. The bad weather will join me until I reach Syria. Every single day along the coast, I will have rain, frontal wind (again.) and a bit cold weather. I am writing "a bit cold" because after leaving the mountains, for me nothing is really cold anymore. I am arriving in Antakya and am preparing myself to leave Turkey. Turkey leaves me beautiful memories and also some less beautiful. Incredibly nice people along the road, I love the solidarity of the people who give me assistance everywhere, while giving me something to eat, to drink or a roof for the night. The people motivate me in hard conditions (some took me for a really insane guy), Istanbul, the landscape in Anatolia, the lonely roads I crossed with this huge desertic's areas covered by snow. I feel so far from everything, freezing but at the same time in peace with myself. I'm even glad I suffered in this cold because now I think I can drive in any conditions. Well, in the future, I will try to avoid cold winters but I win my bet: leaving Europe, and even my departure was a bit late in the season, leaving the Winter behind me. I am leaving Antakya and on the wet road, I am almost falling down. A kurd on a motorbike is stopping and inviting me at home for a break. He is explaining to me the problem of the kurdish people in Turkey and in the other close countries. People starts speaking Arabic. The air is getting drier and a bit hotter than before, here I am: the syrian border.

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