The view at breakfast is just as good as at dinner.

I like this place.. I think this bloke does too .. he arrived 30 years ago and liked it so much he stayed ever since ..

We’re hugging the coast today all the way round to Antalya.. riding with one foot in the lovely blue water ..

It’s yet another curvy sensuous road wiggling and dancing its way along the water’s edge, you can almost hear the music in the air and feel the rhythm in the road.   I can feel my helmet begin to pull me in one particular direction. We come to a junction and it spins to the right on my head leaving blind and with no other option to turn  inside and follow the path it’s chosen down to a small cafe perched up some steps.

Her name means ‘flower’ and she leaves a little bud on my helmet.. I think I’ll leave that sentence just as it is ..

After much refreshment its back on the road towards Atalya.  The road gets ever more busy as we get closer.  It’s very hot and very very windy and at lunch we stop on the beach.

There are some Russian ladies there, they’re the only ones sturdy enough not to have been blown into the sea.

One is a pure Russian and the other is a Ukraine/Russia mix.  They both live here permanently.   The Ruskraine lady is really nice.  She is quite shy but we stand together on the beach and chat away about two totally different lives and watch turtles play in the surf.   It’s all too easy to make generalisations and I’m just as guilty as the next man but in truth, the reality is often a lot more complicated.  This lady is conflicted and one side of her brain is at war with the other, it can’t be easy.

Atalya is tourist central and its packed tight.  Approaching most cities looks exactly the same and you’re hunting the 5% that is different.. the original city .. the heart. Just like Sarajevo.  Its just another scrappy city until the last km then it all changes.  Its the same here. I’m not hopeful about this place at all at the moment though.  The Satnav is saying its less than an km and we’re still hemmed in and sweating like pigs.  Riding at walking speed with the thick metal tide.  ‘Turn right’ Right.. OK.. but there is a barrier.. and a hut here.  This isn’t a road.  Turns out the old city is gated and closed to traffic but if you’re staying in they will open the barrier and let you ride your bike through the maze of tight narrow streets along with the throngs of tutting tourists.  It’s a very delicate operation and by the time we get to the hotel the bikes and the riders are approaching meltdown.

Good hoteliers are adept at defusing tourist time bombs though.  A free beer in the shade on a comfortable couch, clean white sheets and a shower.   Everything quick and simple, no waiting about dripping sweat on the tiles.  No stupid questions.  All that can wait until later.

In the morning we’re getting ready and someone has been through the bikes overnight.  Small things, but often stuff that’s travelled with you for years, or useful things you have no hope of replacing out on the road.  You can only strip them down so far though.

We’re off early and we quietly ride out through toy town.  It’s well before tourist o’clock and the streets are empty and clear and we plot a route out into the mountains.   It all starts out fine,  smiles set to max and bikes on auto pilot.  I’ve been really surprised at the amount of twisty riding we’ve done this far and its the same today with the bikes spending most their time on one ear or the other.

Stop for Chai .. I like mine with milk ..

As soon as we leave it starts to rain.  The road is shiny.  Its one of the shiniest roads I’ve ever seen in my life.  I’m going round a corner and I can see a full reflection of the opposing cars in the road surface.  When it really starts to rain it’s like riding on ice.  I am properly shitting myself for about an hour, tiptoeing about, sliding everywhere, looking death in the face every  five minutes.  I’ve not had an experience like that for quite a while.

Then as  soon as it started.. it ends and we’re back on the black mirror.

We’re headed for Göreme today.  To the caves and the balloons.   Göreme itself is an odd place.  If Meerkats were human sized, they would live in a place like this.  You would expect with the amount of tourist traffic that it would be shiny and clean but the road is all up for miles and its a dusty dirty ride through the centre before trying to find your specific cave.   It’s a labyrinth of tiny roads wound between the rocks and it can be like looking for a needle in a haystack.  But it’s all worth the trouble just for the views.

We’ve got  a day off to look around.  It really is an off place.  I’m just following my nose and we go into a village with a cave system obvious from the road.  This one was apparently occupied until an earthquake some time in the 60s.  It has the remains of a 6th century church right at the top so just for shits and giggles we climb up in 35 degree heat and full kit for a look.  I don’t get much out of looking at these old places .. but I do believe that as people wander through life they leave tiny parts of their souls behind that can hide in cracks, soak into the rocks, into the earth  Sometimes I like to close my eyes and just let my body listen.. let it tune in..  I’m convinced there is stuff beyond our five senses and I’m aways keen to feed in when I can.  Places like this that have experiences so much emotion over such a long time are a good place to do it.  Or, alternatively its the crutch I lean on ever more heavily as I get older..  I do wonder where I’ve left bits of my soul though.. by now I must have scattered it just about everywhere. 

One of the riders wants to head out into the scrub and sand to look at some formations in the distance.  Do I really want to leave the safety and security of the solid black stuff under my wheels?  Not really TBH, I’m not a particularly confident off roader at the best of times and a lot of this looks like narrow overgrown goat tracks from here.   I have a secret mechanism for randomly flipping a coin in my head and I set it off.  Heads… right .. here we go then.  Shit or bust time.  The front rider has taken all his luggage off and is very quick and confident as we chase up and down and round the rocks, through the soft (and thankfully shallow) sand and dried up stream beds.  The only way I can make myself do this sometimes is to ride in the middle.  Trying to keep up with the bloke in front while trying not to hold up the rider behind.   It concentrates my mind and stops me hitting the emergency stop button.  Its like everything in life though.. no risk .. no reward.

I can hear my tyres kiss the tarmac when we head back to town.  A big wet Frenchy .. glad to be back   I can feel my inspiration waining again and I need to not let it drop any further.  Keeping everything straight and level in my head on trips like this my first priority.  We’ve all got a lot of alone time on the road, time to let my mind give me pleasure or pain,  keep the demons under control or let them run riot.  We’re all the same. Out minds can be our best friends or our worst enemies.  Anyway.. exactly when did I qualify as a psychiatrist.  My treatment today is an hours walk with the camera..