Mestia & the final leg of Turkiye (day 87 - 94)
Day 87 - 94 (7th - 14th Nov)
9,149 miles
Tbilisi - Mestia - Istanbul - Greek Border
Andrea got up early and went to catch the 8 hour bus (long wheelbase Sprinter) to Mestia, as I saddled up the bike and found somewhere to stow the Georgian broom I thought looked cool and wanted to take home. In loading the bike I met the only other motorcycle traveller I'd encountered so far this trip, a Turkish lad who had been to Kazakstan and the mountains of Kyrgyzstan on his 200cc bike laden with camping gear and spares. He sold his KTM to fund the trip and figured the bike was low enough value that if anything happened to him or his bike he would have no hesitation in leaving it behind and getting back (ironically, he blew his engine leaving Tbilisi and continued the journey home to the northern coast of Turkiye on the back of a flatbed recovery). I also met a french cyclist who was riding to Australia from Paris called Carolann whilst I was having breakfast before setting off and had time to talk a little about our trips and onward journeys. Its these fleeting instances of meeting people that make travelling interesting. I wish I'd had more time to get to know Carolann and hear more of the experiences she'd been through but then if I hadn't been up early getting ready to go, we may never have met anyway.
The ride out of Tbilisi was chilly, I had set off in winter gloves and all my vents zipped up, but after an hour had to pull over and add 2 more layers of warmth to my top half, whilst warming my gloves on the cylinder heads to give my hands 5 minutes of warmth before setting off again. It was 6°C and the heated grips weren't enough to stop the painful ache of cold making my fingers white and numb. As the ride continued west and towards the flat plane between the Caucasus range to the north and the Lesser Caucasus to the south, I rode through snow for the first time on a little pass and temperatures dropped to 2°C. I stopped for lunch, fuel and warmth, then continued on. With two hours remaining I was 80km from Mestia which seemed an excessive estimated time for the distance, but before long it was obvious why.
I came off the motorways and the road begun to twist up through the foothills of the mountains, skirting closely past the occupied region of Abkhazia. As the road climbed the temperature which had edged up to 12°C, began to drop again. The little logging villages glued to the mountainside with plumes of smoke from log burners and fires keeping the people alive were populated by 4x4 cars and trucks, I was the only motorcycle I saw. The snow and ice which had been distant on the hillsides was getting closer to the road, until it was at the edge, then on the road.
My awareness of the changing condition wasn't fast enough. I was riding into a corner when everything became detatched below me, I had no steering and no braking. I straightened up and prepared myself for a problem as I was forced to ride off the road and down the verge in a straight line as my only choice. Through lucky circumstances and nothing else, I avoided hitting the bucket sized boulders at the side of the road, I didn't drop the bike, and I came to a stop in the snow. I had ridden over black ice and managed to stay upright, that was a clear warning of the need to change how I ride. I set off again a lot slower, and my focus was tuned a lot tighter to the road, my speed, shadows and dark patches. The north facing slopes of the hills were the worst, you could feel the air change quickly, the roads were wet and dark, some of it was shadow, some of it was water, some of it was black ice. I continued on at 15-20mph or slower when the conditions got worse, speeding up on the warmer parts of the road where the sun had melted the ice. I looked at the time, I had 2 hours before dark, ETA was currently sunset, and I was 70km away, it felt like a bad idea to continue but Andrea would already be there, I had no phone signal, we had accommodation booked and I had no Plan B, so I continued. I rode past locals visually encouraging me to go slowly, I waited for construction vehicles to pause repairing the road in places the cliff cut almost straight down to the ravine below and was being re-built, before gingerly continuing on over the black ice, with the car drivers having already told me they wouldn't be on a motorcycle in these conditions. I was aware.
As the road continued to climb, it turned more east, and the sun had more chance to melt the ice on the roads, with conditions improving despite the gain in altitude. I was able to maintain the ETA Google was projecting, but used the full 2 hours of riding, to emerge at the accommodation as the sun went down. My thoughts turned to what that road would be like on the way down in 4 days, a problem for future self.
Andrea had arrived a few minutes before and checked us in, we were staying in a guest house but it was essentially 4 bedrooms and a bathroom around a common area, all of which was unheated. We had paid £4/night each, but the result was a very cold place to sleep. We turned the oil burner on in the room, and it stayed on for 4 days which was enough to keep the frost from the room, but everywhere else was bitterly cold.
Mestia is a gorgeous ski town in winter and a hotspot for hikers in summer surrounded by 4000+ meter snow covered mountains. We were there in November so it wasn't either of those things, and as such the active life of the town was having a breather before the winter season. A lot of the places were shut, being built or renovated and I found it hard to get into the mindset of wanting to explore the place when our accommodation wasn't hospitable (from the cold), and the town felt 'dead' - that said, Andrea had been researching the area and had a more positive approach to it which helped adjust my view. We made a plan to do some hikes during our stay, but spent the majority of the first day slowly wandering around the town to see what was there, sharing the roads with cows and pigs (and their piglets) which roamed freely, or the street dogs which followed and sought compassion from the visitors. There are a number of square Svan Towers in Mestia which were unique to the region and are scattered around the hillside. They were built between the 9th and 12th century as look-outs and defence for the region and added an interesting component to the landscape of the town. We had a look round the Svan museum and made plans to hike up to the Cross over Mestia the next morning.
The walk up to the Cross Over Mestia was steep, pretty much onto, then straight up the slope gaining 2,800ft in a relatively short distance. The views from the ridge were stunning, it was full a 360° vista over Mestia and the mountains surrounding it, including Mt Ushba which sat on the border of Russia 3 miles to our north.
That evening we had dinner in the town then head back to the guest house, and I wanted to tackle the problem of cold for my hands when riding the bike. Through Google translate I described what I was trying to do with the relatively quiet host who had taken a very 'hands off' approach to hosting (pretty much zero contact). I wanted to make some wind-deflectors to add to the handguards on the bike which would help keep the heat in my hands, our host found me some scraps of roofing underlay which was ideal. It was relatively rip-stop, non-permeable and light. Using a cigarette lighter and some welding wire from my selection of bike bits, I poked a series of holes in the guards, then used copper wire to stitch the material to the guards, making pockets for my hands to fit with-in around the grips. I figured coming into western europe in a few weeks would be cold and wet, so these would help whilst riding down the mountains back to Turkiye but mostly keep my fingers alive riding through the Alps in December.
The next day Andrea and I went into town without much of a plan and were approached by one of the locals touting for business and offered to take us to visit the glacier, which worked for us. We got some food then hopped in his van and head up the valley to the start of a 2 hour hike to visit Chalaadi Glacier. It was a relatively easy walk following the river to the base of the glacier through autumnal woods with snow scattered throughout. Another stunning place to be with big views all around, soundtracked by distant rock falls building momentum carrying huge volumes of rubble to the valley bottom around us. That evening was our last together after having met in Istanbul almost a month earlier so we went out for some food and ate far too much Georgian food again, but I wasn't ashamed of the volume - its culturally the right thing to do!
Andrea was staying in Mestia a few more days but had elected to move to a warmer and more comfortable accommodation, which made a lot of sense, so we said farewell the next morning as she head off to a warm hotel, and I prepared myself for Ice Road Riding - Round 2.
I had been tracking the weather and noted that although it dropped to -7°C before dawn every morning, it picked up to 10°C during the days and the lack of snow or rain meant the sun would have chance to do some melting, hopefully. The ride down wasn't as bad as the ride up. There was still snow on the roads, ice in places, very torn up tarmac and roadworks all over the place, but it was manageable and I was aware of it. I gave Tom the warning that I would be heading into treachery without signal and if I didn't emerge in 10 hours that my stuff was up for grabs, but 2 hours later I was on the dry warmer surfaces heading toward Batumi on the Black Sea coastline to the west. I had hoped to get to the border in time to cross back into Turkiye that afternoon and possibly sleep in Hopa, just over the border in Turkiye.
I got to the border and had the same drama of handing my passport and vehicle documents over then watch 5-6 other people pass through without hesitation as the computer umm'd and arr'd about whether to let me out of Georgia. Eventually, a cursory glance through my panniers from the Georgian official and I was out, and moved onto the Turkish control to get into Turkiye. To my surprise, this was relatively painless and I was through the whole process from start to finish in less than an hour, parked up in Turkiye looking at a map wondering how far to push it today. I set off thinking I might get to Trabzon and see how I felt by then, but after a few hours riding I started to think.. the roads were well lit as I contoured the north coast of Turkiye along the Black Sea, how far away was Istanbul. I checked, 1200km. I rode into the dark and started thinking I could get to Ordu, maybe even Samsun if I could get that far. I had this idea that maybe I could actually get to Istanbul, in one go. It was a long way and Google said it would be 7am before I got there but I knew that Peter would be on duty at the Cheers Hostel doing the night shift, and I thought riding from Mestia in Georgia across the whole of Turkiye in one go would be pretty impressive. I bought some service station snacks and coffee at 21:00 and carried on.
As I rode into Samsun, I still felt okay but I was conscious I didn't want to suddenly hit a wall of tiredness or not be able to get fuel at 4am on the side of the road somewhere. I could over come those issues but the thing that changed my mind in the end was that it started to spit. The last time I'd seen any rain was coming into Sofia in a storm 5 weeks earlier, I had been very lucky with weather so far, but the road was greasy. I accelerated in 3rd gear and the rear wheel span hard, I changed to 4th and accelerated, and span again. As a test of how much traction I had on straight sections of road, the answer was very little. Once I left the Black Sea coast, the street lights would stop, and the wildlife of the country (wild bore, dogs, wolves) was more inclined to be wandering around on the roads that I wouldn't see, and I would have no traction to avoid or do much about them let alone surprise corners and changes in road direction - 23:30 with 740km to go, I abandoned my plan and stopped at a roadside motel.
The next morning after a mediocre breakfast I set off again to complete the journey to Istanbul, and messaged the manager at Cheers Vintage Hostel - Can, to enquire about staying a couple of nights. The day returned to the status quo of warm and sunny, as I continued to motorway straight to Istanbul. Aside from the staff at the hostel the only person I would know landing there would be Pamela and I'd messaged to see whether she would be around and was looking forward to catching up when I got there for a day or two.
As I rode, with the hours of headspace available to drift in and out of thoughts, I realise I'd not really been using my bike for adventure since the bear. It was purely a mode of transport, and I was wasting the opportunity I have with it to explore and adventure. To be fair some of that had been a product of circumstance, I had intended to go to Tbilisi, and to Mestia, and spend the time in those places rather than travelling or adventuring, but I started to think about how to conclude my trip. I would be travelling through Greece, into Albania, Montenegro and Croatia then Slovenia and mainland Western Europe. I felt like I should make sure I didn't just hop from touristy location to touristy location, and do some adventuring with the bike. At one of the fuel stop and stretching rests on the way to Istanbul, I downloaded the Trans European Trail (TET) routes for Greece, Albania and Montenegro, to see whether I could tie in some shorter mile trail rides as part of the next phase of my riding. I would need to work out how they tie in but it felt like doing some TET riding up the adriatic was a good way to see the country, if I could work it in between towns or villages to make sure I had accommodation/food available if the weather was poor.
I had wanted to blast across the top portion of Turkiye to get to Istanbul and on to Greece because I had spent a lot of time in Turkiye already, and although there was still a lot more to see, I would need to come back for those another day. I wanted to add variety to the trip and felt that 3 weeks in the country was a fair amount of time, considering the final destination had originally been Kazakhstan not Turkiye and there was a lot I still wanted to do before it got to cold elsewhere.
As I approached Istanbul, traffic begun to build quickly until I was at the back of a multi-mile long stationary queue. The bizarre thing was cars that had shot past the last exit from the road, did not consider it too late to make that exit still. The hard shoulder was littered with 15-20 cars all in reverse creeping backwards past cars ploughing into the back of the traffic jam, an insane sight to see on a motorway in the dark. I spent 30 fairly intense minutes picking my way between the traffic to eventually get to the front and see that the cause of delay was 3 lorries that had become a little too well acquainted, spilt diesel and goods all over the road as well as strewn themselves far and wide, closing the 4 lane motorway down to one. Grateful to have been able to avoid sitting in the traffic until sunrise, I carried on and found myself in the subburbs of Istanbul again. Aware that everything near the Blue Mosque region where the hostel was is expensive, I nipped to Kadikoy for some noodles on the Asian side of the city then continued to Cheers Vintage Hostel to be greeted by Peter and Sinan again. Mestia to Istanbul, 21 hours, 1600km, two days.
I set about getting a shower and sorting out some of my stuff then spent the end of the evening in the bar chatting to Can before retiring in the familiar corner of the vast city.
Part of the reason to come back to Istanbul was that it was a good target of distance for my route across to Europe, but I also had a few errands I wanted to get through and some gifts I wanted to buy. First order of business the following morning was to sit in the roof-top terrance with a coffee and catch up with Pamela. Once the crowds picked up and she became busy working, I got some food at sat chatting to one of the guys I'd met in my dorn the previous night. I hadn't intended to do much socialising when I came back to Cheers because I had a fairly limited time to get a few specific things done then I needed to continue on, but I ended up spending 3 hours talking to a couple from the US and was reminded of the value of travelling and the variety of people you meet, and made sure I was there for the conversations we were having. In the relatively short time I had, it was really warming talking to and getting to know Celine and Ulises - both very interesting and engaged people. One of the best things about this hostel was that somehow, the people that were drawn to it seemed to have something about them. Some hostels are functional, the people that visit are looking for a bed and are transient, but the people who go to Cheers Vintage Hostel feel like they all have more depth to them and are there for the city. I guess Istanbul is a destination itself, despite being a 'gateway between the East and the West' its a specific place people want to go, not everywhere has that draw.
I set off to run my errands for the day and managed to get everything sorted, heading back to the hostel by mid-afternoon and planned to set out for the evening with Pamela to Moda in Kadikoy. She had discovered a cafe styled like the TV set of 'Friends' so we went for an explore and found it. It was a really interesting cafe with loads of anecdotes and references to the series in the menu, the decor, and the atmosphere and tongue-in-cheek funny staff. It was really nice getting to see Pamela again and properly catch up, we spent a few hours there then wandered down a few streets adorned with brollies hanging above the cobbled roads giving a really interesting environment to walk through before getting a couple of beers. The evening disappeared very easily, we headed back to the metro to cross under the estuary and were blocked by an officious guard who wouldn't let us get the underground back to the other side of the city, declaring our only option was to get back on the metro a few stops north then a bus which would be about 2 hours of delay, and make Pamela late for her 2am remote working. Some others behind us were in the same situation so we agreed to go as a 5 and split the cost of a taxi to the otherside. Two of the other 3 were turkish and did the liasing with the taxi driver, which started off well but started to become a bit strange. The original plan was to drop us off first before continuing on to where they were staying, but the route the taxi took was convoluted, eventually one of the others hopped out and disappeared, then we continued to a totally different area of the city. The other turkish chap declared they would get out now and were about to disappear, a quick bit of maths on his part to with paying their share of the taxi left him actually paying the entire fare so I let it happen, not pointing out his mistake and not feeling guilty about it either. On the final leg of the journey to our hostel, the taxi driver pulled over to pick up his next fare whilst we were still in the taxi which I've not had before, then we got out half a mile from our destination. All told - it was one of the most bizarre experience I've had in a taxi, but it fit the vibe of Istanbul and was quite a fun conclusion to the end of the night.
The next morning I packed up most of my stuff then head for breakfast and ended up meeting more people I wish I could get to know better. I had missed the Cheers 'family meal' and pub crawl the previous night but spent a few hours chatting to guests I'd briefly met the previous day and hearing about their evening, their onward travel plans and more about their lives and stories. Aless is a Brazillian croupier who was living in Armenia and is relocating to Bucharest, where would I ever meet these people back in Derbyshire? She was funny, easy to talk to and struggling with a very big hangover, but was really interesting to spend some time with. I said farewell to Pamela, Peter, Can, hoping to see them again, said goodbye to the guys who worked on the street outside the hostel and had come to be familiar with me and my escapades with the bike (and had greeted me back when I arrived the previous night), then loaded my kit and left Istanbul for the final time this trip - an incredible city.
A few days previously Georgie had asked on Jacob's behalf whether I'd been over the world's longest suspension bridge which was in Turkiye. I hadn't been over it, I hadn't even known it was in Turkiye, and going from Istanbul to Greece it wasn't on the way either but I could fit it in if I rode round the bottom of the Sea of Marmara so I set off south, back to the Asian side and along the south coast. Whilst riding I rung home to catch up with Mum as I'd missed her call a few times, and ended up chatting about the variety of people in all sorts of circumstances that I've met travelling, the exposure to other worlds and ways of doing things, people who live a digital nomadic life, the opportunies and experiences people have, and my want to not lose the mindset I currently have toward it by falling back into familiar pattern and routines back home. I've noticed that environment makes a big difference to outlook, its obvious but its different when you actually see it yourself. Sitting in a busy coffee shop tucked away in the corner, around hustle and bustle even though I'm not interacting with them, makes it easy to be productive and energised with writing. Sitting in a quiet apartment with white walls and rain outside, makes me shut down. Being in a between-season town feels a little desperate, being in a busy social hotspot gives me energy, climbing mountains or being in wide open space feels like anything is possible. I need to continue to be conscious of the impact of environment on mindset when it changes around me. One of the most powerful ways I've seen the difference is when I've stayed in contact with people I've met who have travelled to somewhere new on the same day I've moved, and have seen photos of where they are and spoken to them about their experiences. Within a few hours of having breakfast together, I might be doing something difficult or tiring or depleting, and they're diving in the Red Sea or surrounded by mountains in another country, it can be as easy to change your environment and circumstances as just heading in a different direction for a few hours.
The rest of the ride along the south coast of the Sea of Marmara was pretty, surrounded by rolling hills and mountains, towns and villages. I stopped for lunch at a little bakery in a little town and ended up chatting to the owner through Google Translate about my adventure and where I was going, he was keen to be hospitable even though I was only there 20 minutes to make a cheese sandwich. He brought me tea, wanted to know where I was going and what I was doing, keen to hear my view of Turkiye and its people. Everywhere I've been in this country and actually every country I've been through has been full of kind and generous people.
As I approached the 1915 Canakkale Bridge I pulled over to work out where to stay that night, with the weather starting to turn and the light fading. I found a wild camping spot 26km from the Greek border and decided I'd aim for that to reduce the number of Schengen days I'd be burning to travel home, giving myself a full day of travel when my timer starts again. It was after sunset by the time I crossed the bridge and it had begun to rain but I was still able to record the crossing to send to Jacob to watch as I rode the 2,023 meters of unsupported expanse. I stopped for dinner at a service station as the rain ramped up then got to the wild camping spot in some woodland at the side of the road in the dark, and pitched the tent for the first time since Nemrut Crater in Eastern Turkiye, hoping tonight would be less eventful.
