Honestly, our two-day stopover in Patmos was a lucky coincidence that came about through a name mix-up 😂 patmos, piraeus... 🧏♀️ I don't know... thanks to my legastenic brain and the stressy situation at the ferry ticket office 🤷♀️
The ferry crossing was already amazing 🤩, but when we arrived in Patmos and were warmly welcomed at the vegan restaurant 'Pernera' with our loaded bicycles, we were very happy about this confusion 🥰 !
Sidenote: The neighboring shop initially wanted to send us away and said we should park our bikes in the parking lot at the harbor... yea of course... not!
In the beautiful 'Pernera', we enjoyed a vegan and gluten-free menu, prepared with love from organic and local ingredients 🫠. And besides the delicious food, our souls were nourished by the inspiring and motivating conversations we had with the people there 🫶
The search for a campground in the picturesque small bays was a bit challenging. Either the beach was too narrow for a tent or private. Fortunately, it was still off-season, and we were able to set up our inner tent in the bay 'Kampos Beach' next to the beach bar, as the beach taverns and sunbed rentals were not yet active.
Our campsite in the middle of Rhodes...
When we found this place in 'Rodini Park', there was not a single person visiting this deep green park. So we thought we could go to bed early and spend a quiet night. However, we did not expect a group of teenagers who had come to play 'hide and seek'. As soon as they spotted us, they started throwing stones in our direction. So we got out of the tent to show them who we are and to talk to them. Finally, they understood that we are travelers who just want to spend a peaceful night here. After exchanging some famous football players and some curse words in different languages, they finally ran away.
We came to Kas exactly when they closed all streets because of the famous roadcycling race through Turkey. Lucky us 😅 so we came to the ancient amphytheater when a group of teenager held a huge flag of Turkey for the media helicopter. Actually the theater is so nice. Its in a very good shape and look that view! While searching for a campspot we cycled on and on and on. everywhere it was too steep or too densely populated or directly next to the busy road... finally we found a nice, hiden, flat spot surrounded by nature.
We left Çıralı with its beautiful beach and the ancient site of 'Olympos' behind us and enjoyed a great day of cycling off the main road. Several kilometers before reaching the coastal town of Finike, we battled against the very strong headwind. It was no longer fun to ride, so we decided to look for a campsite. The weather forecast indicated that a terrible rain and thunderstorm will approach the next morning. Therefore, we searched for a sheltered campsite to avoid getting soaked... Yes, we found a roof under which we could set up the tent. The night was peaceful, the wind even stopped. And in the morning when we woke up, we thought the weather forecast had been overly dramatic... But suddenly it started to rain and then the storm began... coming directly from the sea, straight towards our small tent! OMG! The roof was no longer helping, the rain was coming horizontally. We feared that the storm would damage the tent, so we took it down while the rain soaked us...
After about two hours enduring the storm, the wind suddenly shifted and 10 minutes later the dark rain clouds were swept away. The sky was once again bright blue, the sun was shining as if nothing had happened. Only the wind continued to blow like crazy. We took our time, dried the tent, sleeping mat and the wet stuff on the deserted playground...
The coastal region after Antalya was not only full of operating hotels and resorts, but also many empty and completely rundown facilities. The same situation existed with plantations and greenhouses, on one side there were many new, modern ones, and on the other side dilapidated nostalgic glass greenhouses... - and a stranded submarine?! - 😂
On the road D400 we had to go through 4 tunnels. There was no possibility to go around 🤯
Who knows us a bit, cycling through a tunnel is the worst, we hate it!
Never before we've seen these buzzers 🖲️ to start the blinking lights around the 'attention, there are cyclists' sign. Actually, we dont know if this helps a lot, at daylight... But of course we pushed the buzzer! In the end of that day we found a campspot, not a magical, romantic nature surrounded spot, but ok...
Antalya... time to take a hot shower, time to chill, time to make laundry, time to chat with other travelers in the backyard of the hostel, time to stroll without bicycle through the old town and time to realize a little bit how fast we've traveled since we are in Turkey...
The wild weather calmed down. In the evening, we found a campspot in a small bay on the deserted beach, next to cucumber greenhouses. The cucumber gardener saw us and immediately brought us a handful of freshly picked cucumbers 🥒 So friendly! (It was the last day of Eid al-Fitr, the celebration after ramadan). He confirmed that we can spend the night here without any worries. We had a very good night there. It was quiet, we felt completely safe and were able to sleep deeply 😴
After another day of cycling 🚵♀️ 🚵♂️ over the hills with amazing views over the coastline 🏞️ and through valleys and bays full of greenhouses, we had to settle for a less idyllic place to sleep. It was noisy, from the busy road nearby, and because of several guys, who had to speed through the park with their motorized vehicles 🛵 🚖 until the early morning hours... At least at one tent side the view to the sea was nice 😎
One day later we where lucky again!
In Anamur we pitched our tent at the end of the long city beach 🏖️ We stood there for totally 3 nights, went for a shower to the open beach-showers 🚿 and relaxed all day long in and around our tent ⛺️
The next morning at Mersin heavy rain surprised us. The sky over the sea was super dark black. The first bad weather wave we sat out in the tent, then, around midday, we decided to start cycling... Only some km later we where lucky to wait underneath a roof of a supermarket until the next cloudburst was over. To Erdemli, our destination for this day, we cycled mostly on the promenade directly along the coast or on the big road D400, totally easy 😎
At Erdemly we cooked dinner in the big and very clean city parc. We knew about the rainy night and pitched our tent, cheeky as we got, in front of a park office... 😇🏕️ #turkey#cycling#bikepacking#biketouring#cyclinglife#adventure#traveling#pedalandexplore#cyclingaroundtheworld#adventuretravel#exploringbybicycle#globetrottingonwheels#travelphotography
From the perfect emergency bivouac spot in the stone hut, the road led us down many meters in altitude. At one point, the canyon with the 'Nehil' river crossed paths with another canyon and its river 'Great Zab' (Kurdish: Zêy Badînan), an ~400-kilometer long river flowing through Turkey and Iraq.
At this crossing point we reached a military checkpoint with heavy armed men asking us the totally unexpected question: 'why are you here ?!' We thought for ourself: to move on, get out of this surveillanced region as fast as possible, but replied with the classic answer: 'we are cycling the world!' 🚴♀️🚴🌍
They let us through and we cycled on, glad the valley widened a bit, happy when we found a playground with beautiful blooming trees. There, we took a long midday break and enjoyed being the only 'guests' on the slide 😅
In the afternoon, we took the opportunity to hitchhike a small bus (we paid for the ride) to the mountain town Hakkari, where we bought bus tickets to Cizre for early the next morning.
Our route, the only existing road, led us all the way up into the mountains. Since we hadn't seen snow in a long time, it was kind of exciting. But the most amazing part of being there was smelling the cool, fresh air without air pollution from cars and trucks. Although it looked on the map like it should have been a big road, there was barely any traffic. When we arrived at the mountain pass (2250m), a very nice downhill awaited us. Wow, this was great 🤩
Around midday we reached Yüksekova, where we had lunch and bought a Turkish sim card. In the afternoon we cycled on with the idea of finding a nice campspot and finishing the cycling day early. It turned out to be super difficult to find a spot to pitch our tent. We cycled along the Nehil river. The land around the river was extremely wet and muddy, not a good idea to pitch the tent. Then the landscape changed from wide swampland and farm fields to a narrow valley with steep rocky mountains on both sides, also no possibility to pitch the tent. So we kept pedaling and pedaling. Finally, we saw a flat and grassy place 20m away from the road. We pushed the bikes up there when we suddenly realized we were being watched from the mountain peak. Armed military men shouted down to us 'yallah, yallah,' sounding like 'get your butt off here...' and that's what we did. We almost lost hope. Finally, we found a place where we saw no military posts or guards around and where we could set up a bivouac (no tent).
We cooked a very delicious meal with lots of veggies and fell asleep immediately 😴
Contrary to our fears, the border crossing went very smooth.
Of course we had to -still on the Iranian side - remove the bags from the bicycles and slide them through the x-ray scanner.
At the passport and visa control, the officer tried to convince us that our visa had expired. 'No, that's not the case' we explained and showed him that he should not consider the time period for picking up the visa, but rather calculate 90 days from the date on the entry stamp. He kept the visas (for Iran it is on a separate paper, as some countries would refuse entry when having an iranian entry stamp in the passport) and gave us back our passports.
In the next room, we were greeted in High German and immediately led to the next x-ray scanner. All the locals, with their worn bags, old suitcases, and dozens of plastic bags full of tomatoes, had to wait. We felt totally uncomfortable and so sorry when we saw how the Turkish border guards treated these people.
As quickly as possible, we packed all the bags from the bike into the scanner and were then asked to push the entire bicycle through 🤣 Wow, we had never experienced anything like this before! - too bad we didn't have a photo of that! - then got the entry stamp and off we went...
The first thing Fiona did, on turkish ground, was removing the headscarf 💁♀️
The temperature was quite chill up there and the snow was within reach. From the border we pedaled ~15km uphill until almost sunset and until we found a suitable campspot for this night 🏕️ 😴
The small island of Kish (91.5km2) was quickly traveled around by car. In one of the typical Iranian picnic huts right on the seaside, we took a late lunch break. Behnam made fries and Marc cooked lentils with babaganoush. We already know, the Iranians always eat the national bread 'lavash' with everything. And of course, we are always offered the bread over and over again. But since we are gluten intolerant, we have to constantly decline. It is really difficult to make it clear that we will not try a single bite of the bread...
Just before sunset, suddenly a lot of people appeared. Everyone was taking selfies, photographing their posing partners and tried to capture the perfect shot while the sun sank into the sea. It was truly a beautiful sight and Marc and I were fascinated by the spectacle. As soon as the sun was gone, all the crowd had disappeared as well. Only us and our Iranian friends remained, drinking tea, chatting, often with the help of the translator, and went to sleep a little earlier than the night before, in Bandar Charak. #cycling#bikepacking#biketouring#biketravel#travelbybike#bikelife#cyclinglife#adventure#traveling#nature#sunset#photography#photo#capturethemoment#focus#photographylover#behindthelens
From Bandare Laft we took the ferry to Iran mainland. Our plan was to pedale along the coast northwards, to stay a bit longer in the warmth. The weatherforcast for the inland regions (Shiraz, Yazd etc. ) is still a bit chilly, espeacially at night...