Day 58 (Turkey): Yaprakhisar - Göreme (in a zone or haze, I can’t tell)

today’s distance: 97km
total distance: 4801km
riding time: 5-6 hours

I woke up so many times during the night with that nagging feeling that your whole stomach is about to explode. It doesn’t of course, but you still have that feeling. Stomach cramps, no sleep, it all goes downhill from there …

I got up late and had almost nothing for breakfast. Couldn’t eat and not much would have stayed down at any rate. I thought about staying where I was for the day, but that didn’t seem like the place to be. Maybe it should have been. I set out with high temperatures already due to the late start and made my way to Ihlara feeling feeble and weak. I figured I would at least get to Güzelyurt and stay there. That would have been 20km or so. That didn’t happen though. Ihlara gave me an uphill which I knew would come … it wasn’t welcome though given the state I was in. I zigzagged up the climb towards the end in order to lessen the grade. No cars around, so that wasn’t an issue. And then it became all a mind game of sorts. You just pedal. Try to find a rhythm, one pedal stroke after another. You compartmentalize things into smaller increments, put down one km after the other. That was the story until the turnoff to Güzelyurt. I would have gone there, but didn’t feel like it. So I moved on. Bought some Coke for the sugars and the mind and pedaled on for the next 40km without much of an interruption. Every place I stopped was closed anyway. Up a few unwelcome hills interrupting the flow, mostly into a headwind (not terrible, but still) … until I reached Derinkuyu. Temperatures had increased a good deal as well, the tar had become sort of gooey in places (though to be fair, Rob over at 14degrees.org is contending with higher temperatures for sure - go check out his fantastic journey as he is covering China on a skateboard at the moment). Just before getting there, my legs ached. Fatigue, exhaustion … and then some. It was a state I had rarely been in. Bad night in more than one way for sure, only partially hydrated and a stiff wind by then. The pain was there, but covered under some blanket. Funny how your body works at times.

I hit one of the first little markets I could find. Following the old Coke and pretzels cure (yes, I know, this is very German), I did just that. I was shot at that point, drowned in sweat and the salesperson let me know as much. When I was sitting outside the store, drinking small gulps of the black stuff, he and an old man were standing behind me watching me. I could see them in the window on the opposite side of the street. They were talking about me … wondering what nationality I was. I heard it. I replied. They looked baffled. Then non-plussed. Continued to talk about me. Strange situation overall. I moved on after a while, thinking that I would cover a little bit more, now feeling a bit better. I rolled along now, aided by a shifting tailwind. Rolling terrain and the further I got the better I felt. Meaning from entirely crappy to not so crappy any longer. In Kaymakli I visited an underground city and it was an amazing place for sure … how people could live in these places is simply beyond me. Not a lot of pictures generally … my apologies. Not a picture taking day I would say.

After another 12km or so I entered another village, hoping that someone would yell cai at me. Someone did. I stopped. There wasn’t any cai in the end, but a good conversation with an old man who had worked in Dortmund. He called one person in particular a “Dummkopf” (something like idiot) and we generally had a great conversation. My bike and legs inspected, I moved on to cover the last few kms to Göreme, passing the town of Uchisar on the way at which point the panorama of the area unfolds.

The feeling when I arrived was amazing. The views were stunning for sure, but I felt elated and happy to have made it as far today. I booked into a small hostel for a couple of nights, hoping that things will look better tomorrow.