Day 79 (Turkey): Pinarbasi - Gurun (back on the road)

today’s distance: 104km
total distance: 5117km
riding time: 5-6h

Rain pelted my window at 5 am. Yikes. I turned back to sleep and got up when my body was ready for it. It was time to get back on the road today. First I needed to fix up the bike though. The brake I had given only a get me to the bus station job and the pedals were still the old ones.  

After a bit of fussing around, the bike was ready to go. I headed for my friend, the owner of the local internet cafe - who back two weeks ago was a major help and would refuse any payment, neither then nor now. I got more of your messages and also uploaded yesterday’s post. A couple of you suggested trying to get DPD to make a donation and I contacted them about it. We shall see whether that draws any response.

Then it was time to go. I admit to having been a bit apprehensive about it. I wasn’t sure about the bike or myself. And sure enough, the road threw a good number of climbs at me today. And that wasn’t the only problem. The towns that were supposed to have ben there didn’t exist or had no market. So I slugged throughout the day on a few cookies and bananas. But the surroundings sure made up for things.

Once over the first pass, the landscape changed from windswept plains and rolling hills to more demanding territory and deeper-cut valleys, but it was extremely pleasant to be back on the road and the grin on my face was interrupted only when the last climb of the day began and I could really feel the lack of fuel I was suffering from.

The road was under pretty heavy construction making riding difficult for parts of the morning and the afternoon. But all of this was made up by just doing what I had been hoping to do for a while now. And that to get back on the bike. I gained more and more confidence in the bike again … which is a good thing. I will have to rely on it for the next months still. I could also feel though that the last two weeks left their mark … I am not completely out of shape, but was certainly better trained prior to the break. But all went well in the end and after a couple days I should be back in good condition. The goal had been to be somewhere to watch Germany play Croatia … so I aimed at Gurun. I didn’t have much of a choice as there wasn’t much food available before anyway.  

Once there I was looking for a place to stay. I also wasn’t going to go any further. I had covered over 100km today, starting out after noon. I also wanted to watch the match. The hotel choice was limited, but I was extremely lucky. Here is the introduction to a concept that I hadn’t heard of before: the teacher hotel. There are also military hotels, police hotels and a range of others. They are run by the government and are designed as meeting places for all teachers, but mainly house those teachers that don’t have their own appartments and - this is important - those that aren’t married. So I was surrounded by a bunch of teachers from Gurun. The person running the place called the English teacher, she came around shortly after and everything was set up very quickly. Everything is veyr basic and I am not sure how many German teachers would put up with it. But it seemed to work fine. Sure enough, Shule (I am completly hacking her name her, but it is Arabic and means flame) translated for the head person and I will be a on a personal field trip tomorrow with them (means early morning for me) to a lake and a canyon. Needless to say we need to be back for the start of school - and Shule was quite enthusiastic about the idea of a class visit. Head person also wants the local paper to do an interview with me … so I am looking at some fun tomorrow.