{"id":90,"date":"2019-09-14T07:25:13","date_gmt":"2019-09-14T07:25:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/?p=90"},"modified":"2019-09-14T08:16:45","modified_gmt":"2019-09-14T08:16:45","slug":"turkey-a-burned-out-clutch-day-8-9-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/2019\/09\/14\/turkey-a-burned-out-clutch-day-8-9-10\/","title":{"rendered":"Turkey & a burned-out clutch: Day 8, 9 & 10"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Robin Ewing
July 2013<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Helen goes home and the family leg of the trip begins!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Istanbul traffic is chaos. I had to navigate at a crawl the narrow, nearly vertical, cobblestone streets of the old city (there was one tense moment starting in first on a hill), constant honking, a jumble of cars with no discernible lanes, parking in the middle of the road, and just overall bedlam all under the shadow of the minarets reaching up like spikes from the almost 1,500-year-old Hagia Sophia and the younger Blue Mosque that dominate the skyline. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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But the fairly empty, six-lane highways in\nand out of the city are luxurious compared to the single, potholed roads of\nBulgaria and Romania. Or at least the toll roads are. I haven\u2019t yet figured out\nhow to pay the toll as the booths are unmanned with incomprehensible signs, so\nI just pick a lane and drive through, setting off a loud alarm and flashing\nlights each time. No one even glances in my direction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turkish drivers are hot-blooded. They honk constantly and are impatient, aggressive speed demons. On the way to Amasya, an ancient city colonized by the Greeks, Jamie, claiming ignorance of the law of the road, got a few double-handed fist shakes from drivers who had to pass him on the right. One angry driver passed, then slowed down and violently waved for us to pull over, presumably for a duel,  and then when, of course, we didn\u2019t, passed again just to slow down and drive on the shoulder next to us. Eventually, he disappeared, probably after noticing the odd stickers and German plates. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Amasya, built in a narrow river valley, is\nsmall and beautiful. The five Pontic kings, who ruled from 281-180 BC, are\nburied in the cliffs overlooking the white 14th<\/sup> century Ottoman\nhouses lining the river, in one of which was our small hotel. Hundreds of\nthousands of tourists come every year and the locals have thoughtfully\ninstalled colored lights under the rock tombs and white houses that cast the\ncity and the cliffs in glow of changing colors. I particularly liked the red.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Apparently, the legendary Amazon tribe of\nfemale warriors are said to have lived in this area, after whom Amasya is\nnamed. Homer first wrote about the Amazons in the Iliad and they were further\ngossiped about by the Greeks, Romans and Byzantines for a millennium with all kinds\nof rumors circulating about how they kept men slaves, killed boy children and\ncut off a breast to better use a bow and arrow. Nowadays, Amaya is famous for\nits apples and producing soccer players.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Yesterday as we drove into the Black Sea\ncoastal city of Trabzon, the clutch went out. So we parked our sadly smoking\nvan, and went in search of beer to drown our sorrows. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turkey makes good beer. In particular, I\nlike Efes, a 5 percent pilsner. I\u2019ve heard about a darker one that is made with\ncoffee, but unfortunately I haven\u2019t been able to try it because no one sells\nbeer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This month happens to be Ramadan, when\nMuslims fast during daylight and don\u2019t drink, smoke, swear or have sex. For us,\nthis means, that outside of Istanbul it\u2019s nearly impossible to find alcohol. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last night, after asking numerous waiters\nif they served \u201cbira,\u201d only to be laughed at, one thoughtful soul pointed us in\nthe direction of a restaurant he said would serve us. It was closed. But a\nnearby hotel doorman waved us in and pointed in the direction of the snack bar.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The \u201csnack bar\u201d was completely dark. One man\nsat alone drinking a tea in the shadows. Another man emerged and we asked for\nthree beers. He nodded, disappeared, another man came to inspect us, and then the\nfirst reappeared with three cold Efes. They cost $7 each (for comparison,\nJamie\u2019s Coke Zero today cost 5 cents). We each drank three.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This morning we took the Opel van into a\nservice center and they are going to be able to replace the clutch with a\nRenault part but it won\u2019t be ready till tomorrow afternoon. So, on the first\nday off from driving that I\u2019ve had since I started, we wandered around Trabzon\ntaking in the sights and then napped.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jamie is currently off trying to get a few beers from a market where he saw some in the window and I\u2019m again sitting on the hotel rooftop with a view of a mosque at our doorstep, the Black Sea and the terracotta-tiled roofs. The call to prayer just ended and the city is silent. I can\u2019t even hear any horns. Tomorrow morning, we are joining a tour group to the Sumela Monetary and then hopefully driving into Georgia. Wish us luck!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Jamie and Wardlaw arrive in Istanbul!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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The Sumela monastery outside Trabzon Turkey<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Robin EwingJuly 2013 Istanbul traffic is chaos. I had to navigate at a crawl the narrow, nearly vertical, cobblestone streets of the old city (there was one tense moment starting in first on a hill), constant honking, a jumble of cars with no discernible lanes, parking in the middle of the road, and just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":129,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-90","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/IMG_0787.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":133,"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90\/revisions\/133"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromlondontomongolia.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}