Rocking out to Islamic Prayer!

 

I wanted to further elaborate on the machine I'm spending most of my time with.

Sophie. I give all my bikes names, it's the first thing I do when I get a new one and most of the time they have the same first letter of the manufacturer. I suppose it's similar to people giving the cars names - it's not that odd is it?

Turkish breakfast

One of the interesting things about Sophie is she is her on little power station: the front hub (or left kneecap) generates enough power to keep my GPS, iPad, phone and iPod juiced up - cool huh. Another thing people may find interesting is that the frame itself is steel tubing, rather than aluminium. There is a good reason for this, even though steel is three times heavier than alu; it provides a dampening characteristic than no aluminium frame could match. A small compromise on weight, means I can "ride Sophie" for "harder and longer" than ever before!

Sophie's not scared.

Another big change I made from the last tour is to cut weight down to a minimum. This means thinner tyres, which unfortunately means, more punctures; a lightweight groupset; chamois leather for drying myself, pans and clothes and instead of using pannier bags, I use stuff sacks which reduces weight by 2kg. This doesn't sound a lot, but cumulatively I've reduced the weight by over 10kg, which is a hefty amount when you're powering up a mountain pass.

 

An early morning rise

My bad streak of punctures continued and I would even go as far to say - "got worse". I had got as far as improvising my tent repair patches to try and avoid a further flat. Nothing worked and in the end the 20+ mile walk to Izmir, seemed like the only option. I started to walk and without the cool breeze, my entire body was covered in beads of sweat within 200 metres. Instead, I stuck my thumb out. Within 2 minutes or just over 10 cars, somebody pulled over. Sahir helped me chuck Sophie into the back of his truck. The stench in the back was unbearable - it stung the nostrils; although it was a damn sight better than walking. I would have guessed he was a sheep farmer and he'd clearly locked his flock in the back for the past few month's without cleaning them out.

He took me to an Oto Lastik shop, which to me and you, is a tyre repair place for cars. This proved to be useless. After a few calls, Sahir had found out where the local crazy bicycle guy lived.

A short plump-looking Turk greeted us. Definitely had to many pies in his time. Even though he looked like the kind of guy you would want for a Grandad. He was so enthusiastic to help and hailed his "woman" down - his words, not mine; to cook us up some breakfast and pop a brew on. While he fixed the tyre and the front rack (the rivet had snapped off), he talked about his love for bikes and proceded to show me his vast collection of girls - he was quite a pimp. He had enough bikes in his garage and once-before bathroom to get half of Izmir on the road.

Ahmed and his girls

After he finished, he bid me farewell and when I offered him some money, he rejected it and said "No problem".

Beach break

I only found out yesterday the exchange rate between Turkish Lira and Sterling. To my surprise I was getting 3 Liras for every pound; before I found this fact out, I treated Lira as if it was of the same value as the Euro and was pleased to find out I had spent less than 50 quid in 8 days :O

Heading down to Cannakale

 

Last night I had the pleasure of sleeping outside a mosque. This came about when I got chatting to a local roadside seller, who's brother owned it. He sorted me out enough fruit to last me a few days for the monstrous price of 17p or 0.50 Lira and gave me directions to the mosque.

To say I got a good night's sleep would be a lie. Every few hours, Islamic prayer was blasted out of the loudspeakers at a similar noise level to a nightclub. This went on till about midnight and then they gave me 5 hours break before an especially prolonged prayer at the crack of dawn.

The local Mosque

The route is now uploaded onto strava for anyone who may be interested.

 

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