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| From Dogubayazit, Turkey |
We got off the bus at the same town as Hassan and waited on the road outside of town for a lift. A lorry stopped and took us partway, past Mt Ararat (Moses' mountain) and dropped us where the road forked telling us to go one way while he went the other. We walked further on, the road was disappointingly quiet and we waited at the end of someone's driveway in the shade of a tree. Before long a car pulled into the driveway, probably for a family gathering and we were invited in for tea, we regretted turning down their offer but we couldn't risk missing a lift, within a few minutes a man came out with a silver tray which he balanced on the boot of car and then wandered back to his family. Our eyes nearly fell out of our heads, there was a pot of tea and a plate each with different Turkish sweet treats on them, they were all delicious and just what we needed to keep a good mood while we were waiting for someone to stop and pick us up. We said thank-you and good bye after a lorry screeched to halt and we went running after it to see if he was going in the right direction, he was, to a certain extent and so we hopped in.
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| From Yusafeli, Turkey |
This guy took us on a massively long detour through some gorgeous scenery through hills and mountains, past rivers and through a herd of cattle crossing the road. He stopped off at a shop and bought us water and juice and we continued onto another town where we got off and said goodbye. By now it was evening and so we got some more pide, the Turkish pizza, which we ate while walking along the road, finishing it just in time to flag down a minibus which dropped us off further on and from there we got a lift with a learner driver, that lift was actually the best example of safe driving I've seen since hitching, some people seem to think that just because they have avoided killing themselves so far they're great drivers and therefore drive like maniacs unafraid of death. The learner driver and his friend dropped us on further down the road leading to Yusafeli and we walked along until flagging down another car which embarrassingly stopped after I'd sworn at them for not stopping – the drove on so far past us that they had a fair way to reverse to reach us.
The interior of this car deserves special mention, it was covered in white fake-fur and had small white curtains covering the rear passenger windows. The passenger in the front was an English teacher and gave us a good talk telling us how great Turkish people were (not that we disagreed) and how friendly and helpful. They were out looking for friends who had broken down and dropped us off when we found them. It's worth mentioning that by now it was really quite dark and we were on a small, quiet country road in the hills. We walked to where there was a street light and settled down to wait.
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| From Yusafeli, Turkey |
After mincing about exercising in the dark and trying to flag down one of the few cars that passed us by without stopping Djalma ventured up the drive to see if anyone was in the house that was behind the light – the only house for quite a while. He called out and was answered by a woman who after a short conversation agreed to let us in. It was just as well that Djalma called out before knocking on the front door, when it closed it revealed a shotgun hanging up with the coats. It was just her and her Mum and despite having already eaten they cooked us a lovely dinner and ate again with us. We managed a conversation of sorts, she understood a little English and Djalma knew a few words in Turkish, she was recently married and her husband was a doctor. Soon enough her father and younger brother arrived and were very friendly – her father spoke VERY LOUDLY to make up for the language difficulties – a brilliant tactic for helping people understand what you're talking about in a different language – one the English naturally employ on foreigners as well.
They showed us to their guest room, a stand alone building with a big bed and we shut out the mosquitoes and slept soundly. The next morning when we finally got up we had an amazing breakfast with the family who had waited for us which we ate in their garden which was full of fruit trees. We tried to give money for all the food but they wouldn't hear of it and waited until we flagged down a car to carry onto Yusafeli. It was a lovely and unexpected stop, heart warming to know that people won't leave you out in the night when you've nowhere else to go.
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| From Yusafeli, Turkey |
We eventually arrived in Yusafeli, with it's world-class rapids and sorted out a room in Greenpeace Pension, corrected from the previously named Greenpiece. We pushed the single beds together and relaxed before changing into our swimsuits and heading out to take a dip in the river. I was in an awful mood since arriving in the town, I was hot and sticky which made me grumpy, the cold water soon solved the former two problems which in turn solved the attitude problem. We splashed in a relatively sheltered part of the river and enjoyed being cool.
The next day we kicked back in the room until late in the afternoon when Djalma dragged me away from my book to go for another dip. After showering we headed into town for a wander, had a beer and a half by the river got dinner in a pide restaurant which was heavenly. I managed to ruin the evening by arguing with Djalma and we made our separate ways back to the pension where we promptly apologised and made up.
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| From Yusafeli, Turkey |
The next day we decided to leave Yusafeli and hitched a lift to the next town with a young family where we ate and got a bus to Hopa which is on the border with Georgia. The scenery on the way was glorious unlike the weather, all the rain just added to many waterfalls we passed and made all the green glow, it reminded me a lot of New Zealand.
The border crossing was the shortest that we'd crossed yet, we got our passports stamped without a clue as to how long we had before our free visa expired. The weather still grey and ominous clouds over the Black Sea made the sea live up to it's name. We sneaked a few pictures – quite naughty so close to the border but we got away with it, changed the rest of our Turkish money and rejoiced at seeing Russian alphabet again. We got a big bus into Batumi for a fraction of what we would have paid in Turkey and soaked up the scenery on the way.
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