Bandirma, Bora & Istanbul

Well Hi everyone ... Bout time I got in on the act. Here's a photo taken from on top of an Istanbul'ian tower. The name of which escapes me right now ... Please note the Sightsavers International T-shirt, so still 'plugging away' on their behalf. If you've got a spare fiver, then please bung it their way, as the donations have slowed to dribble since I've left the UK.

http://www.justgiving.com/lenz And here's the link again to make it easy for ya!

You'll be glad to know I'm finally getting my act together, and so there should be more piccy's appearing in most of the 'postings' from here on in.



Anyway .... on with the BLOG!

Bandirma, Bora & Istanbul

“I've been this way before” I think, as I stand on the deck of the ferry crossing the narrow strait towards the 'Asian' side of Turkey. God, it looks familiar ... maybe even the same ferry and the same spot on the boat, where I had a leg-stretching wander, on a long bus-ride to Istanbul from Dalaman airport. during a previous visit.

Ferry crossings are something that I generally enjoy. It's usually a break in any journey, to get out (or my case off) of whatever you're travelling in, whether bus, car or whatever and move legs and limbs that have been fixed in one sitting position for sometimes hours at a time. Most of my ferry crossings have been across La Manche, and were a welcome pause during the mad dash to visit my kids in France. This was different though as I was a long way from home, and a very long way from the final destination in Ozland.

Long tiring rides were beginning to become something of a routine, so once more would be glad to come into land. There was a prospect of stopping for a few days to catch up with myself and my emails, as well as a 'phone-home' sesh' on Skype. Coming off of the ferry I could've easily stopped, laid down and slept right there and then. I didn't want to go on, but forced tiredness and monotonous scenery into the background, in order to continue and finish the day's riding in Bandirma.

Two hours or so after getting off the boat, I arrived there. My first impressions weren't too promising and appeared to confirm Lonely Planet's downbeat description. Installing myself into a hotel on the main street, head off out for a nose-about and spotted Bjorn riding into town. After blatting our seperate ways across Europe, we'd met up at long last ...

With Bjorn in on the act, we renegotiated the double room discounted rate in the hotel. Accomodation organised, it was time for the serious business of finding beer and food as well as discussing plans for the next few days.

There was purpose in coming to this rather non-descript place. The reason being, because it was the home of local motorcycle enthusiast Bora Eris. During an episode of researching availability of spares and servicing a few months before leaving, it was found that Turkey could well be the final-frontier for a long time to come. Feedback from the Horizon's Unlimited website, by one of the Turkish members indicated that Bora's a good bet to organise not only tyre supply and fitting, but just about anything else for the bikes. In short was told “He's the Man!”.


Top-bloke Bora Eris

And here for all your help Bora, is a good plug ...

Contact Bora Eris (Bora ERÝÞ) on his website, or email: boraeris@eris.com.tr
or call: 00 90 532 291 20 50



As a keen biker and local entrepeneur with a thriving tyre business, he's a darned nice bloke too, and helped with much more than business ethics normally dictate. And with it being our first steps out of nice safe Europe, was a 'must' as a stopover. It was our last chance to take stock of all bike'ish things, before venturing further east. High on the list for me, was new rubber to replace the part-worn Conti's on my travel bike. With Bjorn getting some nice fresh oil in the engine of his own Beemer.

I've put this photo in of me as I've got an very odd expression. And no, I don't know what I was thinking or saying!


















We found that business with Bora was always a relaxed affair over endless cups of çay, and feel sure that anyone else on motorised two-wheels who found themselves in this part of the world, would do well to drop in and visit him. I've little doubt Bora would give them a good Turkish welcome, as well as helping with any bike servicing requirements. This is business with a personal touch almost unknown in the UK, and found that I liked it very much. Bora's leading-hand Hussein even washed the road-dirt off the Dakar too, making it nice and shiny once more. Though Garfield's appearance was already getting too grimy for retrieval. The marmalade puss with the Rochdale scarf, was doing his best impression of the Cheshire cat by slowly disappearing. But it wasn't into thin air, as in the famous fairy tale. Garfield was slowly being hidden under a layer of road-gunge.

Some time before setting off from the UK, had chance to meet up with another HUBB member Graham. And while I knew he was coming this way, didn't really expect to see him, without making specific arrangments. So was pretty surprised when I spotted a familiar pair of bike-strides walking towards us, when returning to the hotel after an outing. And yup, you've guessed it, the trousers had Graham's legs inside, with Graham firmly attached. Taking the chance to catch up, it turned out that he'd met up with another long-distance biker on route here. That evening we were taken along to a resort town just along the coast by 'Top-Man' Bora. More beers and a chance to ava'chat and bore each other to death with our travel stories. It turned out that Graham's new travel buddy Andy, had rear-shock problems, and had recently had a brand new replacement fitted in Germany while riding through Europe. This is unusual on such a young bike, and gave some small concern that everything was not as robust on our chosen mounts as reputation suggests.



Graham ..... And Andy



















Stop Press: We're now in Khorag, Tajikistan, and guess what? There's hydraulic-fluid leaking from the rear-shock on Bjorn's bike. This gives us one major head-ache in sorting it out, as it's a specialist job to repair, and we're not going to get a replacement easily or cheaply.

Any BMW exec's out there who're reading this ... Then take it from me, that any bike with rear-shock problems that has less than 30K on the clock, is un-bloody-acceptable. Now come on, be honest! Can you imagine if this sort of thing happened to Range-rover or Land-cruiser owners? There would hell to play, and would get crucified in all the motoring journals. So get yer shit together, get your shock absorber specialists together, and kick their bloody arses till they get it right!!!!! Whinge over, but will keep you all posted on events as they unfold.

Meanwhile, back to our heroes in Bandirma ...

While in Bandirma we took the chance of visiting Istanbul. With Bora's help and direction left the bike's in a lock-up, so we were able to take the boat across the Sea of Marmera, for a 3 day Cook's tour. This was my 2nd visit to this thriving, teeming metropolis, and what a fantastic city it is too. It still retains much of it's West meets East character, that has made it a centre of trade and one of the most popular Silk-Route destinations for millenia ...

Bjorn taking photo's of our 2nd favourite beverage, çay (no guesses for 1st fave').

And here's the resultant piccy! (courtesy of http://www.panomoto.com/ )

Making our way directly to the Sultanahmet district with back-packs, found a decent hotel with ubiquitous roof-top terrace over-looking the Bosphorus. Personally I wasn't bothered about doing a great deal of sightseeing while I was there, as I'd been to most of the well-known places in that locale, on my first visit some years ago. But found I was still impressed by the outside of Aya Sofia, it's domed edifice simply oozing history. It's stones worn down by footsteps and time from the Crusades and earlier. Having witnessed the ebb and flow of Christondom versus Islam, the power struggle of religion was part of the fabric of this wonderful building. My best memory though, was the power struggle on the football fields of Vienna. The European cup was in full-swing, and at the time Turkey was doing quite well. It was a chance to have a couple of cold beers and sit in the streets shouting at the wide-screen TV, along with all the other drunks ...

The Bosphorus ... A lovely bit of waterway. Full of romantacism, history ...and other unidentifed floating 'things'.

Afor closing this chapter of the blog, will make mention of The Cistern. Having somehow missed it first time around, was glad to have made the effort to visit this oddity. Walking to the entrance in the oppressive heat of the afternoon, we failed to gain entrance on the first attempt, as the bus-load of people trying to get in buzzed like bees around the kiosk. Nothing's worth that much queuing, so we 'pulled the plug' and went elsewhere that afternoon. I'm so glad we went back though, as an early start next day meant there were'nt too many other people in there with us. The place most definitely had atmosphere. The silence of which was broken with some quirky synthesized music, that echoed it's way among the stone pillars, instilling the whole place with a rather spooky feel.

Justice done or not, here's a photo of the Istanbul Cistern (sorry, but there's no eery music for accompaniment)

Carp swam like ghosts in and out of the shadows formed by the support pillars and low coloured lighting. A description and photo's of what essentially is a simple area of underground water storage, will not do it justice. Particularly after wandering into one of the far corners, where the medusae were located. There you can see the faces of two Gorgons carved into seperate stone blocks, that are sat under a couple of pillars. But they remain as testament to the continuing superstitions of the builders, during the Roman period of the city. Their writhing serpent visage prevented from working any black magic, because they'd been set in place off of the upright (one on it's side, the other upside down). So much for Constantine's faith in a Christian god!


Beware the power of the Gorgon! She's gonna getcha!

A boat ride back to Bandirma, another night in the hotel, and we say our goodbye's and thanks to Bora, before heading further south east towards Capadoccia. The quest for Fairy Chimney's was on ...