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Koruköy

Route: Porto Lagos - Komotini - Alexandroupouli - Kipi (Greece) - Ipsala (Turkey) - Kesan - Koruköy

I love Turkey already.

At the frontier, Greece waved me through without stopping. Better than that, the Greek border guard, Stratos, wanted to talk about bikes and girls, and far from stopping me taking a photo of the border crossing, insisted I take a picture of him. (I'm usually told that pictures aren't allowed anywhere near a border. Hope Stratos doesn't get into trouble over this):

On the other hand and on the other side of the bridge, I had to show my passport and vehicle registration to people behind four different windows on the Turkish side. The windows are so low that I could have kneeled on the floor to look the officials in the eye. But I felt, diplomatically, that might not be a good idea.

Entering Turkey cost me 5€ for three months' "road insurance" -- I don't intend to put that to the test -- and 15€ for my visa: instantly available, but nevertheless this is the only European country other than Roosia that requires a visa.

My first stop, in the border town of Ipsala, was to buy a SIM card for my mobile. It took longer to register it than to pass over the border -- and it isn't bloomin' well working.

Tonight, I'm in a dodgy motel Somewhere In Turkey -- some 40 miles from the border. After Kesan and before Bolayir, about 15 miles north of Gelibolu -- better known in English as Gallipoli.

It was dark by the time I got here. There were so many insects flying into the headlight and pitter-pattering my visor and jacket that I thought it was raining. Although the road has been better than pretty much anything I saw in Greece, I know much better than to ride through a strange new country.. with strange new unwritten rules of the road.. in the dark. I need to learn the rhythm of the road here.

Besides.. the sign promised "Motel - Camping - Restaurant." It was off the main road and next to the sea.

The campsite is closed. Oh, and so is the restaurant. There's no shop. I walked for an hour along the highway this evening to the nearest shop. Peanuts, a packet of crisps and orange juice: my first meal in Turkey. And then an hour back. Lucky I needed to stretch my legs.

I have more remote controls in the room than I have channels on the little tinpot TV. The bin next to the loo hasn't been emptied for some time. I haven't dared pull back the blanket to make sure there are clean sheets on the bed. Two dogs outside have not stopped barking since I got here. They're big dogs. Another is whimpering and I haven't dared look. The walls are so thin they're practically see-through. I would be able to hear a pin drop if the couple next door stopped having sex and started dropping pins.

There's a tube of something in the bathroom. The picture suggests it may be toothpaste but it has the words 'Rektal Kopuk' and 'Falkin Farki' blazed across it. I don't intend to put anything called Rektal Kopuk in my mouth.

All true; it sounds like I'm moaning and griping.

Now add The Most Spectacular Sunset EVER. Fifty, a hundred, five hundred different divine colours generously spread across a huuuuuge sky, over a vast landscape stretching to distant mountains and down to the sea, of golden wheat fields and deeply dark green pine forests, some of the emptiest, least man-made landscape I've ever seen, at least in Europe.

The people in the phone shop were so cheerfully incompetent that you couldn't help but laugh with them. They also fetched a glass of tea [sic] for me while we waited for inspiration.

Meanwhile, out on the street the bike was attracting a crowd of admirers, young boys and old men (beautiful women continue to resist my.. I mean the bike's charms.) One of them, the gentleman on the left with the beard and the kind face, insisted that I ride back to his place: a motorcycle shop -- well, a yard full of wrecked and pulled-apart motorcycles; pride of place a pre-war Adler, which looked good enough to hop on and ride away -- except the engine was missing. More tea was offered, and a lengthy conversation, somewhat one-sided, in Turkish.

I love Turkey already.

--

Interesting language. At one stage I thought the Turkish for 'Hello' was 'Merry Bar'. Anything that rhymes with 'Perry Bar' would have made things easier; A few hours in to the country, I currently think it's actually "Meh'rr-AKH'bar" -- but it could still rhyme with Perry Bar. Or Halesowen. I'll keep you posted. I was struggling with 'Thank you' -- 'Tay-Shay-KURR-e'derem' -- until someone told me that 'Sao' is also acceptable -- and much easier to remember.

Until I got here, the only Turkish I knew was taught to me by a man I worked with in an aluminium anodising plant many years ago in Norway. He was the strongest person I have ever met. He carried a knife as long as my arm. He slept through the winter in an unheated corner of the factory in order to save more money for his family at home in Turkey. We got on famously.

"Zhoo-zhuk Kai'yakk."

This, he told me, is the worst insult you can *ever* give to a Turkish man.

It means, 'You have the penis of a small donkey.'

And the reason any Turkish man will be so insulted that he will wish to kill you, with his knife as long as your arm, is because he believes his penis is like that of a very *large* donkey.

Heh. I love Turkey already.

--

I already loved Greece. The last miles today were special -- a country that shows a new and varied face at every turn.

This is the one, small corner of Greece were the Muslim communities were not forcibly removed to Greece in 1923. (I've met many 'refugees' here -- the descendants of Christians who were expelled from Turkey at the same time.) The reason they were allowed to stay was purely political -- of course -- a diplomatic sop to Turkey, in exchange for allowing an Orthodox presence to remain in Istanbul. It also ensured the area stayed populated with people who were 'Greek' (even if they weren't Greek Orthodox) at a time when Bulgaria was pressing a strong claim for these lands.

So one village has a church, lots of Greek and Byzantine flags. The next has a mosque, a minaret, and fewer Greek flags. But I have had no sense of antagonism or difficulties between the religions up here. The only time I've heard anything approaching anti-Turkish sentiment from ordinary Greeks was in the far south, a long way away from here. Rather, people have tutted and blamed "the politicians" for any friction with their next-door neighbour. Which has cheered me no end -- although they aren't about to start voting for each other in Eurovision.

--

I don't think it's the height of tact for someone, presumably someone in authority, to have this roadsign planted next to the highway a couple of miles from the Turkish border -- so that any Turk will be forced to ride straight past. Come on, Greeks. It's Istanbul not Constantinople, dear. Has been since 1930, at least. (Can you read Greek?) And the Byzantine double-headed eagle? That went out in 1453, fergoodnesssakes. Get over it. You got Thessaloniki instead.

--

Through cotton fields this morning. A million loose balls of cotton wool had broken free but, carried on stiff winds, had become entangled in trees, bushes and tall grass at the sides of the road. So much that it looked as if it had been snowing. It's harvest time for the cotton. Tractors and lorries criss-crossed the country lanes between Porto Lagos and Komotini, hauling great trailers, some stuffed to the gills with cotton; others, newly-emptied, were going back for more.

The trailers were being hauled down both sides of the road, so that cotton from Field A, being carried to Warehouse Y, would pass by a tractor delivering from Field B to Warehouse Z. This, I considered, was hardly efficient, but it's probably how it's been done for centuries.

But then I started recognising tractors, and lorries, and their drivers. No wonder there didn't seem to be a pattern to the collection and transportation of the cotton. It wasn't them being inefficient. I was lost and riding round in circles and they, the locals, were toying with me by driving back and forth. I wondered where the Candid Cameras were placed.

I was talking to two bikers from Mallorca, en route for eastern Turkey and Syria. They took a boat to Barcelona, another from there to Civitavecchia on the east coast of Italy, rode across to Ancona, another boat to Igoumenitsa and then biked straight through to this end of Greece today. It's probably taken them the best part of 48 hours. I left Barcelona six months ago.

I've managed to whizz round Greece in a month and a day, which took me by surprise when I totted it up. When I was asked this morning - I guessed it was about seven weeks.

When I started the trip, I had vague thoughts that if I made it to Greece as winter approached I might find casual work and a place to live out on one of the islands. Greece in the winter. It had a certain appeal to it.

Having spent a month on the mainland, I have revised my opinion. Greece in the winter has an enormous appeal. I'm determined to come back.. but it'll be the mainland: the Mani.

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