Day 62. Friday, September 29. Sile to Istanbul. 92.3km of riding, with 1,146m of climbing.
We did it! The Dane Train pulled into our hotel car park In Istanbul just after 3pm this afternoon, completing our 62-day, fabulous and fascinating adventure across central Asia. We spent 44 days riding 5,200km through six countries, roughly splitting our overnights between camping and hotels.
Here are two photos of us…just to make sure everyone looks good in one or the other! To my left are Søren, Nina, Lars and Jette from Denmark, Jerry from Singapore, and Joanne and Warwick from Canada.
Every day of the tour threw new challenges at us. Today was no exception. We had two hours of rain riding this morning. Moderate but enough to get us thoroughly wet. Then it doused us a second time as we cycled the 10km or so along the southern (Asian) shore of the Bosporus between the city’s two huge road bridges over it, which link Asia and Europe. This photo is our first view of the Bosporus, with the easterly of the two bridges in the top left corner.
I was greeted at our hotel by Stuart, a very good friend since we pre-teenagers started secondary school in Solihull…some 62 years ago. He and his wife Jane spend a good chunk of their year at their Mediterranean seaside home at Kalkan in southern Turkey.
Stuart made a special trip up here to Istanbul to greet me. It was wonderful to see him. He came to our celebratory dinner this evening…then we’ll hang out together in Istanbul tomorrow before we head to our respective homes on Sunday.
After just a brief chat with him, I had to plunge into packing. Given our very strict biosecurity measures at the New Zealand border, that meant a deep clean of my bike and related equipment (I’ll do my camping kit tomorrow), and than disassembling and boxing the bike for the flights home. Below that photo, is one of our celebratory dinner restaurant, and the street it’s on, near our hotel. This evening for us (and many of these diners) the city fully lived up to one of its nicknames – Dersaadet, the door to happiness.
Apologies this is a shortish, last-day blog. But it’s still very full on here! Give me a chance, tho, to get home and to reflect on these past 10 weeks and I’ll write a post-adventure wrap up blog a week from today. So please check back then!
Lastly, two very big thank yous. To my fellow Silk Roads’ adventurers – riders and crew. Some 40 of us, including local drivers and guides in the six countries we visited. You were terrific companions. Your good humour, help and friendship brightened every day, solved every problem and heightened every memorable moment.
And my hearty thanks to you readers – family and friends – for following my travels and encouraging me every pedal-stroke of the way. Many times, just when I needed it, I heard you cheering me on.
What a ride. Well done Rod. Been awesome to bike vicariously with you. Look forward to the wrap up but nothing could beat the immediacy of the on the road blog.
Safe travels home.
Kia kaha.
Great reading and many congrats on the achievement. My mother was born in Istanbul, or Constantinople as it was then, of Armenian heritage hope you get to enjoy some of the city and its endless fascinating history………
What an adventure!
Gosh – to pull that off with only a scratch in the ditch and one blown tyre?! You are incredible and clearly invincible!
Thankyou Rod for making the time to share your daily journey with us. We certainly could feel some of that heat early on and the gruelling climbs – yet you made it so enjoyable for us – helped along with brilliant photos and superb historic details to make it worth delving into deeper. I dipped into Google earth to see exactly where you were and that made it all the more real. Quite an expansive stretch of country side you all just pedalled across!! Bravo bravo!
Congratulations on such an epic adventure! Much appreciated that you kept the blog going even when your rest days were so precious.
Crikey – that was awesome – well done – it sounds like a wonderful adventure. Look forward to seeing you fairly soon. Kx
Enjoyed every post and picture. Such an amazing view of a part of the world so removed from us as told by a dear friend!! And Stuart!! Wow that was amazing. Looking forward to your final blog. Congratulations Rod!! Thanks for taking us along.
Just caught up with your last entry – we have devoured every word and photo of your blog over these past weeks. It has given us an incomparable insight into a part of the world we are never likely to visit. Well done for managing to keep writing even when the going was tough, and what a feat to have completed the trip. We have been blown away by it!
Just caught up with your last entry – we have devoured every word and photo of your blog over these past weeks. It has given us an incomparable insight into a part of the world we are never likely to visit. Well done for managing to keep writing even when the going was tough, and what a feat to have completed the trip. We have been blown away by it!
Awesome journey Rod , tough but very rewarding , congratulations .