We have fond memories on the route from Kavala to Istanbul.

The very names of the places we will be passing cause a Pavlovian reflex. The literal water of anticipation waters our mouths.

We expect, how do you say, of course ...

… a genuine Dejà-Vu

It's a wonderful route, sometimes along the sea, sometimes through small, picturesque villages and towns where you want to linger, sitting for endless hours in a street cafe while the heat melts the asphalt, the local pope walks the street with measured steps comes down, bows to the right, dares to take a look at the young beauty to the left.

You don't need to talk, hardly think, just feel life passing by.

And so it is today.

Not that we had been equipped with a better vehicle last time, oh no. Is it this year the engine or the rocker shaft or God knows what, it was then the starter.

We either had to push the VW Beetle (energy-consuming) or park it from the beginning in such a way that we were able to perform a roll start downhill (only possible in hilly terrain).

It is obvious that this is not the first time we are blessed with a particularly nasty vehicle. We can't even imagine being on the road in a car that doesn't cause permanent bad surprises.

For once not much traffic

And so we drive across familiar terrain, along burnt meadows and fields, not a single animal, not a cow, not a donkey, not even birds, and yet we feel almost at home.

Sometimes the idea flashes up for an instant that we are the only living creatures far and wide. Rarely a truck, sometimes a pickup truck, then again no one for a long time.

The reason becomes clear after some time. Of course, Greece and Turkey are once again at war and the conflict has caused us close to sleepless nights. If the conflicts had escalated, our planned trip to India would have come to a premature end. But more about that below.

For the time being we are still on Greek soil, we pass the places that have remained in vivid memory - Xanthi, Alexandropoulos, Komotini. The names remind us of roadside stops, restaurants where we had to communicate with hands and feet because the staff spoke only Greek, and we had to point to appropriate pans in the kitchen.

Komotini Greece
Xanthi - old memories

But the food, although rather unknown in appearance and taste, was delicious.

All this returns, at the latest when we are caught up by smells, smells as the most reliable memory detectors, smells from the kitchen, smells from the steaming plate, the smell of the street or the chirping birds in the hanging cages.

The little church in the swamp

Sometimes memories turn into images that, upon revisiting them, turn out to be, at best, only approximately correct. The beach, remembered as an endless white expanse stretching to the horizon, turns out to be a rather dirty stretch of seashore, full not only of white sand but also of sharp black stones that are better avoided barefoot. Or are we at the wrong place?

Precisely. The memory - a questionable device.

But occasionally it hits the bull's eye. For example, at the small cute church in the middle of a swamp, and a priest giving Monika heated glances.

Path to the tiny church
Old times …

We do indeed find the right turnoff, then the path over the wooden footbridge, right through a swamp full of peculiar sounds and noises, where the reeds bend in the wind, where you only see the sky and the reeds and the holey footbridge.

And indeed, as if he had been waiting for us all along, the strange saint greets us at the gate of the little church, his eyes just as wet and strangely irritating as two years ago, but it doesn't matter.

Another dejà vu, one of a kind.

But the language is also a barrier this time, although the gestures are inviting and the timbre of his voice is euphonious. After half an hour we say goodbye, of course leaving a small donation, which his clergy kindly takes note of.

Then, grinning once more and somehow relieved, we head back down the path, turning around one last time before getting back on our bikes...

Greeks and Turks - an eternal story

The closer we get to the Turkish border, the more frequent the military convoys become. The near-war between the two arch-enemies happened just a few weeks ago.

A brief look at the so-called Cyprus conflict in 1974.

Whoever triggered the conflicts (in any case, the story goes back a long way) - Greek coup plotters, the Cyprus Turks, the Cyprus Greeks, Archbishop Makarios, or whoever - in any case, in the summer of 1974, the north of the island (and thus a third of the territory of the Republic of Cyprus) was occupied by Turkish forces after Greek coup plotters wanted to enforce the annexation of Cyprus to Greece.

I don't want to say more about it, the matter is about as troublesome as the one in Northern Ireland. Every now and then, new explosive potential arises, resulting in new feuds, new wars, new victims. As I said, it is extremely tedious and incomprehensible.

In any case, the conflict has worried us more than anything before or afterwards. That's just how it works - not until you are affected yourself does the matter take on any significance.

The border crossing

At best, one could assume that the still smoldering conflict might make the border crossing more difficult. To our surprise, however, this does not create the slightest problems, as if all disputes had dissolved into nothing.

Of course, the customs officials on one side and the opposite side are unlikely to plan vacations together, but at best they cast a few grim glances at each other. I am sure that if the opportunity arose, they might share a glass of Raki or Ouzo.

Anyway, we are glad about it, since after crossing the border there are still a good 250 kilometers ahead of us, and the evening is not far away. They are rather boring kilometers, except for constant ups and downs there is nothing significant to report.

And then the sea of ​​lights

Sometimes darkness is a blessing, as it is today, just shortly before the day's destination. We would miss so much if the city appeared on the horizon but as a more or less random collection of gray houses and streets?

And how breathtaking a city looks when, from afar, it sends a sea of lights as a welcome. When you approach your destination in the darkness of night and the place appears like a shining pulsating being. So in Mumbai, so in Singaporein Doha or Delhi..

Today is no exception. Istanbul greets us and we greet back.

The first important part of the journey has been accomplished.

But there are so many parts ahead of us...

Istanbul – City of Dreams

IstanbulThe last city of Europe and the first city of Asia.

The crossroads between the Orient and the Occident.

A fascinating mix of East and West. And the gateway to the east and west.

A city that you want to visit again and again and enjoy again and again. How Buenos Airesor Laos Luang Prabang. Hanoi. Mandalay, .

The Hagia Sophia. The Taksim Square or the Galata Bridge. The Sultan Ahmed Mosque. The Topkapi Museum. And of course the Grand Bazaar.

Istanbul. Constantinople. Byzanz. Three historic names for the one historic city.

And here we are now.

The bazaar – a world within the world

The image of the city is shaped according to our memory. And for once it corresponds this way.

The grand Bazaar with its winding alleys leading in all directions and nowhere, the teeming life communicating in all the languages of the world. When nothing else helps, one communicates with looks, grimaces or, according to old custom, with hands and feet.

The hidden restaurants, from which the smell of exotic food hits your nose, resulting in an immediate increase in hunger.

The merchants, on the upper echelon of worldwide sales skills, approach cautiously and at the same time inexorably, praising things we can hardly use now, even if their merchandise looks just as desirable as it is promoted.

The porters, who carry enormous loads on their crooked backs, which would bring us strong Central Europeans to the limits of their possibilities (only many years later, on the Langtang Trek in Nepal, I could observe another, almost unbelievable increase).

The stores, large ones with expansive sales areas and smaller, hidden ones you almost stumble upon, and whose owners cast shy and at the same time challenging glances at the potential customers.

carpets and sweets

And the stock, a universe of wonderful precious carpets and fabrics and statues, but also a thousandfold of incredible junk, whose quality and purpose seems dubious at first sight.

The smell of roasted meat and fresh fish mixes with the strange aroma of peppers spread on towels, nutmeg and other spices, yellow, red, brown, black.

It smells of toasted bread and sweets, fresh cakes and nuts, candied fruit, marzipan, confectionery and pralines and burnt sugar bars.

And then we, the tourists, the buyers, the customers, the victims, greedily looking, sniffing for bargains with swollen nostrils, and still being ripped off after a short time. With the firm conviction of having made a particularly good purchase, of course.

Everyone is there, the Americans in their big checked pants and colorful, kitschy sunglasses. They stand out, others less so. Germans and Italians. French and Swiss.

The sellers' grin remains hidden.

In summary: The Grand Bazaar covers 31.000 m² and houses around 4.000 stores offering a wide variety of goods. It was built in the 15th century under Sultan Mehmet Fatih after the conquest of Constantinople.

The Bazaar is still the same, and we are grateful for it.

A wrinkled old man

TThe noise, the smoke-filled, stale air, full of all kinds of strange smells, tires you out.

The restaurants close to the alleys offer an excellent spot to observe the hustle and bustle and once again make up one's mind about the fascinating behavior of the human species.

An old, wrinkled little man strolls past the tables, offering something which, on approaching, turns out to be strange puppets. He recognizes our interest in no time and sits down at our table.

And now we realize what a treasure he is offering. It is ancient, very valuable puppets made of camel skin, offered in a similar form elsewhere in the bazaar, but never in this unique beauty.

In conversation, the man turns out to be at least as interesting as his marionettes. In fluent German he talks about his origins in Azerbaijan, his studies in Leningrad, his flight from Russia to Berlin. He is now in his nineties and earns a place in a nursing home by selling his beloved marionettes.

It's obvious that selling his puppets hurts him, but it's the only way he can make some money. His favorites are precious and expensive, but the true value would probably be much higher.

Maybe on the way home we might not resist the temptation, but we are still on the way to India, the journey is long, the space is limited, and so we wish him all the best and say goodbye.

Out and about in the city

We stay another day, it almost looks like a business trip. And indeed, there is a lot to do, some of it pleasant, some of it less so.

We will get the visa for Iran (maybe) today, no idea how the bureaucracy works there, but we hope for the best. Because without visa no Iran crossing. Always these imponderables, they are a miserable hassle.

And then we have a special rendezvous with our French friends, surely looking forward to returning the borrowed money. Surprisingly, we do indeed meet them at the Pudding Shop, money is still not available, as expected, so we postpone our meeting until the afternoon. Hope is small, so there is little surprise that our friends make themselves scarce at three o'clock in the afternoon. Well, shit happens, you never stop learning.

In fact, we are once again in search of suitable map material, but without success. Also the help of our Turkish friend Arto does not lead to positive results. His time is limited, however, because he is about to leave for Switzerland. The probability that he will be drafted into the army in the foreseeable future is high, and so he is flying to his girlfriend tomorrow.

And we, we are slowly preparing for the fact that we are going to India without road maps.

Matching Song of the year:   Mike Oldfield - Tubular Bells

And here the trip continues… through the middle of Anatolia

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