Marking the end of the Silk Route with a Quarter Pounder with Cheese

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We caught a bus from Goreme to Istanbul. It turned out to be a long journey. We had left Dave and the truck in Goreme as he was doing an overhaul before it headed down into Africa. We had 12hrs on a comfy bus but we were ready now to be in Istanbul. The last McDonalds we had was in Xian at the start of the journey so it really was quite fitting to finish with ´Maccas´ when we got into Western Turkey (yep it still tasted the same and I don´t need any more for another 3mths.)

Istanbul is a great place. It was a bit of a culture shock to be surrounded by other tourists and no-one saying ´hello´(other than the carpet salesmen) and waving at the truck. Prices were no longer central asian prices we had returned to home prices (with the added shock of the Aussie Dollar dropping from US$0.97 to US$0.68). On the up side the food options extended beyond our staple of the kebabs/shaslicks in various guises that we had been eating since Xinxiang Province.

I went and had a look around the Haga Sophia, the Cistern (the underground water storage) and the Grand Bazaar. Turkey has certainly become more of a feature on the tourist route and the Grand Bazaar was looking a lot more slick than when I was there 11 years ago.... but it was all great to see (and to have fresh fish in the first time in a long time).

People were gradually leaving over the time that we were in Istanbul (and some even before that). It was a wierd feeling finishing up. It was a great journey with a mix of people - some were overlanders in their minds but not in reality - and some provided a lot of laughs as we crossed the Taklamakan, Karakum, Kizil-kum, Dasht-e-Kavir deserts. A big thanks to Dave and Claire who negotiated the roads across Central Asia (and Caprice the truck who generally behaved herself) It was a great trip and everything that we saw was really worthwile. (even the irrigation museum in Turpan .. go Gaylord Irrigation and his underground tunnels)

For me now it is on to Spain - Barcelona and Madrid by myself and then joing an intrepid trip through Portugal and Morocco. Having been in Spain for a couple of days now I am really hanging out to be back in the not so busy side of tourism.

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