Blogs from Turkey, Middle East - page 6

As we walked back to the hotel from dinner last night the thing we all noticed was that the temperature had dropped and the wind had picked up. When we looked out the window this morning, if anything, the wind had gotten stronger. We got away from the hotel at 8:30am after a good breakfast. I think The Plaza might just have been the best hotel we have had on the trip. Getting out of Edirne was hectic. The road we left on was extremely busy and in very bad condition with no shoulder at all. We had to be on our guard the whole time until we exited the city. We were then on a smaller road with no shoulder for a while, but much less traffic, until we turned onto the D20. This was ... read more

Before we left this morning we all plugged in our destination, Edirne, into our route app, MAPS.ME (M.M). Those that follow the blog know I've been having issues with M.M and it was doing it again this morning. Jeff was the only one who get get the App to route along the course we wanted into Greece, Tom led us off. We had to back track a little way to go over a bridge and swing down into Greece. At this stage M.M gave me a route that was much shorter than Tom had for the back track, so we followed that and duely ended up on barely discernible dirt and grass tracks for about 2kms. Eventually we hit the main road and the "short cut" had cost us about 15 minutes. Not happy, Again! What ... read more

I have recently changed roles and the new project requires a lot of interaction between various offices, so I traveled to our office in Ankara, Turkey to meet the team and see how they intend to complete this project. They were sooooo incredibly nice! They definitely spoiled me by taking good care of me for two days. It really reminded me of my old office in Ventura, California and I got a little nostalgic and even homesick. It was quiet and easy paced, and everyone seemed to respect and value each other. Though they work fairly long hours! The office was located in the older downtown area near the embassy, with great views over the city. However, they have a new office that is being completed and will soon move there, out of this area instead. ... read more

For my next short weekend Trekkup trip, my friend and I decided on Cappadocia. I had long wanted to do this trip and, while I had initially planned to do the trip on my own for a more extended period, I figured why not. Trekkup trips are generally packed and so I should get to see what I wanted without having to spend too much time organizing it, including the balloon rides, which I was not initially planning on, but now was excited about. It was a small group of 6 going and we all got along pretty well, which is crucial for small groups! This was my first time in the other Istanbul airport, Sabiha Gokcen Airport (SAW), which is located on the east side of the city. We had a 4 hour layover and ... read more

Hard to believe it had only been a week since we arrived in Istanbul. Everything felt so familiar and comfortable in such a short time and we also felt that we have seen all that we needed to. Although a trip back was scheduled on our return in just over a month. We woke at 6am so that we could leave by 7:00 for the airport to fly to Dalaman. It was already light. It took most of the day to get to Kas. We hadn't expected it to take so long. The flight to Dalaman was meant to leave at 10:00 but it wasn't until 11:30 that we arrived and then the bus to Fethiye which left at 12:00 didn't get there until 1:30. That bus cost 80TL and then another bus for 100TL ... read more