Turkey - The End of the Turkish Road
- 3 hours ago
- 8 min read
After generally driving short distances each day during our extended stay in Turkey, we now found ourselves with quite a lot of miles to cover to reach the Black Sea coast taking us on to Georgia in our last few days.
Our first day was spent driving through flat wide open plains with moody dark clouds. We arrived at Lake Tuz, Turkeys second largest lake at 643 miles surface area. It is a salt lake and the internet had shown it to be a stunning pink colour. However at this time of year after heavy rains it just looked like a big lake. We stopped at the visitor centre which was full of coach parties breaking their journey between Ankara and Cappadocia. We decided to park for the night at a quiet spot further round the lake. It was a scenic remote spot, and we did get a nice sunset, but with continued heavy rain all through the night we were a little concerned we may have sunk in the sand that we were parked on.
We had been visited by someone with big paws during the night, and we left our own heavy tracks pulling away successfully. We drove past the salt mine nearby on our way back to the main road.
We decided to stick to the back roads today which were a bit more scenic, pulling over for a late breakfast by a reservoir. The contrasts in the colours of the landscape were lovely.
We visited the ancient site of Alacahoyuk, which was built by an Indo-European group known as the Hittites in 2000 BCE. There is a striking Sphinx gate at the entrance and there are six reconstructed royal tombs which would have had rich burial gifts in of jewellery, gold and bronze objects. We just saw a cute little cat that was enjoying the warmth under cover in one of the tombs. There was a nice little museum at the site displaying pottery and other items found in the excavation of the site.
We continued on through the modern looking regional town of Corum and parked the night at a motorhome parking site, attached to a municipal picnic site which was busy with locals enjoying picnics and barbecues on a Sunday afternoon. We had the motorhome area to ourselves, but soon realised why it may not be so popular due to it looking out onto a busy noisy dual carriageway.
The following day we made it to the Black Sea coast. We bypassed the main town of Samsun and continued further east along the coast to the small but attractive resort town of Unye. This area is known for hazelnuts - who knew that Turkey produces 70% of the worlds hazelnuts, most of it coming from this area?
On a bleak cool day there wasn't much to keep us here, but we had a walk around the central area and along the waterfront. There is an ancient 550 year old plane tree in the main square and there were some grand looking old mansions in the town. We eventually decided to park for the night a few kms from the town centre at a dedicated motorhome parking spot by the beach. We'd spotted a cycle path which we thought would take us all the way back into town, but when we tried it, it finished for construction works just a couple of kms away. We'd read the motorhome parking was free if you don't plug in to the electric and water, but just as we'd got settled in, the caretaker of the site came and said we'd need to move unless we paid the €15 charge that had been implemented in 2026 regardless of whether you use electric or not. He was very apologetic and nice about it, but we moved to the free parking by the main road. We tucked ourselves in between two locals small caravans that looked like they were parked there permanently, but seemed to be unoccupied. Then a family arrived back at one of them, firing up their generator and had their TV on high volume. Hmmm - another noisy night in store. Actually they did switch it all off at a reasonable time.
The following day we drove the short distance to the resort town of Ordu. It was another pleasant place, with its only attraction seeming to be a Cable car to a hill overlooking the town. We had a cycle up and down the promenade cycle path before heading on to the busy port town of Trabzon, our last planned destination in Turkey.
Reaching Trabzon we parked up in a big central car park next to a large mosque as we had a few jobs we wanted to do in town the following day. We had a surprisingly peaceful night with just the mosques call for prayers waking us at 5.15am.
We managed to get some documents printed that we needed for border crossings, but failed to find a laundry that was open or that was prepared not to fleece us.
Our plan was to head out of the town to visit some other tourist sites, but Colin had spotted that there was a well reviewed Iveco garage on the edge of town and he decided to call in to see if they could check out a clicking noise we were getting intermittently from Lolly's engine.
They set to looking at it straight away. They thought maybe it was a belt tensioner which they replaced. We were pleased it was't anything major. However, as they were putting everything back together and testing it, they discovered the water pump that we'd bought in the UK before setting off was leaking. They also said the fan had a crack in it which would need replacing. We were sat in their customer lounge and Colin was starting to get more and more anxious and was looking sick with worry. No-one spoke English, so everything was having to be communicated both ways on Google translate. Having had the work done in Serbia and a service in Fethiye, I was wondering how they could be finding so many issues and could they be scamming us. Colin said he had seen the parts they had said were faulty, so we just had to trust they were being straight with us. It was late in the afternoon now, and the owner asked if we wanted him to book us a hotel for the night. We didn't have a lot of choice. They promised to get straight on with the required repairs in the morning. The owner drove us to the hotel, and on the way asked if we'd like to go to a local restaurant for koftes with him which we thought would be much nicer than dining at a soulless hotel restaurant. He treated us to a delicious meal, and we battled on with conversations via Google translate. As expected, the hotel was a 5 star characterless place and we didn't get a great nights sleep due to fretting about the work being done to Lolly and the hotel room being like a sauna it was so hot.
We had a tense morning the following day, but they got everything put back together and tested by mid afternoon. We were given lunch in the staff canteen which was surprisingly good and I had a nice long chat via google translate with the cleaner.
They admitted the clicking noise was still there, and Colin and the owner went through the work done and parts used and agreed on a discounted figure. Colin came away with a new Iveco fleece jacket, roasted chickpeas and some Turkish tea - it didn't take away the pain of the bill though.
It was too late to set off to visit the sites out of town so, feeling drained after two stressful days, we went back to park up in town next to the mosque, just relieved to be back in Lolly.
The following day the weather was better for our trip to the caves and monastery.
The drive to Cal Cave took us up steep windy roads through interesting villages that felt a million miles from the coastal towns.
The cave itself is said to be the second longest cave in the world, but visitors can only see around 1km of it from well maintained walkway. We were the only visitors there, and the gaudy lights took a bit of getting used to, but I guess they did show up the features on the stalactites and stalagmites more. The path took us to a waterfall in the cave.
We had to drive all the way back to Trabzon to take a different road out to the monastery. We got to appreciate the views into the valley more on the way back down. Colin gave Lolly a jet wash, but I think he came off worse.
It was another scenic drive out to the Sumela monastery, which is situated in a stunning position clinging to a rock face surrounded by a misty forest. We had read mixed reports of how close we'd be able to drive to it, but we were made to park in a car park about 3km short of the monastery and then paid extra to take a minibus up the steep road to the entrance. The mist had really descended now, so we were wondering what we'd be able to see. We got a glimpse of the monastery from a distance briefly as the mist cleared.
A stepped path took us right up to the monastery, where sadly don't get the perspective of its position up close. The entrance fee is hefty, particularly when quite a lot of the internal area is covered for restoration, but we couldn't walk away now.
The colouful murals on the outside and inside of the rock church are incredible, but they are also heavily graffitied - you have to wonder how they were left unprotected for so long to allow visitors to deface them.
After visiting the monastery we retraced our steps to Trabzon yet again, and continued east along the coast, parking up for our last night in Turkey in the town of Rize, a tea growing region. We enjoyed our last glass of Turkish tea and parked up next to the gigantic tea glass that lit up at night.
From Rize were only about 110km from the Georgian border, our destination the following morning. We reflected on what an amazing two months we've had in Turkey. When we entered back in February I was worried we'd be hanging around trying to kill time while we waited for the weather in the Caucuses to warm up, but it's been quite the opposite. There has been non-stop amazing sites to see, and we didn't even reach the eastern part of the country which has so many beautiful places to see which we'll have to return for.
The Turkish people have been so warm and welcoming - we've lost count of the times we have been offered a free tea or coffee. The food has been delicious and the Turkish wine very drinkable. Travelling in a motorhome has been easy here, with great free camping spots and proper campsites when required. Our highlights - so many, but has to be Cappadocia, Pamukkale, Ephesus, Gallipoli, and Mediterranean coastal towns like Fethiye to name but a few.
While sad to be leaving Turkey, we are excited to be moving on to new countries and experiences that will push us and Lolly out of our comfort zones.
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