Joe’s Trip to Turkey 1999 (8 of 10)

The Fez Bus left on time, more or less, what we refer to as on “Turkey Time”, aka “Fark Etmez”, aka “It doesn’t matter”. The objective of the day was to climb the ruins of Termessos, hidden away in the Taurus Mountains. I kept my eyes peeled to catch a glimpse of a live Taurus, but saw only ordinary Fords.

Shortly before arriving, we stopped at a Migros supermarket, an efficient, Swiss owned supermarket chain with gaudy orange signage. I bought fresh, perfectly ripe peaches, pastrami, Gouda cheese and chocolate milk (three cartons).

Termessos is one of the few places that Alexander the Great could not conquer. Set high upon a mountain with adequate water cisterns, it would have been impossible for any dude to conquer, no matter how much chocolate milk that they had brought along. After we hiked up more mountain in one hour than I usually do in a year, we continued across the Anatolian plane following the famous Silk Road, as in Marco Polo and the one to China. THAT Silk Road. FYI, it is long and straight and hotter than hellmouth.

We were driving along, listening to some ghastly tape cassette as we watched an accident occur right in front of us. A farmer driving a diesel water truck eastbound blew through a stop sign from a farm road and severely limited the forward progress of a southbound Tofas Fiat. Two men were ejected post haste through the windshield and the force of the collision broke the truck in two.

Here we are on a pleasant holiday and all of a sudden we had bloody carnage to contend with. All of us piled off our bus and asked the whereabouts of any sort of first aid kit, an item that the bus was not equipped with. I suggested that someone donate a t-shirt to stop at least some of the bleeding. The two unfortunates were living and I would guess that they will be OK and will be able to play the piano someday soon. Our bus driver gave the offending farmer what-for and the victims were whisked away to a hospital by a passing Tofas Fiat. Not wanting to be detained by the Police as witnesses, we were ordered back upon the bus and we continued our journey.

We arrived at that evening’s destination, Egirdir. The group stayed overnight in one pension while I fled in the opposite direction. I chose the first recommendation mentioned in the “Let’s Go – Turkey” book, which turned out to be one of my better decisions lately. A double bed, clean shower/toilet ensuite came to 3,000,000 TL, or about US$7.00.

The jovial owner is a retired Pepsi distributor. His wife does the cooking for the guests. He touted the fish. I ordered the fish. Wise choice. Egirdir is at the edge of Turkey’s second largest lake and is known for the freshwater bass. The unfortunate fish that was now upon my plate had been caught by my host’s brother that afternoon and was about as tasty as I ever have had. Another course worthy of mention was slices of eggplant (or aubergine, if you prefer) that had been wrapped around a lamb meatball as if one was to wrap a present, and secured with a toothpick and then stewed in a fragrant tomato sauce.

The next morning I got a lift by the hotel shuttle, a tired Renault with a slipping clutch, driven by the hotel owners’ son. I was taken to the Fez Bus pick-up spot where I dropped off my luggage and went for a walk. It was market day in Egirdir, peasant farmers and their families in raggedy pickup trucks or ancient Massey-Ferguson tractors had arrived in town for the occasion, bringing loads of melons and produce. Lots and lots of melons. The hotel owner’s son had told me that these people were from small villages, not big towns like Egirdir, population 5,000.

I snapped some sneaky photos of the scene. Moslems, like the Amish, believe that a photo steals one’s soul. I passed on the melons, but I bought a lovely kitchen knife for $4.00, made in Bursa, where the good knives come from.

Back on the bus, we traveled northbound past endless wheat on our way to Cappadoccia.

Read all the adventures!
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9
Part 10

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