Early in the Cycle

We have left Turkey as of yesterday and begun the cycle 4 days ago! Departure from Istanbul was a bit scattered as we cleaned up final details of sending stuff to Canada (thanks once again Graham and his FedEx discount !!) How could we leave Turkey without succumbing to the carpet salesmen ?? Actually we did not buy a carpet….but a bit of stuff you will have to wait to see, and mostly we had to condense ourselves down to 8 panniers. The weather has warmed for our departure which has helped us to feel confident that we have enough warm clothes and wet weather gear.

Here here Amb’s journal entry for Day 1 of the cycle :

“ I am not sure if you call that a start or a story “

“Our first day of the 3 month last stage. Boys sleep like logs and hard to wake up. Leah and I sleep poorly and awaken early to a spectacular and dramatic call to prayer at the Blue Mosque (just outside our hotel window). Missed breakfast, no cab even though pre-booked, miss our bus (pre-bought tickets). How frustrating that was. The next bus is 30 minutes later and actually leaves an hour later. Sunny to drizzly/windy Thrace. Hyrabolu before noon and we set to work excited with spectators curiously congregating. No parts are missing. A torn plastic bag had not lost anything important but had been worn about by the chain of the tandem. This had been a worry. The first 2 single bikes came together easily, but as we put the tandem together we realize a chain wheel had been badly bent, cogs and ring. We were all devastated. Return to Istanbul may be our only choice, Amb may have to head back for replacement part. BUT the local spectators come to our aid. After tea-ing us (x3) and feeding us and offering cigarettes to Leah and I (really!): 1. They arranged the teeth to be straightened 2. Simon and I are driven to 3 separate places until we find a machinist who was able to straighten the ‘wow’ with an industrial metal press !! And this all without and English !! When Ambrose gets back excited, Leah is distraught about poor pannier fits. We realize we have never placed full panniers on the bikes prior to our crazed departure to fully test the configuration. We solve pannier and rack issues, remount the chain wheel, and Leah and Sy have a small tour with no noise, no skips, no derailing. Hooray !! We sit for another tea and consider our luck (both good and bad).

New pump also had never been used and needed some significant figuring out. At this point we realized we were not going to be cycling today after all and finished up the last few details when an English speaking (fair to good) teacher/internet café owner who helps us find a local hotel/restaurant/teachers residence. He also told us our planned route had a closed boarder crossing, so we plan to change our route……”

Anyways the chain wheel is holding and we are now in Svilengrad (pop’n 20,000 -- get out your maps!) in South-east Bulgaria taking a well earned and needed rest day (Day 5) Mileage has been unexpectedly large (53 km, 42 km, and yesterday’s 77 !! ) to bring us here. We realize daily mileage will be dictated largely by the location of accommodation. The remainder of our cycle in Turkey (the part they call Thrace) was characterized by further unbelievable hospitality and curiosity on the part of the Turkish. At one point an elderly couple stopped us in our tracks and insisted on us waiting while they ran inside and got us apples and oranges for the journey. Lots of hair ruffling and cheek pinching of the boys and apparent absolute delight and amazement in what we are doing, and the participation of the children. Via broken language we list the countries of our journey, and the reaction is incredulity!! People have been incredibly friendly and full of waves and hoots. One challenge early on was dogs on the edges of villages, coming out and chasing us. The first of these were really fierce and I heard Sy on the back of the tandem mumble in tears “I want to go home now”…and I didn’t blame him. However, gratefully the dogs that have followed have been much less scary and convincing and we are learning to ignore and just ride on.

Yesterday we crossed 2 boarders from Turkey to Greece then Greece to Turkey. We cycled though beautifully remote un-traveled feeling NE Greece limping from village to village over 2 unexpected steep long-ish climbs hoping for a Greek lunch along the way. However, the towns were sleepy tiny places with no restaurants so we plugged on with the food we had brought until we finally entered Bulgaria to a completely different feel again. Bulgaria seeming both more western and more poor (which translates into welcome lower costs for accommodation and food). We are staying in a Soviet era monstrosity hotel with commanding huge lobby and hundreds of unfilled rooms. No
Wi-fi internet in our hotel room, however, and so far the towns people much less interested in our tourist identity and lack of language. Virtually no English spoken with one shining exception of a woman named Deanna who has just returned home to Svilengrad after 14 years away studying in England and Switzerland. She has helped us to translate the menu and was a welcoming soul for our first night in Bulgaria.

Language will certainly by a challenge, and the alphabet is of course different (which we have not had to deal with in Tanzania or Turkey). It is amazing how when I think back that each stage of this odyssey has helped to prepare us for the next. First, our time in Africa helped the kids to adjust to being away from home, and to create a sense of home away from home (and daily they comment on what they are missing from Muheza, Sy especially) and to generally get used to the notion of other cultures and languages and how different it all can be. Turkey then prepared us for being nomads and creating ‘home’ with daily rituals and reading aloud and bonding as a family. Turkey introduced the idea of yet another culture, completely different again, and the sense of unbelievable history and complexity of the world. And now we are pursuing for sure the most challenging of all our time away, what with the added layer of intense physicality as well as regularly changing culture, language, alphabets, foods, religions and topography. Really a completely different thing, than spending 6 months stationary in Africa. In Tanzania, I felt that many before us has done what we were doing, but honestly, cycling through Thrace and receiving the hospitality and curiosity we did, made me feel that we were cycling on tiny rough roads where hardly a traveler had been (let alone a family of cyclists). This is both wonderful and a bit anxiety provoking !! (Amb, however, would never admit that… )

The boys are doing amazing on the bikes, Griff burning up the miles on his own bike, fully loaded panniers an all. Riding already 2 days more k’s than he has ever gone in his little life. Simon and I have been on the tandem together, mostly having a great time, him chattering and whistling (!) (are you peddling back there ??) and he seems to feel the wonder and accomplishment of it all almost as much as I am. Not that there wasn’t the odd muttering from the back of “this sucks” on the unexpected long hills yesterday, but I must admit I was thinking the same. It will take us some time to build up fitness and strength as we look ahead to the Balkan Mtns and the bigger Tartars of Slovakia….

Our sad news is that Sally and Rose will not be able to join us as expected in early May due to complications at Rose’s work not allowing her to go. We are all massively disappointed, especially the boys of course, but we are looking forward to cycling with Paul and maybe Ed beginning in mid May.

That’s all for now. Lots more but I have rambled enough. We are missing everyone and starting to get homesick in earnest. Trying to balance that with being fully in the moment here…

Xo Leah