Holidays 080 - 084 Antalya

I was very lazy! Spent a lot of time laying around on the beach, hanging out with Helena & Jörg and eating. But there were also some more active things: visiting the eternal fires of chimaera (naturally burning since antique times - at least) and the ruins (with pseudohippie pancake township) of Olympos, staging a highly official ceremony for establishing the winner of the Haiku contest, sewing some stuff, washing Arthur in the rain and fixing him and myself getting soaped, massaged, beaten and burned at the hamam and the barber.

Day 085 Antalya - Side

Goodbye happy days of sunshine,friends, sea and bliss.
Welcome hard & lonely days, climbing up high mountains, crossing barren land with noone by your side.
Ok, today was still grace period. Yesterday evening I had to say goodbye to Helena and Jörg who helped me a lot by bringing bikestuff from Germany, by giving me some of their equipment and most importantly by being there as the best possible friends. Muchas muchas gracias guapissimos!
During our farewell dinner I had a black bitch snoozing at my feet. After saying goodbye she followed me all the way through the old city to my hotel. Only there she was not allowed in and started to bark for a long time. I do not know what she thought that I have promised here - but I felt like a betrayer.
In the morning I had to make some adjustments to Arthur - yesterday I had noticed a slash in one of my panniers and some small holes in another. Fortunately Jörg gave me two of his to use, I just had to make them fit to Arthur. When I was nearly out of Antalya I had one last jump into the mediterranean sea - tomorrow I will go up into the mountains and cross central anatolia to the black sea. Cycling was easy today. After 5 holidays crowned by a visit to a hamam I was perfectly relaxed. Furthermore todays way was very flat - just following the sea. So I quickly covered more than 90km. It was not very spectacular - some of the way was a bit inland with nothing much to see and when I was back on the coast most of it was covered by huge hotel complexes (though some of them were spectacular in their ridiculousness). Shortly before arriving in Side I was outrun by 3 German (or Swiss?) cyclist who just arrived in Turkey and will be going pretty much the same way as me for the next week - but they are cheaters: they have a car transporting all their luggage, tststs...
Side looks like a big tourist resort but it has a very nice side: a huge, pompeji-style antique city only partly excavated. I spent the sunset strolling through the ruins.

Day 079 Kemer - Antalya

A day of hellos and goodbyes. We cycled the relatively short way along the coast to Antalya. After a week of cycling Wolle had to fix his first flat tire shortly before our destination.
We were very happy to reach Antalya - the last days with all the mountains and Schluppen nearly put us over the edge. In Antalya Helena waited for us at a beautiful hotel where Helena and Jörg will spend their holidays. It was a bit out-of-budget for me. I checked in at a cheaper pansiyon a short walk outside of the old town before we ventured out for a goodbye lunch for Wolle. After showing him the way to the Airport I spent the rest of the afternoon doing nothing - but nothing with air conditioning, aaaaah! In the evening I was invited to the huge buffet at Helenas and Jörgs hotel, muchas muchas gracias :o) ! Seriously stuffed we had a short look at the harbour but soon the cycling of the last week took its toll and we could only think about sleeping.
I will also have some holidays from travelling now, just relaxing in Antalya and gathering new strength for the mountains of central and eastern Turkey - sooooo, no blog for a couple of days :o)

Day 078 Finike - Kemer

Puh, I am seriously tired again. Today it was more than 1200m altitude, puh!
Both Jörg and me were on our last legs - only the thought that we will be relaxing from tomorrow on kept us going.
After waking up we found some strange footprints on the beach - only later we found out were they came from - turtles, yay ! Two of them crossed our path today.
Wolle had planned our last full cycling day along minor roads. In the beginning this was a very very wise decision - we cycled along an incredibly clear sea of a colour not blue anymore but magical. On the following first mountain I had my first falling-from-the-bike-experience: my right foot was still stuck in my click-in pedal when I stopped. Autschn. Fortunately it just led to some more scars on my right knee, a loose chain and a shifted handle bar - all stuff that could be fixed immediately. Still getting up the rest of this and all following mountains was quite a torment today. The landscape was amazing, but I did not really have many resources left to enjoy it properly. When we finally reached the top of the last mountain we came to a big road - the Harbach brothers later declared this as the moment when the cycling holiday was over - that is where we got out of the wild back into civilisation. We rolled down to sea level and ended up in the terribly artificial resort town of Kemer. I simply do not understand how people can enjoy holidays at such a place - but obviously there are a lot of people who do, the town is packed with tourists. Fortunately we found a comparably quiet spot on the beach a bit out of town and pitched our tents there.
Sorry to all non-German-speakers, but the following only works in German:

GEWINNSPIEL !!! GEWINNSPIEL !!!
Seht ihr das Bild mit dem deutschen Schild? Der Spruch klingt ja toll, aber ich versteh ihn nicht. Ich glaube das ist ein Haiku bei dem die erste Zeile fehlt.
=> Unter allen Einsendungen einer Ergänzung in Haikuform verlose ich ein wunderzaubertolles Mittelmeererinnerungsset bestehend aus:
- 1 Fläschchen Mittelmeerwasser
- 1 Schächtelchen Mittelmeerstrandsand
- 1 Mittelmeerstrandmuschel
- 1 Mittelmeerstrandstein
- 1 besonders kitschiges Mittelmeerstrandsouvenir