Turkey

September 21st cont.

So after getting through customs which took the generally average two hours, although on this occasion over an hour of this was taken with waiting to buy insurance, we had the car 'searched' by the police, customs and gendarmes all with the space of ten minutes.  Each search consisted of opening the back door and pointing at the fridge and asking, 'what's that?' we were off.  Interesting that the ammo boxes on the roof or the slide out ones in the back illicited no queries.

We drove and drove over crappy little roads until there was a massive wide toll road appeared next to us.  We followed it for about 100km before we got chance to join it.  Then we joined it and it pissed it down with rain.  Properly rained - so much so that we had to stop under the shelter of an overpass for a bit until it abated.  Then we drove and drove.

Having driven some more we started passing ghastly seaside towns full of tower blocks and discos.  Thankfully the sun came out and these disappeared only to reveal a tiny winding cliff top coastal road for the last 150km of our journey to where we were planning to stop for the night.  This took two and a half hours and led us to Anamur.  A toilet obviously.  But we had some food and water and managed to sleep once the band had stopped playing to the lower middle class Turkish people.  The lower middle class English people reading this - you know who are, (my friends and family, obv.) at least you're classier than your Turkish equivilents.  I should actually be pouring vitriol and scorn on Turkish people as I write this as they can't read it - Google Sites is banned in Turkey.  Not hard to circumvent but almost as odd as amazon.com being banned in Syria.  This explains the even longer delay than usual in updating my rantiness.

Still sleep we got.   

September 22nd

Woke up and drove over similarly nasty road for three hours to the first 100km of 500 or so.  The road finally got wider and therefore quicker but still not nice when a massive coach appears in your lane as it over takes another bus on a blind corner.  Still Sterling Moss had nothing on me - the Mille Miglia would have been mine.  We past lots of nasty towns until around 6pm we we finally wound our way down the cliffs to Kas where we met Jo's bessie mate Penny.

Penny had got there a night before and had allegedly already conducted relations with most of the male staff below the age of 23, this made it a bit uncomfortable for Jo and I but we made do.

We went out and had some typical Turkish foods and a load of drinks.

September 23rd

We went out and had some typical Turkish foods and a load of drinks.

September 24th 

We went out and had some typical Turkish foods and a load of drinks.

Penny bothered some of the male staff under the age of 20.

September 25th

We went out and had some typical Turkish foods and a load of drinks.

September 26th

We went out and had some typical Turkish foods and a load of drinks.

Penny bothered some of the male staff under the age of 17

September 27th

We went out and had some typical Turkish foods and a load of drinks.

Kas was lovely for a small Turkish town but basically every restaurant serves exactly the same food.  There's not even really a variation in the quality which means it's even more boring.  Over the previous days although Jo and Penny went diving (I wasn't feeling A1) and they went on a boat trip and got shouted at by a woman with a loud hailer telling them to enjoy themselves, (Jo said she wasn't feeling A1 and they got let off to take a cab back to Kas - it should be pointed out I had a great day wandering around town and reading having foreseen this) we really didn't do much, which was nice, apart from the dullness of the food options.  We did take some underwater shots of swimming in the sea with Penny's cool camera but that was that.

September 28th

Penny's last day so we did lunch (you can guess) and then the aforementioned water photography and then Mr and Mrs Pikey Mc Pikester smuggled their stove, pots and noodles into their room and cooked Nali Noodles in the bathroom to avoid eating Kas food again.

September 29th

We left for Bodrum, only another 350km up the coast but it took us six or seven hours of dull windy roads.  We got there to find the prices have suddenly hit London style and the favoured form of dress appears to be a Man Untied shirt and shorts.  We managed to get tickets for the ferry to Kos the next day and confirmed it took cars - we weren't certain it did at this point. A fucking rip off too - for a one hour trip it was north of £200.  We went out for some dinner and got a bit concerned about Rhubarb fitting on the boat when we saw the size of some of the other ferrys but since we'd given precise measurements we assumed it would be fine.

September 30th

Got to the ferry terminal where it became clear the boat was basically only designed for people.  There was a sign on the boat saying maximum height 2.05m.  This was a concern as Rhubarb is 2.50m.  Everyone assured us it would be fine as the bonnet would fit under that bit and the roof would fit under the higher bit which was 2.30m.  Only the Captain said No, laughed and said, you must wait a few days 'til we use the small boat (which doesn't have a height restriction.)  Resisting the temptation to hit him I unbolted the jerry can holder and let out most of the air from the tires, ignoring the Captain we tried to fit him on - and he stuck 1m short of fitting.  The crew said they had to go but blagging five minutes more I took the ladder off the roof top tent, took out the bedding from the tent and let out a bit more air from the tires.  We lost the required 20cm exactly - you couldn't fit a piece of paper between the upper deck of the boat and the tent on the roof of Rhubarb.  In fact I suspect he only fit because we compressed the suspension springs.