a trip to the dark sea of the world [part III]

Day 5—Thursday July 19, 2007

Sleep was restless. I kept waking up, think I was late, but it was 5:30, 6:30, 7 am…and what could I be late for?! But, the sun was bright and the river was loud and I was up.

Tiffin eventually joined me and we headed to breakfast, where we had heaps of kaymak and two types of jam—visne [veeshnay; sour cherry] and kayisi [kayeuseu; apricot]. No bee attack on the goodies, but there was a cool green bug on the chair. I ate much too much.

We waited for the rest of the group and, in the meantime, the rafting guide staying at the pension came and talked my ear off. He told me about all the different types of rafting available and all the places around the world where he’d gone rafting. He tried to allay our “fears” about the water being cold and by describing the beauty of the rapids:

“Shakira gibi dans ediyor!”
“The water dances like Shakira!”


Always the businessman, always the Turk, he knew “a guy who could give [us] a great deal in Trabzon.” Too typical. Just a tad annoying.

We left late, circa 10:30. Mehmet Bey brought us first to the bakkal [corner store], where he and Abu Bekir bought food for a picnic. It's also where we saw an incredibly large bag of hazelnuts Beckham's lil punim staring us down from the Pepsi machine [the man is everywhere, even the most remote villages in the mountains...oh oh it's magic, you know].

After our little shopping trip, it was time to really get going. We didn't know where he was taking us, but Mehmet Bey started driving towards the road that Tiffin and I walked up the first day.

T: It would be really funny if we turned down that road. We can look for your earmuff!

And yes, my friends, we turn.
We drive over the bridge.
We. See. My. Earmuff!

“Dur! Bir dakika!” x3
“Stop! One minute!” x3

I jumped out of the car, as everyone else in the stared at me dumbfounded. Harika! Everything I had lost was found!

Shaking his head and chuckling, Mehmet Bey continued up the hill.

Me: It would be quite funny if he also stopped at that promenade where we stopped last time.

Lo and behold, he stopped at the promenade:

“From here you can walk around and have a picnic. I’ll pick you up in 2-3 hours.”

OK! We put our stuff down and started to walk. It was nice because we were able to go further than we had the other day—we were three-quarters of the way up at that point. We followed the road—the butterflies were out in full force—and arrived at a fork in the road.

Problems ensue as no once seems to care [fark etmez]:

Filiz [aka Spunky Girl]: Do we go up or down?
Me: Fark etmez. What do you want to do?
Filiz: Fark etmez.
Me: What do you want Abu Bekir?
Abu Bekir: Up?
Filiz and kids chorus: Nooooo! Up is boring. Down takes us to a village.

I guess fark etti after all…

So, we continued down the hill and were passed by 3-4 dolmus along the way. The other day we had seen no one on that road! We got down to the town and, I must say, I was dreading the trek back up.

Suddenly, a dolmus stopped. The driver was friends with the kids and he offered to drive us up the hill. Huzzah! We drove up and then Abu Bekir said:

“wanna go to a nicer place for our picnic?”

OK! We packed the car and headed off. It was a harrowing ride—he took the curves 30x faster than Mehmet Bey. Back in town, we stopped at the bakkal to call Mehmet Bey, letting him know our plan. Then we moved on.

Again, we went down a road Tiffin and I had taken two days prior—the roadblocked one—but today the roadblock was gone. So, we went much further…20km further. It.was.gorgeous. No surprise.

After what seemed like an eternity we finally stopped at a pine covered area near the river. The driver, who I thought was coming for lunch since he had driven us so far, left without taking a coin!

We set up the picnic in the shade. The watermelon and cola were put in the water to make them cold. Spunky Girl and Tiffin made salad. Abu Bekir and Spunky Girl’s Uncle cooked the chicken and veggies.

It was all delicious, delightful, relaxing. Just great fun. We were so lucky to have the chance to participate. It was obvious the kids were happy too, we gave them an excuse to get out and not be so bored. Ach! It was just so nice and I’m so glad Tiffin made the decision for us to stay that extra day.

We took some group pictures that came out well. Here you can see (l-r): me, Spunky Girl's Uncle, little cousin girl, Tiffin, Abu Bekir, little cousin boy.







And Filiz, being the [not too overwhelming] drama queen that she is, instated my camera for a little photo session near the river.

By 4 o’clock, we were pretty darned stuffed. Picnic plus all that kaymak and jam for breakfast—Tiffin and I needed a walk. There was some confusion as to whether or not Mehmet Bey would even be coming, so Tiffin and I decided to walk back.

Bekir wasn’t pleased. We had a small petrol tank and two heavy carpets to carry. Additionally, he just flat out wasn’t interested in the concept of walking…he’s not one to be particularly enthralled by nature. He assured us his father would be coming and after much argument we convinced him to wait at the picnic site—there was no reason for him to be miserable, especially after everything he’d done for us! I thought we had convinced the kids, as well, but they decided to come along for the walk.

So, we started without Abut Bekir. At some point, however, we turned around and saw Bekir coming up behind us. There had been a few other Carson the road, also having picnics, so he left the heavy stuff with them to drive back to town. In the end it all worked out!

It was a wonderful walk. Along the way, Abu Bekir would point out interesting things, like trees split by lightening, or logs fallen by winter avalanches.

We also saw some remarkably twisted trees—the Paleobotanist claims this results from correction-overcorrection-recorrection in growth habits orrrr sickness.

Meh, I just thought it looked neat.

The coolest sight of the day, however, had to be the large block of ice we passed alongside the road--in essence, the remains of a small glacier, melting in the heat of the day—which, to me, was a remarkable thing.

After having our fill of frozenness—and trying to avoid the snowball fight that was beginning between the kids—we moved on. All of a sudden, Mehmet Bey came driving along the road. Tiffin and I wanted to walk some more but Mehmet Bey insisted us on driving us to a safer walking location—apparently, bears are quite abundant in the forest. He explained that bears were also the reason behind the random high -pitched sirens we were hearing back at the pension. He had a tripwire system around the beehives he tends--when a bear comes near, a siren blares and bright lights go on, scaring the bear away. Ha! Glad we found that out.

We drove a long long way. Secretly, I was glad we didn’t walk it. The day was hot and three days of hiking without reprieve were taking their toll on my body. I was tired. Eventually, he let us off, I had my relief-in-the-woods experience, and we had a nice walk home…not including the last 1.6km struggle uphill.

As we came near the pension, I saw Mehmet Bey's dog across the river. I took a picture of him and he started barking. Mehmet Bey came running towards us from behind his beehives telling us not too take pictures of the dog because it scares him and he'll attack. Yet another good thing to know.

When we got back to the pension, new guests were coming in. We sat down for tea with the kids and watched the new guys—Slovenians—come up. An interesting couple, he was a chubby fellow, pissed off and out of breath with a cigarette lit immediately upon reaching the top, she dressed like Lara Croft. Hell yeah, they were gonna beat the giant Kackar!

After tea I went for a shower—it was burning hot, thanks to all that gunes [goonesh; sun] enerji [there was a lot of gunes that day]. Then, it was off to the terrace to write. However, just as I sat down Abu Bekir came in and we started talking. Same things—comparing the US and Turkey—but he did reveal a strong interest n Ottoman history along the way. Tiffin came in followed soon thereafter by the kids. The TV was turned on and Turkish-English language lessons began between Tiffin and Filiz, with me acting as intermediary translator supreme. A nasty headache ensued and writing was not happening. Luckily, an hour later dinner was called.

Dinner was not manti [mahnteu; Turkish ravioli] as Mehmet Bey had said. Nonetheless, it was good, consisting of soup [homemade by Rafting Guide’s wife], salad, pasta, chicken and potatoes, watermelon…and, also prepared by Rafting Guide’s wife, un helvasi [oon helvaseu; flour helva]! We enjoyed the helva but Abu Bekir’s face when he tried it is impossible to describe—priceless…yeah, his plate went immediately to the trash.

After dinner, we went upstairs for cay. We had had a lot of tea since getting to Barhal, but the Black Sea is tea country, so I indulged. Upstairs, Tiffin played pisde [peeshday; a Turkish card game] with the kids and I played tavla [tahvlah; backgammon] with Filiz. I was doing ok until the usta came over and started guiding me…so I ende up with a mas [mahsh; three game loss in one game]! After that, I gave up and the usta took my place. Thankfully, he lost too.

Abut Bekir came over and he got a kick out of flipping through my journal, seeing all the doodles. Then we started talking about the plan for the res of our trip. The kids left, but Filiz gave me her email address—“make sure to come over when you come to Istanbul!!”

By 11:30, Bekir and the usta had helped us develop an itinerary. I can’t tell you how helpful they’d been the entire time. The Israeli couple were highly intrigued by us, they couldn’t figure out what the deal was with the Turkish and the English. It was hilarious to catch them staring as we laughed and talked with the guys.

The four days that we spent in Barhal and our time at Karahan Pension can be described as nothing less than fantastic. In reality, I don’t think I can begin to do it justice. The environment was refreshing, encouraging, and challenging. The treks we took weren’t easy and I’m proud of how successful we were…and it’s not as if it didn’t get us anywhere—no, it paid off in spades with the absurdly awesome views and a great sense of accomplishment!

The whole experience also made me realize that it really does make a difference to know even just a tiny bit of the language. It was immediately obvious upon our arrival that our experiences with the people at the pension and in the town were going to be a lot different than the other tourists there. Other tourists couldn’t—actually, they didn’t try—to communicate…they didn’t even say “merhaba” and would get fed up with the people at the pension when they couldn’t understand. Even many of the foreign guides, who frequented the place, couldn't speak much Turkish; instead, they just relied on silly hand gestures to get their points across. I just found it disrespectful and condescending.

We, on the other hand, had the experience of a lifetime. Without being able to talk to the people at the pension we never would have seen all the things we saw and learned as much about the area. We went far away and saw things in the backwoods, but it was more than just gazing around at the pretty scenery—we were able to do active viewing, learning all about the water systems and ways of life in the area at a significant level. We also made friends and had a good time with people we barley know, we could let down our guard—something I find hard to do in Turkey.

And, if we couldn't speak Turkish, none of that would have happened. Just a little bit, that’s all you need!

To top it off, we stayed at the pension for four nights, breakfast and dinner included, two unexpected lunches…adding up to 200ytl = $78/person [they gave us a 40ytl discount]. But, I would have paid so much more for that experience and I can’t praise the Karahan Pension and its people enough. They were warm, kind, and helpful beyond belief.

Sum up: Make Barhal a priority in your traveling life! Make the Karahan Pension the place you stay! Learn some Turkish!

a trip to the dark sea of the world [part II]

Day 3: Tuesday July 17, 2007

I slept well that first night in Barhal but couldn’t quite manage to sleep past the usual 6am self-induced wake up call. I dozed until 7, when the French family woke up and started arguing. It was cloudy again, but parts of the sky were finally visible. The weather was chilly, but the cold didn’t permeate deep into my bones like it had the previous day during the rainstorms.

Around 8 o’clock, Tiffin and I made our move to breakfast, where we ran into two enormous groups of Israelis checking out. That’s when we realized that there were many more people staying at the pension than we had originally thought. Somehow, though, the place managed to seem deserted.

Breakfast was incredible, not because of what they served—it was a typical Turkish breakfast in content—but the quality and flavor of the products was outstanding. We had:

1. Fresh bread
2. Hard boiled eggs
3. Tomatoes and cucumbers
4. Olives—delicious, not too salty
5. Beyaz peynir—great consistency, no overpowering sheep’s stomach aroma
6. Kasar peynir—a nice bite, similar to a good sharp cheddar
7. Butter—fresh, fresh, fresh!
8. Honey—delicious, local, great texture that reminded me of the stuff I fell in love with in Cyprus. Honey production is big in the Kackar Mountains, plots of beekeeping boxes can be seen dotting the landscape and cluttering porches
9. Apricot jam—this stuff was out of this world and truly tasted like apricots
10. Kaymak—HEAVENLY. Now, I’ve never been a big fan of kaymak—a form of clotted cream—but my goodness, this was to die for…and it would, in actuality, kill you if you ate it on a regular basis.

Oh my, how I indulged on this breakfast!For once, the Lonely Planet did not lie—the reason we even chose this place was because the LP claimed it’s breakfasts were out of this world. Overall, though, the Karahan Pansiyon was a steal at 30 ytl/person half-board, with declicious homemade local food, a wonderful location, comfortable [and energy efficient] accommodations, and kind proprietors [Mehmet Karahan, the owner, is a doll].

After breakfast, we decided to go for a hike. We stared by crossing the river on a nearby bridge. We followed what we thought was a trail, but it ended up leading us to a little house. We walked a bit further, through mud, found some wild strawberries, and a neat drainpipe we thought must be used for irrigation.

Hitting a dead end, we turned around and made our way towards Barhal "centruum". Along the way, we saw some neat makeshift drainpipes and took a detour into a grove of apple trees.

Once in town we turned down another road. This ended in a roadblock but gave us some beautiful views of the river and the chance to feast our eyes on the delicate wildflowers growing all around. After hitting the roadblock, we turned around and when we got back to the city center a man randomly stopped us to talk:

Guy: What do you think of Barhal?
Us: Oh, it’s beautiful!”
Guy: Your Turkish is outstanding. Where are you from?
Us: We’re American, but I’ve been living in Ankara for six months.
Guy: Ah! I live in Istanbul but I am originally from this village!

He was kind and genuine. He wasn’t trying to con us into anything, get us to stay at his pension or hire him as a guide. He just wanted to talk. Overall, the people in Barhal were all so kind and receptive, particularly because we spoke Turkish. Even on our first day there it was evident that speaking Turkish made a huge difference in how you were treated and regarded by the locals. They could barely hide their excitement when they realized we were Turkish speaking tourists!

After saying good day we continued on through Barhal, following the road towards Yusufeli. Along the way we came upon another road and turned. This we followed for about 2.5-3 hours enjoying absolutely lovely views and a landscape brimming with butterflies, wildflowers, and funny-shaped pines.

Down by the river, the terrain had seemed rainforest-like, humid and filled with ferns and waterfalls. Upon ascending the mountain, we quickly and noticeably moved into a new ecosystem, characterized by a relatively dry soil and loads of conifers. As we realized this, Tiffin and I looked across the valley. The change in terrain was so stark and clear—a near straight line cut the mountains horizontally where the tree types suddenly changed.

The walk was delightful, especially as the sun came out. We could see forever and caught random glimpses of higher peaks covered in snow.

Around 12:30, we decided to stop. From the top, we could see a long winding road on the other side of the valley and a tiny little dot walking along it. It seemed he came from a village high in the mountains. Imagine realizing you need milk and walking all the way down from the top of the mountain then all the way back up...only to remember you forgot to buy toilet paper! Gah!

And then a great hunger splashed over us and so we made our way back to town. By the time we got back to Barhal I was pretty well pooped. We stopped for lunch at a restaurant [only three to choose from] with a most hilarious menu—"fleshy foods" = meat foods, "thawed cheese" = melted cheese—and ordered the regional specialty: kuymak, melted cheese you eat with bread [a bit like fondue].

It was surprisingly cold and windy in the valley and I had lost my earmuff along the walk. So, the warm hearty food hit the spot and we relaxed there, munching, drinking cay, and watching loads of little kids running around chasing dogs as an old woman herding sheep and cattle trundled through their playground.

At one point, the van from our pension showed up and one of the guys hopped out to chat with us. It was nice—again, we were lucky to know some Turkish because the locals interacted with us and at a more significant level than they did with other visitors.

The van left and we finished our lunch. Slowly we started our 1.5km walk back to the pension, first stopping in the corner store to see if they sold that delicious honey or jam. Along the road we were behind two kids who were convinced we were following them and kept turning around to look at us. Finally they freaked out and let us pass.

We made it back, though it was slow goings, and I went to take a hot shower…except I ended up taking the coldest chower of my entire life. It was wretched. To make thing worse, as I came upstairs Abu Bekir was on his way to fill the furnace with wood to heat the water up! Agh! I have never felt so cold as I did in that shower.

Then, to really top it off, I discovered that I had not only lost my earmuff, but also a roll of shot film. I was incredibly upset about it as it contained pictures from Cyprus, Mt. Erciyas, and parts of the day’s hike. I was especially upset about the Erciyas photos as I knew I had some wonderful shots. Losing film upsets me like nothing else and that realization had me feeling pretty low. In response, I ate a bunch of helva…which then proceeded to make me feel oh-so sick.

Around 4 o’clock Abu Bekir came up with some tea. I didn’t go out, stuck under the bedcovers, but Tiffin went out to meet him. He struggled with English and she struggled with Turkish, but I let them go at it. I knew Tiffin wanted to improve her Turkish and having me around didn’t help that—she never got to speak. Eventually, though, I wanted some tea and it sounded like they were in a silent rut, so I went out as well.

Abu Bekir was a nice, if a bit shy and mumbly, guy. As Tiffin noted, it’s hard to hear him and the rumbling of the Coruh River in the background definitely didn’t help the situation. He talked very slowly as, it seems, do most people out there. It was wonderful for me, of course, because I could understand that much more…but boy did I go through most conversations with Abu Bekir completely clueless as to what he was saying!

We talked with him awhile longer and gathered up some facts about him and his family:

1. They are only in Barhal during the summer, though Mehmet Bey was originally from the area. In winter, they go on vacation—Antalya, Istanbul—it seems they do quite well for themselves.

2. The room we were staying in did not actually belong to the pension—it was owned by a Britiish man who lends the building to the Karahans when he is out of town.

Apparently, Abu Bekir forgot we were coming so he only had this room open for us. He assured us, however, that another room would open up for us in the coming day. We were fine with it, but he apologized and insisted on us moving the following night to a room with a solar-heated shower and bathroom en suite.

We also talked about the dam project:

1. Apparently, once they flood Yusufeli there will still be access to Barhal by an upper road. Luckily, the flooding is a ways away yet—the project was proposed and passed some 15 years ago but flooding still has not started. As Abu Bekir said “everything in Turkey goes slowly.” Truer words were never said.

2. Abu Bekir can't wait for the place to be flooded.

After a few awkward silences Bekir excused himself and Tiffin and I stayed on the balcony to chat, bundled in rolls of blankets. We talked about travel a lot and she pulled out her handy Collins Mini-Atlas which, of course, revived my travel bug. I decided early on, however, that while in Turkey my travel focus would be on Turkey. As I came to realize how easy it is to do—even by oneself—I intended to take advantage of that opportunity to the fullest.

At some point, the Spunky Girl and one of the other kids came over to grab the tea. Spunky Girl asked where we had walked and what we were planning to do during our stay in barhal. We, of course, said “we don’t know,” which for some reason had her laughing heartily. She left but came back half-an-hour later to call us for dinner.

Dinner was good, again: Yayla corbasi [yogurt and mint soup], salad, leftover dolma and kofte, zucchini and broad beans [which I’d watched them pick from the garden earlier in the afternoon]. We had a table all to ourselves, but it felt a bit strange because it seemed we were on display. There was one other single couple and another large Israeli tour group. At some point, the tour guide picked up a phone call, came over to where we were sitting, and proceeded to talk quite loudly for 20 minutes. It was, to say the least, annoying.

Later, an old teyze [teyzeh; aunt, used to refer to an older woman] came out and stopped by our table. She started up a conversation and quickly took to us as she discovered we knew some Turkish. Spunky Girl came over and an animated conversation ensued. Teyze seemed to really love me, grabbing me and hugging me to her a number of times. She was also convinced that I had been in Barhal two years prior. It took five minutes of saying “no I haven’t” to convince her that no, I had never been to Barhal before. She was also quite funny when she saw a man walking down the slippery stone steps with a flashlight and a cup of hot water. For the life of her she could not understand what he was doing…so she yelled at him! Luckily, he was British.

At some point, the conversation turned to Tiffin and my plans for the next day. It ended with us making a plan with Spunky Girl to go on a hike. CRAZY! I couldn’t quite understand if we were going to be paying or what we’d really be doing, but it sounded good anyway!

Well fed and well planned, Tiffin and I went to bed.

Day 4: Wednesday July 18, 2007

I woke up early and was delighted to see a bright and sunny sky greeting me. Hurrah for good weather signs!

Breakfast was, again, delicious though the lack of kaymak made me weep on the inside. The bal [honey] and recel [reychel; jam] were up to par and, unexpectedly, became a wicked source of entertainment:

When we first sat down to breakfast there were no bugs in sight. All of a sudden, bees attacked our table, sticking themselves in the honey and jam. The one who chose honey seemed particularly ironic.

The others just lazed and licked. Some kind of strange heaven. You could see their proboscis sticking out and lapping up all the goodness. Tiffin also pointed out the rose petals in the jam—perhaps the secret ingredient, the addicting drug—which attracted one bee in particular.

It was quite a sight to watch them be first drawn to the plate, struggle to get out, then resign themselves to being stuck…in deliciousness. Heck, I can’t really blame them…I would swim in a gooey pool of that honey and jam.

After breakfast we went over to the Barhal Kulesi—an 8^th century Georgian church. We had seen it sticking out amongst the trees when we went walking the day before but what we hadn’t realized was that it was actually located directly next to the pension. You can’t see it from the street and there are no street signs, but had we read the guidebook description of the pension we would have learned that it was part of the property. When we asked Mehmet Bey where it was he was surprised and chuckled as he pointed us down a little path.

The church was quite impressive and it’s amazing how well hidden it is within the forest. It’s not open, but from a hole in the back you can see inside. It seems that it was converted to a mosque for awhile—the floors were all covered with kilims—but has since been deserted.

Next door was an elementary school, but from the windows in back it also seemed abandoned. Inside one room you could see stacked up desks and a little cardboard house with a Turkish flag on top—they start early with nationalism here.

Around 9:30 am a flatbed truck came to take us part of the way up the mountain. We sat in the back, which afforded us some gorgeous views. Barhal is where fairytales are made. It epitomizes that fairytale landscape, filled with a rushing river, wooden houses, trees, wildflowers, wild fruits, and snow-capped mountains. It’s Sound of Music on crack. It’s fantastical.

We stopped at some point, hopped out, and began our hike. There was a large group of us—me, Tiffin, Abu Bekir, Spunky Girl, her two young cousins, and her uncle [who is actually the same age as her, 17]. The ascent was not easy and there seemed to be some significant discrepancy over whether we had taken the right route. The plan was to go to one of the two Karagols [kahrahgeul; Black Lake] in the area, but we didn’t in the end.

The walk ended up becoming quite stressful for me because the group would routinely ask what Tiffin and I wanted to do: go on or stop? Abu Bekir always wanted to stop while Spunky Girl always wanted to press on. Tiffin never had an opinion, nor did I, but I had to play diplomat as I knew Turkish. It marred the hike for me a good bit as I was being asked every five minutes...

But, at the same time, it was hard to ignore the scenery and not be mellow. If nothing else, the nature around us was to die for. The hike was a challenge, the wind was cold and rain threathened, the other kids complained, but it was totally worth it. I am so happy we decided to do it and that the kids organized it all—we never would have made it so far on our own.

Along the way, we walked through a number of little villages--if you can even call them those. In one such place, Abu Bekir opened the door to a small wooden shack, showing us a wheat processing wheel used to make flour for bread.

In the moments of rest, we could hear the wind streaming through the valley creating such haunting sounds. Add to that the dark clouds and graves spotting the landscape and you've got yourself a thoroughly eerie place. Walking through the small mountaintop villages the smell of burning would percolated through the air and it reminded me of home. The cesmes gushed with clear buz gibi [like ice] water straight from the mountains. Really, heaven.

Eventually, we stopped in one of the yaylalar [pastures] and munched on some snacks the kids had picked up that morning. Spunky Girl pointed out her mother’s old summer home [top row, center]. It seemed that both of her parents were from local villages but she was growing up in Istanbul—same with her uncle. This was her first visit to the area in eight years and you could tell that they were pretty bored—“there’s no nightlife, our cell phones don’t work”—and that’s why they hang out and help around the hotel.

Up on the ridge, overlooking the river valley and pastures, I had a moment of complete sensory overload. While it never quite wore off, it did calm down a bit, allowing me to engage myself in the conversation being had by the others. We sat up on that ridge for a good long time, chatting about the typical topics of comparing Turkey and America. I could tell Tiffin was a bit miffed because she couldn’t really participate, but I tried to translate and involve her.

It’s not easy; I couldn’t be a translator for life. I’m both lucky and unlucky to be able to speak Turkish. And really, the experiences like I had at Kerkenes and again up in Barhal were indescribably critical in improving my Turkish. After Kerkenes, I felt ten times more confident about speaking and, more importantly, understanding. That helped in Barhal and even by the second day of our stay there I could tell I was getting even better. Granted, they tended to speak slower and we always talked about the same three things…buuut, details.

We made our way back down around 12:15 and I immediately felt it in my knees. It was a long steep walk down, but yet again the distracting surroundings made up for it. After getting to the bridge where we were originally left off there was still a long way to go. At some point, the kids and I stopped to pick cherries off a tree but Abu Bekir and Tiffin continued onwards. We ended up getting pretty well separated, so Tiffin got some Turkish speaking time and I had a nice walk down with the rest of them. Let me tell you, though, that Spunky Girl was a talker!

Trout fishing, though technically prohibited in the Coruh River, is still done extensively. We passed a fellow who had caught some and he showed us. They were beautiful, speckled with big red dots.

Later we saw a man standing in the river—how?!?!—picking bugs off rocks to use as bait.

Bekir and Tiffin stopped at some point to wait for us. Continuing onward, we came upon some more cherries that we just had to have. It became quite an acrobatic escapade to get them down, but there’s nothing like fresh fruit from the trees, especially when they are cherries that stain your hands. We also picked some tart fresh apples and were informed that the weird balls we saw hanging on some trees were fresh walnuts! Later, Spunky Girl’s uncle pointed out some fresh hazelnuts, too.

At some point, we turned off the road and followed a pathway up in the trees next to a gushing stream. There were a number of little corridors in it that were stopped up with weeds or old rags. Apparently, on certain days different corridors are unstopped and the water is allowed to stream down, soaking the soil.

Each little town is given a specific day when it can release its dams. The weeds and plants are later collected by the women, put in shacks to dry, and use to feed the cows and sheep through the winter.

The path was great—not only was it flat and rock free, but it was hidden. We passed all sorts of little homes hidden in the forest,

saw nifty old wooden doors,

crossed treacherous bridges,

caught some delicious views of the mountainside,

picked all sorts of fresh fruit from trees, met women collecting plants, and tried not to fall down the slope! We followed the path all the way back to the pension—what a wonderful walk, secret amongst the trees. As Tiffin said, it felt like we were the Lost Boys from Peter Pan.

Once we were back at the house, Bekir showed us our new room. It was recently refurbished with a bathroom inside [hooray!]. We had to move our things over and luckily he helped…

And just when I thought the day couldn’t get better…I FOUND MY LOST FILM CANISTER while I was packing up my stuff! Then, to add the cherry on top, I took a wonderfully hot shower. Hurrah! The best day ever!

After the shower I spent some time writing and watching English language Al Jazeera. That was interesting. I’d never seen any Al Jazeera before. At some point, Abut Bekir came up and we talked a little bit. I had read a headline about a bomb outside the Ak Parti office in Ankara and we tried to find the news, but to no avail.

A bit of boredom eventually set in as I waited for dinner. Not so much boredom as being too tired to do anything productive. At some point I went down to hang out and got to talking with another one of the guests. Dinner came-in a good way—with yaprak sarmasi [stuffed grape leaves], tavuk corbasi [chicken soup], salata, patates, pilav, tavuk ve patlican [chicken and eggplant]. Tasty! There were fewer people—a Turkish copule comprised of a rafting guide and his mauve haired [way unnatural] wife, and an American? Canadian? Couple. We had seen an Israeli couple, but they didn’t come to dinner.

After dinner we talked to Mustafa Bey about leaving the next day. He told us we could catch a 6:30 am dolmus to Yusufeli and he’d have breakfast available for us at 6 o’clock. Oy vey! But, we thought, at least htat would give us a full day to do things. So then the problem was deciding exactly where to go…easy, no?

HA! We thought our plan was to go to Trabzon, stopping at Rize for lunch. Then we started talking to Abu Bekir:

“Why don’t you just stay another night?”

And that got us thinking. More people joined the conversation and we moved to the upper balcony. You see, we discovered a flaw in our brilliant plan—Sunday was election day. Apparently, that meant that everything was going to be shut down. As a result, we were going to have to stay in one place a day longer. Of course, neither of us could decide where to go and where to stay. Ayder, on the other side of the Kackars, seemed nice and had hot springs. But, the weather was unpredictable, it was very busy, accommodation could be problematic, and getting there would be difficult. But then trabzon didn’t seem to warrant three days. And then there was the option of staying in Barhal another day, though we thought we’d done most stuff.

At some point in the conversation it came out that we didn’t have to worry about the election. Back in the day, people would have to stay in their homes on election day and everything was closed. Now, things would still be functioning.

Did that information help us? No! After much concsertnation and way too much English-Turkish translating I got to a point where I was just too tired to care. So, Tiffin made the final decision: we’d stay another day in Barhal then go on to Trabzon. We’d go on another trip with the kids the next day, leaving at 8:30 am. Sounded perfect—OK!

And with that I ate a piece of helva and went to sleep.

a trip to the dark sea of the world [part I]

Days 1 and 2: Sunday July 15, 2007 and Monday July 16, 2007

My trip to the Black Sea region of Turkey with dearest Tiffin was a somewhat spontaneous thing. While at Kerkenes we had discussed traveling together after the dig, but we weren’t sure where we’d trek around. So, on July 15^th, Tiffin showed up in Ankara and we had to decide where to go. Her departure from Turkey wasn’t until the July 25^th, giving us a whopping ten days to play around with.

So many options! Beach? Yoga-hippy communities in the middle of nowhere? Black Sea? Mountains? Hot? Cold? Ruins? Gah! We barely knew where to start. Lucky for us, Tuna and Ahmet had suggested the Kackar Mountains and the Black Sea as being the best. After doing a little guidebook reading we had to agree with them as it sounded awesome. So, we decide to catch an overnight bus that evening to Erzurum.

Of course, we made the decision on the fly [around noon o’clock] and just planned to go with the flow...

sidenote #1: As I’ve traveled in Turkey I’ve realized that that is the only way to do it here—significant planning is not particularly worthwhile. It took awhile for me to accept that approach—to just get on a bus, end up in a place…with absolutely no plan—but it’s one of the best character traits I’ve evolved since being here. Admittedly, I still lapse back to my second-by-second sickeningly detailed planning ways [maybe more as a procrastination technique/way to use the backs of all those rip-off calendar pages than anything else?], but I’ve definitely mellowed out a bunch since being here. Granted, I can’t deny that having a decent guidebook is key—they are helpful for figuring out where to begin and can have useful maps/historical background—but, you can usually only trust them as far as you can chuck them. It’s best to just…go...and have one in your backpack.

Conveniently, Robert was also staying at my place when Tiffin arrived—he decided to make a quick trek out to Ani after the dig and, though I couldn’t go with him, I was able to give him a place to leave bags and restore his sanity [two 16-hour bus rides in four days takes it out of you!]. He was heading back to the U.S. the evening Tiffin came to town, so we gals went with him to the otogar that afternoon.

After dropping Robert at the HAVAS airport shuttle we went find us some bus tickets. We were planning to start our trip in Barhal, a tiny town on the eastern side of the Kackar [cach-car] Mountains. Unsurprisingly, there are no direct buses to Barhal or the next closest town, Yusufeli [yoosoofehlee; Joseph’s hand], but the man selling us our bus tickets said that he would make absolutely sure we get to Yusufeli:

“Problem yok. Merak etme!”
“There is no problem. Don’t worry!”

Well, that was a relief—I was a bit worried that my Turkish wasn’t going to cut it out East, so having the help in place would be great.

Hoorah!
We were excited. Our bus departed at 7:30 pm, so we decided to go to Kizilay and see if the backpacking store was open—I didn’t really want to drag around a duffel bag for ten days. Unfortunately, however, it was closed. Sunday. Bloody Sunday!

After that failure we went back to my apartment and packed. At that point we also decided that, although we didn’t really have a plan it might be wise to get a room reservation in advance for, at least, the first night. It would not be cool to go to the middle of nowhere and find that there was no where to sleep except outside with the bears. Not cool at all.

So, we took care of that, put together a spectacular trail mix using all my dried fruits and nuts and the kilo of dried white mulberries [yum!] that Tiffin so kindly brought from Istanbul, ate the last dregs of food in my fridge, and lumbered back to the otogar.

We arrived at the otogar with plenty of time to do a some people watching before our bus was to depart. As we were mindlessly staring at people around us, a random fellow came up to us:

“Yardimciyim!” [yardumjihyihm]
“I’m a helper!”

I was completely confused by this and immediately began to panic at the thought that we were about to embark on a trip to English-free territory I was the primary Turkish speaker…if I couldn’t figure out what this guy was talking about…well, let’s just say it was going to be a looooong and miserable ten days.

But, he seemed a kind, if not a bit too serious or sad, guy; round and meek and himself a bit confused by us. And, after he repeated it a few times I finally understood—the guy at the desk had enlisted the driver to personally help us figure out how to get to Yusufeli. We later learned that the driver lives in Yusufeli…so, unlike other yardimcis I’ve had, this guy actually did know how to get us there—how lucky were we?! Excited, and relieved by this resolution, we hopped on the bus to begin our adventure! Ooh goody!

The first leg of the ride was better than I expected. We actually stopped at the Sorgun reststop, which felt somewhat strange as we weren’t continuing on to Kerkenes but, rather, we’d be blowing right through. Luckily, we got over the nostalgia bit and enjoyed a spectacular bowl of ezogelin corbasi [ehzohgayleen chorbasuh; Ezo the Bride soup, a delightfully spiced red lentil-bulgar soup]. That stop came around 10:30 pm and afterwards we fell asleep.

Overnight buses are the pits if you don’t get any sleep. This ride wasn’t too bad, but Tiffin said later that the attendant kept trying to wake me up because my feet were on a seat or something, which is totally yasak [yahsahk, prohibited!]. They are such Scrooges, those attendants!

But despite a crick in my neck and insatiable-unexplainable knee pain I was able to sleep until ~5:30 am, when I woke up to find us rumbling through a desolate and beautiful gorge that seemed to engulf us completely. Unfortunately, my camera was not easily accessible, so I have no documentation of the surroundings.

It was silent inside the bus which, combined with the gray and drizzling weather outside, provoking in me an odd warm-but-melancholy-and-somewhat-eerie feeling...but that may have just been the buzzy sleepiness talking. Whatever it was, waking up to that sight just bubbled up the excitement that always come with spontaneous travel and new environments.

And then, after 13 hours, we finally arrived in Erzurum circa 8:30 am. As we got off the bus we were immediately accosted by people screaming out destinations and trying to get us onto another bus. Pah, typical otogar behavior.

It was cold and rainy so Tiffin and I huddled together with our bags until the driver came over, telling us to follow him. He brought us to another guy and told him that we wanted to go to Yusufeli. The guy grabbed our bags and put us on a minibus. It was such a blissfully simple transition—without the driver’s help I think we would have been entirely too shell-shocked to move anywhere. Then we would have been stuck at the Erzurum otogar until the next day with nothing to eat and nowhere to sleep and it would have been super depressing and all…

Maybe an exaggeration, but the point is this: the help was more than just blandly appreciated.

The minibus to Yusufeli was slated to leave at 9 am, but we left a bit late. This prompted some [loud] grumbling from a few passengers. But, when we finally did leave, the bus was filled to the brim. Since the next bus wasn’t until 2pm, I can understand why they were willing to stand for three hours.

The variety of people and lack of places served to make the ride quite interesting and best described as a constant game of musical chairs prompted by people getting on and off. Additional entertainment came in the form of two cute, but pompous, little boys.

As we left the Big City we quickly entered into a landscape I can’t even begin to describe. It was absolutely stunning and a wholly unexpected sight. Basically, we drove along a deep river gorge spotted with wooden houses, sandwiched between clear flowing waters and fierce/awesome mountains, which provided some of the most outstanding displays of geologic structure I have ever seen. The sight was entirely overwhelming in such a good way.

Including the Kackar Moutains in our trip—especially the south-southeast side—was one of the best decisions we could have made. You see, there is a new dam project that has been passed which will entail flooding Yusufeli and the surrounding valleys. Inhabitants will be relocated higher in the moutains, but the access, views, and charm of the area will surely be devastated.

sidenote #2: A similar thing is scheduled to happen to Hasankeyf in southeast Turkey, but that has the added issue of flooding a major archaeological site.

Upon arriving in Yusufeli we were again privileged to be in the company of unnecessarily helpful people, as our driver immediately directed us to someone who would take us to Barhal—our final stop. We loaded our bags in the minibus and the driver told us that we’d be leaving around 3 pm. That gave us 3 hours to explore!

Now, Yusufeli is not very big. Granted, it’s bigger than Tiffin or I ever expected…but that’s not saying much. Nonetheless, we were shocked to see how busy and bustling it was. It was particularly crazy due to the July 22^nd elections quickly closing in. Yusufeli, being one of the bigger towns in the area, was thereby victim to incessant campaigning. Every persons' ears were being constantly bombarded by party campaign buses going back and forth along the main street, belting out obnoxious jingles and slogans at deafening decibels. And, of course, jingles being jingles, they get stuck in your head. Let’s just say I was not happy with the tune that I was humming for the rest of the day.

Needless to say, three hours was a long time to waste in Yusufeli. It had been rainy and freezing since we had arrived in Erzurum—weather I was entirely unprepared for after the heat wave in Ankara—and I couldn’t feel a good part of my body. So, we found a little tea garden where we indulged in our first cup of Black Sea tea, shared a karasik tost [kahrahshik toast; mixed melted cheese and meat sandwich], and people watched—i.e. identified tourists and guessed nationalities. There were a surprising number of them, mostly German, we supposed.

At some point, a young fellow came up to us and started speaking Turkish very quickly. I couldn’t understand him and he eventually figured out that English would be a more effective approach with us. So, he went on to explain to us that he (somehow) heard we were heading to Barhal and that he was a guide, happy and ready to provide us tours around the mountains!!

Oy vey. It’s one thing to have it happen in Istanbul, it’s another thing when this kind of stuff is happening in serious middle-of-nowhere land. But, we took his card and told him that if we decided to take a guided trek we’d be sure to call. And we were sincere.

Eventually he left and we decided to walk around a bit. Again, not many places to go, but we crossed the bridge over the furiously tumbling Barhal Cayi [chay; river, or tea!] and moseyed along the other side. We got back to the van with 45 minutes left to spare and we stocked up on cucumbers, tomatoes, and the ever necessary gum. Back at the minibus durak [deurahk; stop] we couldn’t seem to find our bus. Amongst all the incessant noise and screaming campaign trucks we finally found our driver, who said the bus was moved around the corner.

We decided that there was really no way to waste any more time in Yusufeli, so we just waited by the bus. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, our crazy potential guide guy showed up and started talking to us. It eventually came out that he really really wanted to recommend this [according to him] super great pension—Barhal Pension [owned, by pure chance, by his great friend!]—but we already had a place to stay.

That didn't deter him, however, and he went on to talk about his history as a rafting and trekking guide—a whopping nine years—and all the different people he met along the way. Most of the tourists that come to the Kackar Mountains, he said, are Israeli. Continuing to ramble, he began to recount a bad experience he had the previous year with an Israeli woman:

He was guiding a rafting trip down the Coruh River. It was a rough day and the rapids were at riskier-than-usual levels. There was an Israeli woman on the trip who was acting like a know-it-all—she’d rafted in Nepal, so she knew what to do. At some point in the trip, the woman fell into the water and didn’t listen to the guide’s instructions. She called for him to help, claiming that he had told her not to swim. He argued with her, saying they were in calm water and she could swim to the boat. She refused and, eventually, he jumped in to get her. They entered a rapidy section and she panicked, grabbing onto the guide and thrusting him underwater:

“I was sure I was going to die in that moment. I saw my life flashing before my eyes.”

Eventually, he caught her attention…by grabbing her breast. Offended, she let go and he came back up to the surface. They got back to the boat, but:

“She didn’t even thank me for saving her. She just said ‘where are my sunglasses? You lost my sunglasses!'.”

I guess the experience ended up jading his opinion of Israelis and, though he doesn’t refuse to guide them, he’s not exactly what you’d call kind in talking about them.

Tiffin and I didn’t really know how to respond, it was an uncomfortable situation. Much to our relief, the guy left and we decided it would be best to get in the van and close the door. We were quite happy when the driver came over and finally started up the engine.

We started the trek to Barhal with five passengers. It was a windy and poorly paved road, but the scenery was from a different world…liiiiike, Heaven?

Our first stop was the village of Sarigol 1 [sahreuhgeul; yellow lake], where we dropped a guy off. We then turned around and headed into the depths of an intense forest. Tiffin and I had been sure that we had been on the route to our pension and we were getting excited about how remote and beautiful it was. The forest was so dense and thick, filled with hidden homes, gates of bundled sticks, wild grapevines, and small plots of bright yellow sunflowers that glowed brightly against the damp forest greens. Throughout our trip that day, the colors had just been so vivid, intensified by the wet weather and dreary flat sky.

The road was a mess, but even back in these depths of nowhere we came upon DHP and CHP campaign flags strewn amongst the trees. Campaigning like this, managing to inch its way into every corner of the country—and let me assure you, this was a corner—made it clear that the upcoming election was really no joke.

Passing half-an-hour along this forest- and flag-filled nearly non-existent road, Tiffin and I were ready to be done with transportation already. You can imagine our dismay when we finally stopped, picked up three women and an old man, then turned around and headed back down the impossible road to Sarigol 1. There, we picked up the chap we had left before and a few more people.

Sigh…now it was cramped.

Twisting, turning, stopping, dropping-off, picking up,…more musical chairs and Hot Potato with Baby,…two hours later we finally get to Barhal. The van stopped and, thinking we had arrived at our destination, Tiffin and I got out.

“No! 15 kilometers further!,” chuckled our dear driver.

Ok, back in.

As we waited to get moving again, one of the ladies in back started to talk to us. She had traveled from Istanbul, her sister came from Antalya, but they were both originally from Sarigol 1. They agreed that it was awfully cold. Really, it was the middle of July and I was in desperate need of some long-underwear!

Tiffin and I couldn’t imagine that people actually lived there during the winter! We had considered rafting down the Coruh River, but then we looked at the furious rapids flowing next to the van and noticed the pure aqua-tinted crystal clearness—tell-tale sign of frigid water sourced from the Kackar Dag glacier. Then Tiffin put her hand in to confirm…and that's when we decided against the rafting.

But, I digress.

So, we got back in the car and headed up the hill some more. Again we stopped and I wasn’t sure if it was our stop. I asked, the driver laughed, and said:

“No, we’re waiting for a friend.”

Always chuckling at us, that man was...

We then proceeded to wait around in “town” for [at least] another half-hour. Finally, we started up again, packed to the brim with people once more. And then we arrived at our pension—Karahan Pension—and, with painful unfurling of curled up legs alongside audible sighs of relief, we descended from the van.

The driver gave us our bags then headed off. We looked at the sign. 100 meters thataway. OK!

Orrrr not so OK. We turned our heads in the direction the arrow pointed and our jaws dropped. There in front of us was a steep rocky slope with no significant trail marked. Goodness gracious! The last bit just can’t be easy can it?!

Slowly we started. All of a sudden, a group of three kids popped up behind us, including a very blond-very thin-very not Turkish looking-very spunky girl. The girl was quite intimidating and, it seemed, had definitely been raised in the mountains/was the ring leader. Nonetheless, there was something quite different about her that just didn’t fit in with the surroundings.

They offered to help with our bags and I stupidly said “no, we can do it,” forgetting that we were at nearly 3000 meters altitude, tired, and attempting to cross over slippery rocks with heavy bags. She shrugged and we trundled clumsily forward, almost dead by the time we reached the top. My lungs hurt for at least another hour after.

It seemed rather remarkable to us that the owners and workers at the pension could carry things up the slippery hill all the time. And then we found out about the pulley system...yeah, at the bottom of the slope there was a motorized pulley that you could put luggage or supplies onto and it's pulled up to the house. Cool...but that information cometh a bit too late!

At the top we talked to the owner’s son, Abu Bekir, and sorted things out. I had made a reservation the night before, but some things seemed a bit confused. It was particularly awkward because the other kids were surrounding us and there was some confusion over what language to speak. After five minutes of complete misunderstanding amongst us all, we decided to speak Turkish and settled things.

He brought us to our room which was…cozy. The bathroom was right next to us, but a treacherous set of wooden stairs needed to be braved to reach it. Really, the whole place was not made for nighttime walking. The view from our window was nice--looking right into the vegetable garden, we could see the family picking ingredients for dinner.

It was about 6pm at that point [we managed to just barely miss the 24 hours of travel mark!] and after settling in and layering up, Tiffin and I took a walk up the road. It was beautiful but cold and after a short while we came back. Abu Bekir brought some tea up and I warmed myself under the bedcovers until dinner was served at 7:30.

Dinner was wonderful—all homemade and hearty. The meal consisted of soup and salad, dolma, kofte and potatoes, pasta, and karpuz [carpooz; watermelon]! The soup was my personal favorite, primarily because of it’s physical temperature—hot!—but the flavor was great, too.

On our walk we had passed a number of people walking in the opposite direction who, we discovered at dinner, were all staying at our pension. There was an intense French family and a group of Israelis. Apparently, there was quite a large group of Israelis staying there, but they all kept Kosher so they cooked their own food somewhere else.

After dinner, Abu Bekir asked for our passports, so we traipsed back to the room to get them, nearly dying on some slippery rocks. Then it was off to bed, an early night because we were cold and super sleepy.

All in all, it was a great start to the trip. We couldn't have asked for transportation and transitions to be any easier. The first day was a real show of that famous Turkish hospitality.

pathetic loser.

aka me.

How, oh how!, could I have let my blog become so outdated?! To have chosen travel, adventure, and photo-ops over updates...

Luckily, the holidays are here, giving me further impetus to change my wily and uncouth ways.

Rosh Hashana New Year's Resolution: To get back on the crazy horse and update!
Yom Kippur atonement: I offer my most sincere apologies for being boring and never keeping my promises to update these past four months.

And with that...

Black Sea stories to come!