Day 43
Sleeping location: Grand Park Hotel, Çorlu, Turkey
Distance (km today/total): 138 / 4305
Estimated climb (m today/total): 1100 / 35500
Litres of fluid drunk throughout day: About 12
Day in three words: Setback after setback
An absolutely rubbish day during which everything seemed to go against me. Things actually started off pretty nicely; I woke up from a combination of morning chill and the first call to prayer, then packed up quickly and headed into Edirne. I was heading east so the sun was rising behind the huge Selimiye Mosque that the city is most famous for, which was very beautiful and atmospheric. The mosque itself was absolutely magnificent, and I spent a bit of time wandering around it. After that I went to pick up some bread, pastries and coffee, but misjudged and ended up going to a place that only served borek and tea, but the man was nice so I stayed anyway. After all this I was still away by 8.30 - the day was going well so far.
It then turned out that the planned route, and by far the most direct route, was along a dual carriageway, but it was well surfaced and had a big shoulder so it wasn’t too bad. I figured I would just plod along and count down the kilometre boards to Istanbul. This is when things started to go downhill. The sky was totally cloudless and the day started to get very hot. The road then entered a landscape of endless rolling hills, up 50m, down 50m, again and again and again, at gradients steep enough to sap momentum and tire me out. Not too much of a problem as I was still going quickly on the downhill bits. Then the wind from yesterday returned. Constant, quite strong from my 10/11 o’clock, alternating between slowing me down and trying to knock me over. My progress slowed right down. My one fond memory of the rest of the morning was making friends with a little dog at a petrol station and feeding him bits of my biscuits.
By noon the wind was absolutely crazy. I was crawling up the hills at less than 10kph and struggling to reach 30kph on the downhills. Sometimes I would try to freewheel down a hill and the bike would just stop. But at least I was still making progress...until my chain chose the worst possible place to snap, halfway up a hill with nowhere to rest Maggie on to repair it for ages. I had to push and freewheel to the next petrol station a couple of km away. By now the wind was so strong that when I leant Maggie up against some railings she was actually blown over, which twisted her handlebars out of position. By the time I had repaired everything it was almost 1pm and I’d done about 55km. My one fond memory of THIS section is meeting a Turkish cycling club out for a Saturday ride, on a motley collection of bikes including one Brompton. They were interested in me and one of them gave me some biscuits.
The next 30km into Luleburgaz, where I’d aimed to have lunch, was absolutely awful. The wind was making riding miserable and I couldn’t even listen to podcasts because it was so loud. A couple of times I actually shouted at the wind to fuck off. I got to Luleburgaz about 3pm (it should have been at 1pm) a ghost of a man, covered in salt stains from all my sweating, and panting wildly. I stayed for almost two hours to try and recover with some lunch and a sit down. I also had to re-repair my chain as it was making some strange noises, which it turned out were not fixed by the re-repair, but I honestly couldn’t face fitting a new chain at this point so I just lived with it.
After lunch the wind had dropped a bit and it was now merely hard rather than incredibly hard. My aim at this point was to ride as much as possible until nightfall then find somewhere to camp. But after about 20km I entered a zone of endless factories and warehouses, all fenced off, which made camping impossible, so I just had to keep going on the increasingly busy dual carriageway. This went on for probably an hour; there was nothing, no hotels, no campsites, and by now it was too dark to safely find a wild camp spot in such a busy area, so I just had to aim for the next town Çorlu, which apparently had some hotels. I’m not sure what the final straw was. Maybe having to use the outside lane on a busy motorway to get into town. Maybe the dark, narrow, busy road that I had to use to get into town. Maybe the massive pothole I hit on said road. Maybe the fact that for some bizarre reason my offline google maps did not include the centre of Çorlu. But when I arrived at the first hotel I was prepared to pay anything to just not be cycling any more. Thankfully, the man on the desk was even willing to offer a 1/3 discount to the dishevelled and wild-eyed man in reception, and the Grand Park Hotel was my saviour.
On reflection...there are going to be days like this on long tours, that’s inevitable. All you can do is get through them and then move on to the fun stuff. I’m sure today is going to be 110km of annoyance as well (same dual carriageway and I can see the wind picking up already), but at the end of it there’s Istanbul and a rest day. Bring it on.
Distance (km today/total): 138 / 4305
Estimated climb (m today/total): 1100 / 35500
Litres of fluid drunk throughout day: About 12
Day in three words: Setback after setback
An absolutely rubbish day during which everything seemed to go against me. Things actually started off pretty nicely; I woke up from a combination of morning chill and the first call to prayer, then packed up quickly and headed into Edirne. I was heading east so the sun was rising behind the huge Selimiye Mosque that the city is most famous for, which was very beautiful and atmospheric. The mosque itself was absolutely magnificent, and I spent a bit of time wandering around it. After that I went to pick up some bread, pastries and coffee, but misjudged and ended up going to a place that only served borek and tea, but the man was nice so I stayed anyway. After all this I was still away by 8.30 - the day was going well so far.
It then turned out that the planned route, and by far the most direct route, was along a dual carriageway, but it was well surfaced and had a big shoulder so it wasn’t too bad. I figured I would just plod along and count down the kilometre boards to Istanbul. This is when things started to go downhill. The sky was totally cloudless and the day started to get very hot. The road then entered a landscape of endless rolling hills, up 50m, down 50m, again and again and again, at gradients steep enough to sap momentum and tire me out. Not too much of a problem as I was still going quickly on the downhill bits. Then the wind from yesterday returned. Constant, quite strong from my 10/11 o’clock, alternating between slowing me down and trying to knock me over. My progress slowed right down. My one fond memory of the rest of the morning was making friends with a little dog at a petrol station and feeding him bits of my biscuits.
By noon the wind was absolutely crazy. I was crawling up the hills at less than 10kph and struggling to reach 30kph on the downhills. Sometimes I would try to freewheel down a hill and the bike would just stop. But at least I was still making progress...until my chain chose the worst possible place to snap, halfway up a hill with nowhere to rest Maggie on to repair it for ages. I had to push and freewheel to the next petrol station a couple of km away. By now the wind was so strong that when I leant Maggie up against some railings she was actually blown over, which twisted her handlebars out of position. By the time I had repaired everything it was almost 1pm and I’d done about 55km. My one fond memory of THIS section is meeting a Turkish cycling club out for a Saturday ride, on a motley collection of bikes including one Brompton. They were interested in me and one of them gave me some biscuits.
The next 30km into Luleburgaz, where I’d aimed to have lunch, was absolutely awful. The wind was making riding miserable and I couldn’t even listen to podcasts because it was so loud. A couple of times I actually shouted at the wind to fuck off. I got to Luleburgaz about 3pm (it should have been at 1pm) a ghost of a man, covered in salt stains from all my sweating, and panting wildly. I stayed for almost two hours to try and recover with some lunch and a sit down. I also had to re-repair my chain as it was making some strange noises, which it turned out were not fixed by the re-repair, but I honestly couldn’t face fitting a new chain at this point so I just lived with it.
After lunch the wind had dropped a bit and it was now merely hard rather than incredibly hard. My aim at this point was to ride as much as possible until nightfall then find somewhere to camp. But after about 20km I entered a zone of endless factories and warehouses, all fenced off, which made camping impossible, so I just had to keep going on the increasingly busy dual carriageway. This went on for probably an hour; there was nothing, no hotels, no campsites, and by now it was too dark to safely find a wild camp spot in such a busy area, so I just had to aim for the next town Çorlu, which apparently had some hotels. I’m not sure what the final straw was. Maybe having to use the outside lane on a busy motorway to get into town. Maybe the dark, narrow, busy road that I had to use to get into town. Maybe the massive pothole I hit on said road. Maybe the fact that for some bizarre reason my offline google maps did not include the centre of Çorlu. But when I arrived at the first hotel I was prepared to pay anything to just not be cycling any more. Thankfully, the man on the desk was even willing to offer a 1/3 discount to the dishevelled and wild-eyed man in reception, and the Grand Park Hotel was my saviour.
On reflection...there are going to be days like this on long tours, that’s inevitable. All you can do is get through them and then move on to the fun stuff. I’m sure today is going to be 110km of annoyance as well (same dual carriageway and I can see the wind picking up already), but at the end of it there’s Istanbul and a rest day. Bring it on.
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