Would you believe it, while at breakfast this morning we discovered that another cycle tourist had checked in yesterday!
Mark is on his way to Syria having spent the last 6 months travelling round Europe, notably riding some of the Tour de France route (shortly before the tour came through). From there he plans to spend the next few years cycling around the world, hopefully raising some money for Multiple Sclerosis along the way. I will add his blog address to the links on our blog.
He is a charming and excitable character, who made for a very entertaining breakfast companion. It has to be said that Debs got a little bored with all the bike talk though. We hope we didn't delay his progress too much, as instead of leaving in the morning he didn't set off until well after midday. We will be following his progress as he is now officially our test pilot for Syria and beyond! Take care and ride safe Mark, it was good to meet you.
As it was well past lunchtime we grabbed some snacks from a nearby bakers and went to Karaalioğlu park to eat them. It was another beautiful day, so we had a stroll through the park and then meandered our way back to the hotel.
The evening was spent looking for a cheapish restaurant to have dinner in. Foregoing the more expensive Kaleiçi we tried one of the restaurants just outside the old city walls. In typical fashion the advertised cheap price came with lots of additions and ended up being dearer than eating in one of the nicer restaurants in the old city. This seems to happen quite a lot in Turkey and rather ruins the dining experience. Still, that is another restaurant crossed off the list. If enough people stop going, perhaps they will all stop trying to rip tourists off.
A few bottles of Efes from the local market and a movie rounded off the day. If we can successfully get the air-con and blanket (the sooner the rest of the world learn of duvets the better) combination correct, we should have a lovely night's sleep.
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