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Oh geez, there are all sorts of um... interesting adventures that people have embarked upon. Cold, long, muddy, hot, dry, wet…..If you will expand the question to how stubborn are you or how stupid in some cases I'll toss in a story. Caveat, not recommended.
Long story shortened somewhat. Invited a girl (whom I had recently met and was trying mighty hard to impress, even going to the extremes of showering and brushing teeth) on motorcycle trip to Europe. I convinced her that this was a good idea and how simple and straightforward it would all be. It was all her fault for listening to me.
We picked Turkey for it's combination of culture and riding. Only problem was that we, as well as the bike were still in North America. She, being very organized, looked at flights and picked a date to fly from Canada a couple of weeks later. I, being organized in manly sort of way (i.e. not at all) stupidly agreed as I figured there was plenty of time to ship bike over and meet up.
After a few delays and unhelpful shippers later, I called the airlines directly and got them to ship bike to Frankfurt. One flight delay later, only one problem now, the day the bike and I arrived in Frankfurt was only a few hours before she was scheduled to arrive in Istanbul.
Hmm, this seemed to be a small problem so I did what most men would do, I left her a vague message that I was "running a little late" and that she should get to the hotel herself and I would see her soon.
Meanwhile, I hoped on my bike, rode an hour south to Heidelberg to pick up my original green card from Stefan and headed east in the early evening. Germany came and went, thank goodness for the autobahn, and once in Austria it got dark. Usually I find Austria quite picturesque, at night not so much. I tried to stop in the middle of the night a couple of times to unpack my sleeping bag and sleep but couldn’t find a decent spot and usually what happens in these cases is you ride long enough and by the time you find a spot, you are awake again. The smart may even stop and drink coffee, the stubborn bounce up and down and slap their helmets.
Slovenia at night looks a lot like Austria. Entered Croatia at sunrise, strangely enough not much traffic at that time of day. Very awake now that it was daylight. Crossed Serbia, still light, into Bulgaria, still light for a while and then darkness fell. You know you've been riding a long time when you get to see darkness twice. A lot of riding with face mask open and even stops for coffee. Moderate amount of singing to oneself, plenty of yelling at oneself.
Finally, at around midnight, arrived at the border with Turkey. Crossed with a couple of German guys in a car who were driving around the world. They were amused that anyone would ride a motorcycle long distances. I was amused that anyone would use such a soft means of transport as a car with extreme luxuries such as "heat" and "music". Stumbled through the border and at one point took an exit that I thought said Istanbul. Things didn't look right so I asked at a petrol station if he knew where the Blue Mosque was and he said it was about 120 km from there. Hmm, my middle of the night route finding could use some work I thought.
Onto Istanbul, finding your way through Istanbul with a clear head is difficult enough, with no sleep it took a couple of hours of driving the wrong way up one way streets. In fact that is the little known secret to getting around Istanbul quickly, that and riding up the tram line (even better when the tram is not on it). Finally, at about 5:00 am, found the miniscule hotel by the Blue Mosque and knocked at the door as if I was only a couple of minutes behind schedule. Told her that I was sorry for being late, traffic was terrible.
Slept rather well that night, coma might be a more apt description. Eventually told her how far I had rode that day so that she wouldn’t kill me. Total distance, around 2,400 km in about 30 hours.
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