Ankara and getting here

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Trip Start Apr 09, 2009 Previous
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  Ankara, Ankara, Turkey
Tuesday, May 26, 2009

I left Olympos on thursday, I was very sad to go after so long at Şaban with Merel and family but it felt like a good time to go as the place seemed to be filling up with families. Me and Tim (new Tim from Ausralia who'd been with me in the dorm and hitched to the city near by with me) set out to hich to our next destinations; Istanbul of Tim and Ankara for me. We were on the same road for the first half of the way so we stayed together. Our first lift was 2 young guys in a flashy sports car, which meant us both cramming into the very small back (Tim is the same hight as me if not taller!) but they did give us a lift all the way to Antaya and we even stopped for Gözleme, tasty stuffed pancake things, and çay. More crowding into small cars full of people and a guy who tried to charge us 100YTL for the lift and we found ourselves on a motorway roadside as it was staring to rain. We were hoping for a group of beautiful Swedish girls in a campervan but instead we got picked up by a trucker and away we went and that was how it was all the way to Afyon, tres easy! Afyon was where we were seperating and we got there in the evening so we stayed overnight, we considered camping out near the motorway in a half built house but in the end got a hotel room in town. It weas that evening that I had my first Ayran and I haven't looked back since. It's a wicked yogurt drink that's salty rather than sweet and goes very well with a kebap, there's a place here where you can get tavük (chicken) dönner and ayran for 2YTL that's less than 50p! Tim also bought a watermelon which, despite not livimg up his expectations was a very good popcorn sustitue whilst watching a heavily cut and dubed version of '' The Notebook'' in the hotel.
Anyway, we had a teary fairwell on the motorway the next morning and I was alone once more. Unfortunately I was at the wrong end of the city and so had to get 3 dolmuşs(I didn't pay for any so it still counts) out to the other side of town where I got picked up by some more young guys with a swish car who took me about half way to Ankara. They left me on a rather baron strip with not much traffic and after an hour of no getting a lift an Ankara bus went past and I'm ashamed to say I took it and worse still payed. So I failed my hitching test, but Tim passed with flying colours making it all the way to Istanbul in just 2 lifts! That makes him an official pro!
Ankara it's self has been fairly uneventful, I arrived and ran around Ulus looking for a cheap hotel managed to find a Turkish place (rather than tourist) undergoing renervation so got a little ensuite for the same price as the cheapest, sittiest shared bathrooms elsware. I'ts also on a street/alley fully of dark drinking hoes, strip clubs and dingy cafes fullt of smoking old turks. Very atmouspheric. There's a nice museum and castle where I met a radar man in the armey and watched some children play football at the top but only enoughto fill an afternoon. Since then I've been bord out of my skull. I had some photos done and handed my passport in at the Iranian embassy on monday, got it back today with no hastle, very nice guy there all very smooth. So now I can leave! Either Trabzon,Van or Dog Bıscuit not sure but thought I'd get a night bus so only an afternoon to kill. There's a wicked old man filed all night restaurant just around the corner where ı've been eating well cheap lental soup at all hours which is good fun as they have rotisery chichens which are actually really fascinating to watch. The way the higher ones bast the ones underneath! Genius!
Had a really long Skype chat with Sunniandlea last night which was really nice! We had video and everything!
Oh, and I've also been eating load of sunflower seeds, they're toasted in their shells and you pop them out with your teeth, it's very satisfying. Bread products such as simit (bread rings coverd in sesmame seeds and other pastryesque thing have been a staple as it's between 3-6 for 1YTL depending how late and therefore stale bread is! And I bought an MP3 at very cheap so I have music as I finished my books (100 years of solitude is one of the best books I've read, highly recomended and also the beach was good, Jared put me onto both  so it's no wonder they're good).
Well, off to eat/bus! See you in Iran!

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Tim and a bus company	The teaful fairwell	One of our lifts	View for the cstle citidel
My rather seedy street	a Hittite statue	Hittite lion	More moving traffic lights
Tasty Sunflower Seeds	A statue next to a statue of Attaturk

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