Only Mad Dogs And Englishmen

We made a break from Istanbul on Sunday as soon as everyone had sorted their problems. My engine is now running as smooth as an LC4 can. We got the ferry across the sea of Marmara and rode south to some mountains about 20km from Izmir where we found a dirt track which came off the main motorway and went up through a village and some fields before reaching a pine forest at the top. This was my first real taste of off roading and although I dropped the bike a couple of times, mainly because I used the front brake at a stop which has no grip, I thoroughly enjoyed it. There are some fantastic photos of me riding over a crest with the sun setting behind me which I need to steal from George and Morgan.

We camped wild that night and just as it got dark were met by a bloke on a tractor with a shotgun. We shook hands and he managed to communicate to us that it was boar hunting season and we should flash our lights if we rode on any further in the dark, which we werent going to do. He went off and we wondered whether the boar would attack us whilst we cooked. George then decided to use his horn after we heard some rustling and I'm pretty convinced managed to clear the mountains of boar and cheese off a lot of hunters! The gunshots sounded into the night despite our rowdiness though.

The next morning we descended into a small village where a lady in a small shop made us some chay and refused payment. A couple of other people turned up and gave us some fresh grapes and pears which we scoffed.

We carried on towards Akbuk where Oli and his family were staying in their summerhouse. In the heat George had the amazing idea of riding through showers made to wash dusty car windscreens.

At the summerhouse we swam in the sea before being stuffed by Oli's mum's fantastic cooking. Honestly the best meal of the trip so far! Stuffed peppers, Kofke, Aubergene dip, tsatsiki, peppers, olives. Proper Turkish food.

The next day we were off to Veysels house, one of George's buddies from his ride to Cape Town in Africa a couple of years ago. We left in the midday sun, the worst possible time to ride, so before setting off doused ourselves and the bikes with the hosepipe to keep cool. We arrived after a ride along some fantastic scenic roads with variable quality surfaces - why an offroad bike comes in handy, and made our way to the Kite surfing beach. Morgan is looking forwards to spending a couple of days chilling and learning how to kite surf and I must now take my wiring loom on the bike apart again after the alarm decided to set itself off last night for no reason and refused to deactivate. Fun times!