Back to the coast! And a note on the waste management of Turkey

We had two whole days of rest in Göreme! Two (2) days without cycling! We actually walked around! Mainly to get food, but still. The landscape of Cappadocia is beautiful, and could be on a different planet. The rock formations, the colors of the different geological layers, the fairy chimneys; just magical. We understand why this place is so populair with influencers, the whole scenery is a perfect backdrop for all your selfies. Normally at sunrise dozens of hot air balloons take off, providing even more Instagram material (just Google Cappadocia). On our way to Göreme we said to ourselves: “let’s do one super touristy thing and book one of these balloons!”. Yeah, nope. Turkey is in lockdown and that also means no balloons. So we wandered through the valleys and had cold beers with the Dutchies we met a month ago in Ephesus. Resting days well spent!

Our plan is to go back to Istanbul via the black sea coast, so this means that after Cappadocia we cycled due north, in the direction of Samsun. The first two days were, dare we say it, rather boring. Hill after hill of grass and wheat. They grow a lot of grass here. Up to where they can irrigate it, that is, all the rest is just barren. And power lines. Not the most awe inspiring landscapes.

We also became more and more a rarity. People would stare at us in the streets and whole families came out of their houses to wave at us. Boredom due to the nation-wide lockdown might also have something to do with it. On the road, we often encountered the international sign for “WTF are you doing?” from drivers when they turned a curve and suddenly were confronted with two hobos on bikes..

We wanted to quickly get some food in Aydıncık, but soon we were surrounded by old men who really really didn’t get the whole cycling business. Everyone got out their phones to discuss our route (impossible!). One of them called a friend who could speak German and this guy wanted to load our bikes in his van to drive us to Zile, 100 km down the road. Or at least we could sleep at his home. Or provide us with some food. The cutest thing was when he asked if we had enough “Taschengeld” (pocket money). We assured him that yes, we actually liked to cycle, camp in the wild and we had enough money and he reluctantly let us go.

After Aydıncık the landscape also became more to our liking (read; there was more to see than grass). The weather was unpredictable, with one day sweating our ass off and the next we woke up freezing and in the rain. But just south of Samsun the scenery reminded us almost of Switzerland so we felt quite at home. Steep hillsides until we finally could see our destination for now: the black sea. We will follow the coast all the way to Istanbul and beyond. Then we will cross the border to (probably) Bulgaria. There is just one thing that ruins the views for us, and that is:

(The lack of) waste management in Turkey

We’ve praised the Turkish food, the Turkish hospitality and the landscape, but now we would like to air some criticism. (yes, we are aware there is plenty to critize, but we would like to stay away from politics). We are talking about the insane amount of rubbish at roadsides, at lakes, rivers, campsites, viewpoints…. Everywhere you’ll find plastic water bottles, ayran cups, diapers, wet wipes, bags, food packaging, cigarette butts, glass bottles, masks (guess that’s a recent addition) and lonely shoes. Why is there always a shoe lying around? Oh, and the pee bottles. Truck drivers are busy people and do not have time for a pee break and use plastic water bottles (they were gonna throw these out of the window anyway).

Not just the “normal” littering, also construction waste is dumped everywhere. Piles with concrete, toilet bowls, sinks, tiles… We were told that the taxes are so high that there is a great incentive created to just dump everything into the nearest forest or down the slope after you’re done remodeling. As we see so much road side during the tour, we keep wondering… The Turks are so proud of their country, how is it possible that they use that same country as a huge open landfill?

On the other hand, it could be well waste from the EU. Since China has banned import of waste from the EU, Turkey has become also the place to ship “our” waste to.

No matter whose waste it is, it sometimes feels futile to pack our waste every morning after camping and dump it in the nearest bin, as we could well spend hours at each site cleaning up…