May 14th: Sorry for the delay but we just were to tired yesterday 😉.
Wow what a ride… 1000 km ! Before reflecting a bit on the long way to Drama a short view back on Ankara. What a beautiful city it is. Unbelievable! Go there, experience it and make your own judgment. As mentioned already we stayed in the Cinnah hotel in the middle of the city. Modern, stylish and very international that is how the hotel appeared to us. We can only recommend it. The only watch out is the concierge 😉. …. and old grumpy bugger that is very determined and stubborn.
After our long drive we parked the car out side the hotel in the parking. The bugger wanted to have the car keys to be able to manover the car if needed. Martin told him 10 times he will park the car and make sure moving around is not needed….. it seemed to me there was a bit of a misunderstanding between the gents as the concierge went on and on… Martin is a very calm and relaxed person but if you reach his limits take a hike…. I think the concierge is still running 😜.
We left Ankara at 6h00am. No traffic at that time at all so an easy drive and after 15 min Ankara was an other stop behind us. We went direction Istanbul. In Ankara a brand new Highway to Istanbul is starting…. you can cruise 125km/h …. no traffic and a street without potholes. We had planned to pass Istanbul via the Northern Route …. to avoid most of the traffic around the city.
75 km before the real city of Istanbul is located you reach the fist outskirts of it. The closer you get the more traffic you are in. The plan with the northern route worked perfectly apart from some very minor traffic jams we made our way through easily . …. and than you reach this Bridge that holds two continents together…. simply amazing…. you drive within 4 minutes from Asia to Europe…. if you go to Istanbul do this it is a great experience.
Now back in Europe next Target was the border to Greece. We took a very scenic road direct alongside the Sea. Magnificent. After 2h you reach the border. We did really not know what to expect…. keep in mind our „fantastic“ experience we made in Bazargan.
On the Turkish side it took 8 min and we went through…. unbelievable…. with the right passport not a problem at all. ….. makes you think about the status of the German passport. Than the Greek side came…. unbelievable an other 15 min and we were done. That gave us a lot of time to drive to Drama and get our new shoes for the car…… that was the plan.
Unfortunately the tires will only arrive tomorrow so we had the entire afternoon to have some beers and discover Drama. Which ended up with a nice dinner in a Tavern close by the hotel. Super dishes and wine and Ouzo and wine and Ouzo. Tomorrow we are on our way to Montenegro.
