I was a sight to behold on the first morning, my bike fully loaded, basket attached and I could barely steer in a straight line!!! I was terrified! The whole bike seemed to wobble underneath me and I had no control. I scrabbled around trying to redistribute the weight in my panniers to make the front easier to steer, this helped a little but then I think it was me shaking instead of the bike so I couldn't win. We stopped for a few photos in front of Hagia Sophia and then we were off through Istanbul. Istanbul is home to 17 million people and so it took a long time to even get to the bridge which takes you over to the Asian side of Istanbul. This took me through my first dog experience, which is to become a common occurence and happens to up my speed by about 10km/hour and my heart beats twice as fast too. Three big dogs barking their heads off at me, and as I am always behind Humphrey I seem to get them in full barking mode. We bought sticks to try and fend them off but I don't think I will have time to use it, and we have since found out, much to the hilarity of everyone we meet, that the sticks are actually rolling pins!
Our first hurdle was the bridge, a huge suspension bridge which takes you to Asia. We started on what we thought was a path along side the road. How wrong we were, the police stopped us and told us to go round through the toll. I suggested we carry our bikes over the barrier once we were out of sight of him, which we did. Humphrey then said 'Cycle as fast as you can.' This was obviously going to invite trouble, and so my bike chain fell off 20 metres before the police man and the start of the bridge. Watching Humphrey speed off into the distance, I, panicstricken, put my chain back on and wobbled off as fast as I could, not daring to look up at what I am sure was an incredible view down the Bosphorus.
The rest of the day consisted of 60% cycling and 40% pushing as the hills got higher and higher and longer and longer. I was close to tears on that day and was wondering why I was there at all! We finally reached Akcacese which happened to be at the top of the biggest hill of the day and I begrudgingly refused a couple of lifts up the road by the lorries that roared past me watching me push Whinne up the hill. I was exhausted and was happy to finally get into bed that night, we camped by the beach that night although we didn't have a great nights sleep as there was a band who played the incessant Turkish music until almost midnight!
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