Handsome IRAK

On the most adventuresome and dangerous leg of our trip we go deep into Southeast-anatolian territory: Kurdistan. Although people told us it is not wise to go there, we have an awesome time hitching with locals.

On a junction just meters off Iraqi territory.

Dunno what happened to this car.

For about 500 meters we are on Iraqi soil!!!
It is a once-in-a-lifetime-experience!



The landscape is jaw-dropping: Huge mountains, remote villages and goat herding.
At the border we are actually not allowed to take pictures. Anyways. Here for you:



More to come!

Ausgesetzt im Dunkeln, im Nirgendwo - Arsch!

Wir verabschieden uns herzlich von Mustafa, einem außerordentlich netten CouchSurfer in Antep. Er hat wirklich das beste aus der kurzen gemeinsamen Zeit gemacht. Vielen Dank Mustafa, wir wünschen dir viel Spaß in England und hoffen, dass dir hitchhiken gefallen wird.

Mit dem leckeren Pistazien-Bahlava im Bauch stehen wir nun auf einer Tanke Richtung Mardin - dem letzen zivilisierten Außenposten in/vor Kurdistan.

Unsere Augen weiten sich beim Anblick zweier S-Klasse-Wagen. Leider können wir nicht wirklich herausfinden, ob sie uns mitnehmen oder nicht. Dennoch entscheiden wir uns bei ihnen zu bleiben. Das ist falsch, denn 30 Minuten später wird uns gesagt, dass die Wagen erst bei Dunkelheit losfahren.
Schnell finden wir einen anderen Wagen. Mohammad Fahrt aber überraschend nicht in richtung Mardin, sondern biegt von der Schnellstraße ab. Minuten später sitzen wir mit 8 Fahrern eines Autoverleihs in einem Industriegebiet von Antep ohne bisher voran gekommen zu sein. Auch der Chai kann dieses mulmige Gefühl nicht verdrängen.

Zwei Stunden später als geplant sind wir dann endlich auf dem Weg. Auf einer Raststätte findet Mohammed einen LKW direkt nach Mardin. Wir laden um.

Yusef ist nett, sein Mercedes-LKW der geräumigste und modernste, in dem wir bisher waren. Wieder müssen wir uns mit Händen und Füssen verständigen. Yusef gibt uns eröffnet uns unbekannte Perspektiven: Für ihn war Saddam Hussein ein guter Mann, denn er bescherte Yusef gute Autobahnen. Irak - dorthin fährt Yusef … leider im Schneckentempo. Dario schätzt, dass wir mit durchschnittlich 40 km/h voran kommen. Ölwechsel und Baden im Euphrat verlängern die Fahrzeit weiter.

Später bemerke ich, dass Yusef eine Fahrweise ähnlich der von Dagobert Duck hat: Gas geben bei ansteigender Straße und Leerlauf wenn's bergab geht. Trotzdem behalten wir immer unsere Ruhe: Wir haben Ferien!

Es ist stockenduster, mitten in der Nacht, gefühlte 30 Kilometer von Mardin entfernt. Plötzlich im nirgendwo halt Yusef an und sagt: "Steigt aus!". Waaas? Wir diskutieren wild mit ihm und bitten ihn uns zumindest bis zum nächsten Licht zu fahren. Fehlanzeige. Dunkelheit, Teer und Hitze. Ich sage zu Dario: "Tja, wir wollten Abenteuer"

Zitat Dario: "Hauptsache du läufst hier mit nem QR-Code in Ostanatolien rum und die Leute können noch nicht mal lesen."

Zum Glück sind wir in der Türkei: Nach ein paar Metern entlang der Zufahrt hält Sinan mit seinem Truck an. 20 Minuten kurdische Musik später sind wir in der Neustadt von Mardin. Wir wollen aber in die vielfach gelobte Altstadt am Hang. Es ist mittlerweile fast Mitternacht und wir haben noch nichts gegessen. Zwei "coole Typen" führen uns ihr aufgemotztes Auto - ein Kia - vor, kennen die Stadt aber auch nicht. Nach einigem Herumfragen sind wir da.

Heroes of Cappadocia

Our second night in the hammocks is better, but still freezing. Tired,
we have a fast breakfast and pack our stuff.

After 10 minutes waiting for a lift, Craig runs to an oldtimer at the traffic light near us.

The four Dutch guys inside are fascinated by our journey and invite us
to get in, although there is no place left. We squash us between them and "join
the party".



For the third time we are asked, whether we are brothers or "warm brothers".
A village later, they drop us and we make a crazy picture together.
While driving away they shout: "You are heroes!"

Hitching an old Ford limousine with Dutch warm brothers.

It was just a short ride, we're still in Cappadocia. I will shorten
our next lifts, there is too much to tell about each of them:
- Mesut, a German-speaking guy on holidays
- Hahlet, quiet man without any English knowledge
- Kaimaluddin, a very friendly Teacher, who invited us to Lahmacun &
Ayran in Nidge
- Mahmut, sympatic Truck-driver, who invited us to Adana Kebab & Coke
(second Lunch) at a gas station
- Vali, who taught us some things about Turkey and Kurdistan
- Ghengis (Khan), open-minded, speaks English and helped us a lot,
especially with his Mercedes (~180 km/h)
- A truck driver, we forgot to ask for his name, told us to be carful in Iran

We get dropped at the fringe of Gaziantep. Luckily people are interested in people hiking along the expressway. They stop and offer their help:



On the way to the city centre we call Mustafa, our CouchSurfer in
Gaziantep and make a meeting point.

He picks us up and we are instantly amazed by his friendliness and way
of life. We arrive at his home at night, take a shower and offer him
fruits and nuts.

While watching RTL German Television (!), we talk about the idea of
CouchSurfing and he explains his new project, a
CouchSurfing/hitch-hiking tour through the United Kingdom. We wish him all the best for this project.

Luckily we can wash our clothes and can enjoy a good sleep.

Exploring Cappadocia

Where is Craig ...

Mehmet, Craig & Dario vs. Language Barrier

Italian looking Sami has dropped us at a junction on the highway just meters before a traffic light. We try to employ new strategies dancing and surprising the passing vehicles. Luckily Dario notices a truck stopping. As we climb the stairs to the cockpit I see locals trying to hitchhike: They copycat our methods ;-)

Mehmet is a fun-loving guy. He's travelled the world - though in a quite different way than many would expect: Mehmet steers his German powered and Turkish garnished Mercedes truck from Kuwait to the Netherlands and from Syria to Russia. Cologne is only one of numerous German cities that he is accustomed to. Today he is heading for the Irak.

We talk about many different topics (truck mechanics, Turkish-German relations, …) and also get updated about the sad happenings in Norway. All of this we communicate with hands and the few words that we know about each other's language. Our Turkish is improving strange situation by strange situation.

An entertaining ride reaches another funny moment as Mehmet pulls the truck over to get new breaks. There is a nice atmosphere in the big hall as we chatter with the mechanical engineers. All around the hall there are posters by German companies about different parts of the truck.



At the end we get a little nervous as Mehmet wants us to take a different route promising us it would save time. Later we would find out it was the opposite of time saving. "Güle güle, Mehmet"

Direct lift to Ankara

We got up very early this morning, there is a long way to travel! With
2 bananas, some cookies and a water bottle equipped, we stand on the
O2, the motorway to Ankara.

Waiting for people to understand our sign, suddenly a public bus stops
in front of us and the driver tells us to get in. First we hesitate,
did he understand where we are going?

But we decide to try our luck and we succeed: The bus brings us to a
better part of the "otobahn", where more cars join in.

5 minutes later, we're lucky again: A friendly Turkish guy in his
fourtıes offers us a ride.



Another lift, another great life experience: Ayhan is an aquatic
engineer and builds huge aquariums for zoos, hotels and restaurants.
We are excited and ask a lot of questions. He has to go to Ankara to check
materials from China for his new project. We tell him about our
experience in the water tunnel on Sentosa, Singapore.

Out of the blue he offers us breakfast and aims at a gas station.
Inside the flat building a huge restaurant is located and we can't
believe our eyes as we see the buffet: Seven different sorts of
cheese, large cans with honey, olives, almonds and mountains of bread!
We carefully choose our food and enjoy our breakfast with "chai" and
fried eggs.



You'll never find anything comparable in Germany!

As we continue our journey, the landscape slowly changes from green to
yellow as we head to Ankara.

As we arrive about 4 hours later, it's 38 degree Celsius, so we search
for some shadows.