Greece lightening, Turkish delight

There are days when being in the van looks quite appealing

Rain.  Gets down your neck, in your boots, in your bags; fogs up your visor, makes getting your gloves on ruddy difficult.  Stops you seeing the road ahead, makes manhole covers and road paint slick and slippery; makes a mockery of stopping distances.  Whips you in the face if you open the visor, and hides rim-crippling ruts and potholes in the puddles.  

Rain.

Not much to say about our trip out of Greece this morning - it was wet from the minute we awoke until shortly before the Turkish border, 166 miles later.  No photos - I’m guessing you know what rain looks like, even those of you from that sun parched desert in Costa del Doddington.  Most of the miles were on motorways again, and I’m also guessing you know about those too.

How to pass the time?  Left alone in your helmet, bottled up against the weather as best you can, it’s a time to ruminate and cogitate.  As the GPS lady directed me to steer along Odysseus Street, Nestor Place or make a U-turn where safe to do so, opposite Socrates’ shop, I was enjoying the ride more that you might expect.  There was nothing much to look at, but the classical names were fun to listen to, and reminded me of years studying the classical texts and plays of ancient Greece.  (Well, we couldn’t spent the entire school term playing sport and binge drinking, right?)

Another odd moment was a stretch of road where a mass-slaughter of insects was taking place.  In the skies around my head, sharp winged swallows were scything through the air after their prey.  It was a combat zone as intense as any WWII dog fight, and a motorway speed motorcyclist was no obstacle to the dip and duck, bank and cut of the birds.  I wonder that none of them hit me, and seeing them operating at such speed in such numbers was very impressive.  Swallows were a traditional good omen in ancient Greece, so I was pleased to see so many.  

I smiled, because it reminded me of my Mum’s devoted monitoring of her own flocks and flights of swifts and swallows.

Little else to trouble you with - the border crossing into Turkey was slow, but hardly dramatic.  We’re all feeling achy but pleased to have got to the end of the motorway madness in once piece, especially given the increasingly lively local traffic.  

So long as they continue with English translations, these signs are easy!

We have a few days here in Istanbul to recover ourselves.  And I have a feeling the 5-star Legacy Ottoman Hotel will be pretty effective at that!