Day 36 (1 July)

Another transition day. But a much easier one than its predecessors.

We were able to leave our bags at the hotel, and Ankara's much cooler weather helped to avoid that uncomfortable feeling that you're starting a night-journey already tired, and a bit grubby round the edges. (Ankara's altitude is almost 1,000 meters, and we've had temperatures in the 20s throughout our stay. Having been broiled for a few weeks, we've found this a pleasant change.)

Because we hadn't yet, we climbed up to Ankara's castle, Hisar Kasri. Unlike Izmir's and Selcuk's, this one still has lots of life within its walls. A mix of renovated and unrenovated, tourist-oriented and ordinary. (Turkish tourists, mind you. We've come across very few foreign tourists. We ran into a big bunch of Italians later at the museum, and heard some French on the streets. But otherwise, there've been surprisingly few foreigners.)

You can climb the battlements for fine, breezy views out over the red roofs and hills of Ankara.







We had lunch at Ceritoglu Konagi (Pancake Mansion), a little place down a picturesque lane off a picturesque street. It was like eating in someone's back garden. We ordered a couple of Turkish specialities that we've not had the chance to try yet: gozleme (which are often glossed as "Turkish crepes", but are really more akin to chapattis, and can be folded over various fillings, in my case eggplant); and manti (described as "Turkish ravioli", but consisting of smaller packages than their Italian equivalent, and topped off with yogurt, dill, and red pepper flakes, giving a characteristically Turkish flavour).




We spent the remainder of our time at the Anatolian Civilizations Museum, trying to wrap our heads around the many early peoples who have left their imprint on this land -- Assyrian traders, Hittites, Phrygians, Urartu, and so on. Two of the galleries displaying later materials are currently closed for restoration. But you can't really complain. There's already far more than you can actually take in at a sitting.











After a quick tea at a simple simit-and-pastries cafe, we collected our baggage, and arrived at the station at 7 pm. According to the timetable we'd been sent, our train -- heading for Kars, way out in the east of Turkey -- was due to leave at 7.55 pm.

I'd happened to read on a website that the line between Ankara and Irmak is currently closed because they're building a high-speed track. So we were not wholly surprised to be diverted to a bus stop at the front of the station, and told the actual train would be leaving Irmak at 9.20. But by the time we'd got the details on this, we'd missed the 7 pm bus, and the next one didn't roll up until 7.40, by which time I was getting just a tad anxious, and starting to wonder what would happen if we missed this key connection...

But the sunset drive, through Turkey's always beautiful countryside, helped to make the world right again.

And at Irmak, we duly boarded the "Turistik Dogu Ekspresi".



This was not the train we originally planned to catch, and the story goes like this:

I'd read that the Dogu Express was a really scenic 24-hour train ride, and took us to a good jumping-off point for Georgia. So we contacted Amber Travel (the agency we'd used to book last week's long Turkish rail journey) to ask them to book it (thus saving ourselves the aggro of constantly checking back to see if tickets had become available on this really sought-after service).

"Snag," they reported. TCDD, the Turkish railway company, in response to the over-popularity of the route, had recently decided to create two services. The "ordinary" Dogu would remain, but without sleepers (offering only couchettes and reclining seats). In addition there'd be the "Turistik Dogu", with ONLY sleepers, at a considerably higher price.

"Two couchettes on the ordinary will do us fine," we said.

"Two snags," they said. There weren't at that point any couchettes available for our date, and because we're male and female, we'd have to book all four couchettes in the compartment.

"Aaaargh," we thought. Don't want to get caught with only recliners on such a long ride. So we opted for the "Turistik", despite hating the label (and the price -- although I guess, if you step back from the context of normally very cheap Turkish rail fares, EUR 44 per person is actually not too exorbitant for such a long distance...)

All good, until we get the schedule. Our 24-hour train trip is now a 32-hour train trip, and we get in at 4.30 in the morning...

"Aaaargh," we thought. And information was hard to come by, as this is such a new service. The rationale seemed to be that, rather than stopping briefly at a large number of places, certain travellers (and service-providing locals) would appreciate fewer but longer stops. But all the timetables we could find showed stops at the key places in the middle of the night. Shurely shome mishtake...

Anyway, here we are in our little compartment for two. We have our own wash-basin, and our own fridge (wish I'd known that). The sofa is a separate entity from the fold-down bed, and therefore quite comfortable.


Another of my fears about this iteration of the Dogu was that it would be an export-oriented product and full of foreigners. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, we're the ONLY foreigners. The rest of the passengers are Turkish holiday-makers.

Our coach-attendant is lovely, and makes a game attempt at English. And not long after we'd got under way, a young woman with some English knocked on our door, selling tours for the places we'd be stopping at (so presumably we won't be doing them in the dark...) We bought, pretty much sight unseen (as all the information was in Turkish), places on the first trip (TRY 75 per person).

Day 37 (2 July)

We woke to golden wheatfields... And then breakfast delivered to our compartment.

The scenery has been wonderful all day. So many kinds of mountains. So many colours.





But the highlight was meeting the Euphrates...






We were told last night that our excursion would happen when the train reached Ilic at 9 am or 10 am. That estimate was this morning revised to 11 am, and we actually arrived at 11.30, at which point we piled into a few minivans and set off.

We were whisked up the mountain, and down again to the bit of the Euphrates that goes through a deep, narrow, quite spectacular gorge. We boated upstream for a little while, and drifted back. You'd have to have a heart as hard as the cliffs to not be overawed.






The next stop was Kemaliye, a very pretty mountain village famous for its mulberries (which are delicious).







It was a great opportunity to see a bit more of the scenery of the area. But I truly regretted not finding the time to learn more Turkish before I came. You really need it in these circumstances. A couple of kind people pulled out some English to translate bits and pieces for us. But you feel kind of burdensome...

And it was all very quick, as such tours often are.

Then back on the train to watch more awesome scenery roll by.





The next stop was Erzincan. We declined the tour, and went for a walk into town instead (where we had a great dinner at Kebapci).


We'd been told the train would be leaving at 18.55. It finally left at about 19.20. We'd also been told there would be another excursion at Erzurum, but it was already dusk when we left, and would be totally dark by the time the train got to Erzurum. We went to bed, so I don't know what happened.

Day 38 (3 July)

Our friendly attendant told us yesterday that the train would arrive in Kars about 5 am, but there was no hurry to get off, and we were free to sleep until 7 am or so.

In fact we'd woken up at 5.30, and the train arrived at 5.45. We started collecting up our things -- and the train set off again. Into a siding... A bit weird. We waited until 7 am, by which time the attendant was out and about stripping beds. We climbed down onto the track and walked back over the ballast to the station.

Before we knew about the change in the Dogu schedule, we'd booked a hotel for the night that became the second night on the train (and of course it was a no-cancellation booking). A bit annoying, but actually it was quite nice to be able to rock up just after 7 am, take our luggage to our room, hoover up some breakfast, shower, and change our clothes.

And then... Kars.

This is a city that seems to have come in for some bad publicity -- wholly undeserved in the view of Pat Yale.

We've found it very interesting.

It's had a checkered past, and was subject at various points to the Armenians, the Mongols, the Ottomans, and the Russians (who attacked the area several times, and in 1877 succeeded in holding it -- all the way up to 1918). These various influences have left their mark on the built environment.












The castle looms over the city (which, at 1,760 metres, itself sits quite high). Looking out, you see countryside that is reminiscent of Mongolia, with patches of snow still lingering on the high mountains on the horizon.






So Kars is a great pivot-point for our journey. We're now very definitely looking east...