Posted by Simon Taylor in Gilgit to Chitral, Pakistan, Video
Gilgit to Chitral Cycle Ride (taster) from Simon Taylor on Vimeo.
This section of the journey took 6 days of cycling and climbed over the 3800m Shandur Pass. We crossed the pass in October to try and reach the Kalash people of NW Pakistan, the only remaining indigenous non-muslims still living in the country. This film is just a brief part of a larger whole.Posted by Simon Taylor in Maps, Route
Posted by Simon Taylor
Posted by Simon Taylor in Route, Summary
Below is a Nasa World Wind video of the route from Ulaan Baatar to Kathmandu:
Download the route as a Google Earth file here
Ulaan Baatar to Kathmandu from Simon Taylor on Vimeo.
Posted by Simon Taylor in Iran, Route
Here's a film made using World Wind, Nasa's simulation software, of our route across the desert in Iran. We took 10 days cycling from Neyshabur to Yazd.
See here for more details. If you want to see this route in Google Earth just click here for the kmz file.
Iran - Crossing the desert from Simon Taylor on Vimeo.
Posted by Simon Taylor in Summary, Turkey, turkeydiary
Finally we reach the end. We’ve had our adventures and made loads of friends, especially in Iran, and over the last 12 months we’ve learned so much about the world, about different societies, cultures, languages, history and about how all these disparate people deal with life in the varied regions through which we’ve cycled. Mongolia, Pakistan and Iran were highlights but everywhere was interesting in it’s own way.
We’ve had time to reflect upon the things we’ve seen, to bore people with our experiences (they did make the mistake of asking) and increasingly to spend more and more time following the valiant attempts of the Iranian people to get the freedom that they all wish for and so deserve. ‘Where is their vote?’
We’re starting to crave bacon, sausages, different clothes, a little bit of consumerism and we miss our friends and family. We’re not really sure where home is so we’re off to England and then Canada before heading off to Dubai to teach there for two years.
The route guides should be good for a few years of cycling so feel free to make use of them, visa info changes constantly so make use of the Thorn Tree on Lonely Planet of you need more up to date info. Feel free to email us for information using the email link if you’re thinking about cycling anywhere along this route yourself and want advice. If you use the guides and they’re wrong then let us know and we’ll update them.
Thanks for reading and a huge thanks to all our friends who helped us while we’ve been away….Jules, Jo and Rob, you’re all absolute stars.
Simon Taylor and Isabelle Bedard June 2009
turkeyontheroadPosted by Simon Taylor in Turkey, turkeydiary
We’re at the end of our journey and have reached our final destination for this cycle ride. We’d always intended to get to Butterfly Valley and now we’re here it’s absolutely magic.
It’s changed, there are new tree houses, people here have changed but the valley is still beautiful.
I first discovered this place about 18 years ago and have been coming back every year or two to relax and switch off from the world of work in the UK.
About 25 years ago a farmer from one of the local village perched high up on the cliffs, sold the orange and lemon tree covered valley to a private person who promptly chopped down all the trees ready to develop the valley for mass tourism.
The end of the valley was (and still is) a breeding site for thousands of butterflies and luckily the land was then bought by a co-operative of Turks with the sole idea of preventing it from being developed. They managed to get the land protected by law and each year one of the co-op runs a small eco friendly camp and restaurant in the valley for a few months in the summer. You can camp on the beach or stay in wooden ‘tree houses’ but no-one can build any permanent structures so nothing much changes, especially when huge storms destroy most of the wooden huts every winter.
With all the rain that Turkey has had this spring, the valley is lush and more beautiful than ever, the waterfalls at the end of the valley are poring with water and climbing up to the top waterfall has become even more exciting.
Here’s some more photos from in the valley and also from George House and some of the coastal paths above the valley:
turkeyontheroadPosted by Simon Taylor in Turkey, turkeydiary
Cappadocia is so photogenic it just begs you to take photos. Close to sunset the shapes and shadows become incredible…..
Here's some photos taken close to sunset not far from our campsite:
turkeyontheroadPosted by Simon Taylor in Ari, Turkey, turkeydiary
In the centre of Turkey in an area called Cappadocia there’s an amazing landscape of fairy chimneys, underground cities and houses and churches built into caves.
It’s easy to visit and it’s also possible to sleep in hotels built into the rocky towers which are everywhere and make up large parts of the villages in the area.
Several million years ago there was a big volcano in the area which one day suddenly exploded, sending billions of tonnes of ash and millions of hard rocks shooting up into the air. All this stuff eventually landed and created a flat landscape of ash littered with smaller hard rocks. Eventually the ash hardened to make a rock called Tufa. (Ari: tufa is like the rock your mum uses to carve sculptures)
Ever since then the rain and the wind have been washing away the tufa wherever there aren’t any hard rocks sitting on the top protecting it, leaving tall towers.
People from the outside called the towers ‘Fairy Chimneys’ because they thought that fairies lived in them.
For hundreds of years people have lived inside the towers, carving rooms and tunnels that go right to the very top. 
They had rooms where pigeons lived in little holes in the walls and the people collected the pigeon poo to use as fertiliser on their gardens, where they grew grapes and fruit.
About 1000 years ago all the Christians in the area were threatened by Muslim invaders and they even built underground cities that they hid in while the armies marched over the top looking for them. Instead of having normal churches they built their churches into the cliffs or underground where no-one could find them and destroy them.
Here’s some more pictures of some of the fairy chimneys and the valleys in the area, the best bit about it is that you can just explore and climb around inside the chimneys looking for tunnels and undiscovered rooms:
turkeyontheroadPosted by Simon Taylor in Turkey, turkeydiary
Having completed the first of our Nemrut Dag summit challenges, we headed West towards the second Nemrut Dag, the 2150m high summit near Karadut village.
This summit is much more famous and more often visited by tourists, as it is an absolutely spectacular sight. Perched on the top of the mountain is a 2000 year old pyramid and on two sides there are flattened terraces covered in giant statues looking out over the rising and setting suns. The whole summit complex wasn’t ‘discovered’ until 1881 when a German engineer employed by the Ottomans to study transport routes found the summit. It wasn’t even excavated until 1953.
The pyramid, terraces and statues were ‘created’ by Antiochus I Epiphanes in about 60-40BC as a tribute to his god and as a way of ensuring that he would join with ‘Ahura Masda’ in the afterlife. Ahura Masda was the name given to the ‘One God’ of the Zoroastians, the first Monotheistic religion, from which all the other Monotheisms have their roots. There are inscriptions on some of the rocks that suggest that Antiochus is buried under the pyramidal mound on the summit but no one has ever found the burial chamber.
For our route Westwards, we wanted to head up to the summit on the Southern road and then head down from the North to Malatya 100km away, and had read in the Lonely Planet that it was possible to cross from one side to the other. This proved no to be the case so we ended up carrying our bicycles and bags up to the summit from the road 700m away and then dropped down to the Northern road.
By the time we got our bikes there at 7am the whole summit was deserted as all the tourists had got cold and gone down. We had the whole place to ourselves and our bicycles. It was absolutely spectacular!
Here’s a brief slideshow:
turkeyontheroad
Posted by Simon Taylor in Cycling Guide, Road Guide, Route Information, Turkey, turkeyroadguide
This 271km route is a real challenge for touring cyclists as it involves cycling over the amazing Nemrut Dag mountain.
If you really like a challenge, a 110km section with nearly 3000m of ascent and descent between Karadut and Malatya.
It can be done over 3 days although it would be more pleasurable and probably healthier to do it over 4 or 5 days and this would give you more time to soak up the amazing scenery of this part of South Eastern Anatolia.
The Nemrut Dag summit is a highlight although with no road over the summit you will have to carry your bike and panniers for about 1km from one side of the mountain to the other.
Anyway if you fancy a go, here’s a route profile:
And here’s full route information:
turkeyroadguide
Posted by Simon Taylor in Turkey, turkeydiary
When we got near to Lake Van in Eastern Turkey we started reading about the volcano that caused the lake to form.
The present Nemrut Dag mountain (2950m) was 1500m taller, and about 6000 years ago exploded creating the lake and a huge crater inside the volcano.
There are now several crater lakes and a whole microclimate in the crater and interestingly for crazy cyclists there’s a 13km road that takes you all the way to the rim, climbing about 1000m from the main road.
Despite the warnings that the road was closed because of snow, we decided to have a go at camping on the rim. It was a bit hairy getting up to there and we did have to carry our bikes and bags up the final 100m to get to the actual rim because of landslides and a huge icey slope blocking the way. Once we were there it was definitely worth it.
We even attempted to get down to the crater although there was really too much snow to make the journey safe enough to do on our bikes, as we discovered later.
We now head off to another Nemrut Dag, about 500km West, with a pyramid on the top and loads of carved heads…hence the ‘Nemrut Dag Squared’ title
Here’s a slideshow:
If you want more information there is a route profile here: Route Profile turkeyontheroadPosted by Simon Taylor in Cycling Guide, Road Guide, Route Information, Turkey, turkeydiary, turkeyroadguide
Most cyclists travelling to or from Van take the Northern route and avoid Diyarbakir. We think this is a mistake as there is a direct route from Malatya over Nemrut Dag (with the heads on the top) to Diyarbakir, admittedly this is a little harder, but so much more spectacular on a bike. If you’re interested in cycling this way in either direction then make the most of these two guides:
If you want to cycle the 385km between Van and Diyarbakir then download and print out the following document:
If you fancy a side trip up the splendid Nemrut Dag volcano (13km one way) then you might also want the route profile as well, although it would come in useful for the Van-Diyarbakir route as well:
turkeyontheroad
