Day 87 - Arnavutköy to Istanbul

48.7 km - FINAL TOTAL 4,483.0 km - Route pedalled.       Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 87  

We are safe and secure in Istanbul, Turkey.   

We decided to leave early because we were a bit anxious about the cycling through Istanbul. I remember from my time in Istanbul 14 years ago about the many hills the city is built on and how steep the walking had been.

The first 15 kilometres were fairly easy. Not much traffic on a Saturday morning in Arnavutköy and then a dirt road. We got to ride side by side, shared the road with one car and half a dozen cows steered by a dog.

Spotting the white minaret, we looked forward to our last chai stop with the guys in a rural setting. It is quite interesting to hear engaged conversation come to a complete stop when we walk in and resume shortly thereafter. From my seat, I could see the start of our final 2 kilometre climb.

On one of her ‘wait for the old guy’ halts, Hélène looked ahead on the side of the road and spotted a small turtle. That was her second turtle of the trip. 

We also encountered our first horse and wagon also going the hill. A very steady climber, that horse was pretty quick and almost caught up to Hélène. The change from rural to urban was instantaneous and we were in heavy traffic.

As you can see in ReLive there was quite a bit of downhill which was nice. We also had the wrestling with the rebar that brought Hélène to an immediate halt with 13 kilometres from the finish. We were so lucky to get that sorted quickly. 

We left the easy riding of the main artery to swing right, uphill to pass beside the Palace of the Porphyrogenitus. We got a turn by turn opportunity to experience the neighborhood's narrow and steep streets.

From there, we passed a number of large and impressive mosques on our way to our final stop on the Sultans Trail, the Süleymaniye Mosque. Because of strict dress regulations, we were not able to visit the inside of mosque so we focused on the surrounding grounds.

From the mosque, it was but a short 1.5 kilometre to the hotel. We finally made it to the hotel almost 10 1/2 hours after leaving Arnavutköy, very satisfied with what we had accomplished over the last 87 days. It was nice to be told to go check in and our luggage would be looked after.

Behind us the Süleymaniye Mosque, Istanbul

I am writing the blog(June 22, 2025) while sitting on a wooden bench facing down a very steep street. I keep sliding down the bench. I could use a seat belt!   

I'm sitting facing Hélène as well as the slope of the hill

This will be our last blog update.  A statistics/lessons learned page will be published once we are back home and we will send an email to let you know it has been published.

Day 86 - Arnavutköy

Total so far 4,434.30 km                       

Video of the day: Europe Day 86                     46 Left to pedal

Today we rested and spending our last night on the Sultans trail.  Tomorrow we reach our goal for this trip.

Our lunch spot today

Airport area appears larger than the town of Arnavutkoy

Day 85 - Kabakça to Arnavutköy

 47.7 km - Total so far 4,434.30 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 84   & Europe Day 85                         46 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in Artnavutköy, Turkey.

We could not get an early breakfast so we had to leave much later than we wanted. We assumed that it might not be that bad since we had only 47 kilometres to ride.  We could not have been more wrong. 

We started climbing as we left the village and it is was pretty much up and down all day. In the rural areas, the traffic consisted mostly of large trucks and some cars. We got a lot of encouragement “horn tooting” from construction trucks whether they were passing us or passing from the other direction. We stopped a few times for chai in villages and scored free chai at kilometre 17.6 . We also had a nice lunch of soup and rice at a tiny restaurant of 3 tables. 

Enjoying chai and learning some Turkish

Then we hit the built up areas. Still the same climbs and with more aggressive drivers and traffic lights. Having to resume a climb from a standing start at a traffic light is such a horrible sensation.

We encountered generous people who paid for our chai again, stopped to give us a bottle of cold water, ran after us down the street to ask if we needed help or stopped next to us on the road to give us a bag of mini chocolate muffins. 

I (Daniel) was exhausted by the time we reached our destination. It was by far one of the hardest days we have had on the adventure so far. We had done hills before, we had ridden in the mid-30 heat before, we had climbed hills in busy urban traffic and descended steep inclines with precious little shoulder on the side of the road. We had a horrible combination of all four factors in the last 15 to 20 kilometres and brutally exhausting doesn’t even begin to describe how tough it was. Riding into Sofia was a picnic compared to the last push today. Hélène had more enjoyment than I did. All I can say is ebike on the next big adventure! 

We went shopping for beer last evening and that was an experience. Only stores that are outside of the magical radius can sell beer. Inside the store, the beer is kept out of sight behind locked doors. There seems to be a disconnect between urban and rural Turkey not unlike what we experience in Canada.

Stray cat hoping for a snack

Day 84 - Saray to Kabakça

 58.2 km - Total so far 4,386.60 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 84                         92 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in Kabakça, Turkey.

Not much of a warm up this morning as within a kilometre of leaving the hotel we went up hill. That was pretty much the story the entire day. A lot more climbing than we had done to date except maybe the ride to Tuttlingen on Day 25. 

We had our now required morning chai break and for the first time in a while, we had to pay for it. We snacked on our favourite Dutch cookies made in Istanbul. 

The breakfast of champions in Hélène's left hand.

Lunch was a bit of a let down. We had hoped to get something from the local hole in the wall restaurant but there wasn’t one. Hélène dashed to the BOK grocery store and came back with 2 yogurts and 2 chocolate bars. 

Bringing in the yogurt cleared out the place

A fellow Dutch cyclist saw our bright orange pannier covers from a long distance and decided to catch up to us. It says a lot about how visible we are with those covers. It also says how slow we are with all the stuff we are carrying. We will let you know his name as soon as he emails us since for the life of me I cannot remember his first name. He rode with us for a while and decided that we were too slow for him and just took off. It was very impressive to see him pull away effortlessly as a recently retired 66 year old.

We got tooted at a lot today mostly by big tractor trailers hauling gravel to who knows where. 

We got to Kabakça at about 5 pm and completely famished. We stopped pretty close in the middle of the town busy area looking for a restaurant. A very astute gentleman figured out what we were doing, he kissed his finger tips and pointed in the direction of the restaurant. We followed his tip and had a cheap and cheerful supper. Turns out the owner has a cousin living in Toronto and plays hockey.  

We stopped in a small store and asked for beer. The owner, a nice lady, indicated she could not sell beer because of the building located next door. Same issue as we had in Edirne. She indicated the “market” is where you buy beer. I have carried an emergency “beer can” since Belgrade and I thought I might have to crack it open tonight.

The building next door to the little store

On the way to our lodging, I spotted empty beer cases outside the BOK market. The emergency beer would survive another day and get closer to Istanbul.

We are spending the night in a renovated outbuilding near the old train station. We discovered that the owner of the place had only one key to get in and that the key was inside the building sitting on the small table. For the last 83 days, the only way we got to lock a door was with the key making nearly impossible to lock yourself out. Here as soon as you close the door it is locked from the outside. It was hilarious to see a guy show up with tools to let us in. We resolved the problem ourselves by lifting the screen and reaching in to the key on the table.

Tomorrow we have another “bicycle climb fest” just like today. A great way to cleanse the body!

Day 83 - Kaynarca to Saray

54.1 km - Total so far 4,328.4 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 83                         156 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in Saray, Turkey.

We left around 7:30 to get a head start on the heat. We had spoken to Jim, from the UK, and he and two other cyclists had done just that leave very early but it turns out it completely messed up their sleep pattern. When we met him in Edirne, he was still having issues sleeping. I have enough trouble trying to get a decent night sleep due to my coughing so the last thing I need is to make things worst by getting up much earlier.

We started off on the main road with the idea of using the Sultans Trail route to get a break from the traffic. We skipped the opportunity at the first junction and stayed on the road. After our breakfast stop, we had enough of the traffic and decided to take the Sultans Trail connection. As expected, it was a dirt road which is okay but we also had an encounter with big and very unfriendly dogs showing upper teeth. We have an ultrasonic dog deterrent device but it does not work on all dogs in a pack. That was the second encounter of the day so we decided to go back to the main road.

We had many more than usual people honk their horns, wave and/or give us the thumbs up. That included folks in cars, large transport trucks and everything in between.

As we got to the top of a climb, we spotted a small building that we thought might be a fruit/vegetable seller on the other side of the road. It was a Jandarma  (police) station. They were waiving us to them. What do we do? We decided that it was best to go see them as it is nearly impossible to do a fast get away on touring bikes. As we joined them, they gave us water and led us to the back of the building where we found shade and a place to sit. They returned with a cold bottle of Fanta. Once done, we shook hands and took a picture. Another pleasant and unexpected encounter.

When we got to Saray we were famished. Hélène had identified a large park area and made our way there. We found a bench in the shade and a donair shop across the street. 

This lady showed up and started to speak English to us without hesitation. She was from Istanbul and went to school in Switzerland where she studied different languages. Rose chatted with us about her personal life and life in Turkey. 

Day 82 - Kirklareli to Kaynarca

 33.6 km - Total so far 4,274.30 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 82                         214 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in the village of Kaynarca, Turkey.

I was pretty easy leaving Kirkareli as it was mostly downhill until we hit a big climb. It was a tough one and even the trucks had to use low gear. At the top, we did a left hand turn, leaving the main road behind snd settled down on a quiet country road.

We pulled into our first village looking to get our morning fix of chai. We spotted the place, lots of shade, many tables and a number of older gentleman sipping chai. We roll by, stop and lean our bikes against the stone wall. There is lots of chattering and as soon as we appear, move towards a table and sit, the chattering stops. You could have heard the proverbial pin drop. The owner takes a step towards us and as I look at him I say “Iki çay” (2 chai). He smiles, leaves and returns with our chai. The chattering has resumed but is pretty subdued. A younger man stands up and asks: “Where you from?” Canada I tell all. A general AHHH is heard from the assembled and the chattering restarts as if we weren’t there. We could not pay for our chai, once again on the house. On departure, we got a big wave from all.

We were going to repeat the above at village number 3 but could not. The village looked deserted. We spotted the usual place but there was no one outside. Hélène got off her bike, walked up the two steps, opened the door and asked: “Is the anyone here?” No reply. At that very moment a car pulled up with two gentlemen inside. One came to talk to us in Turkish, we replied the usual. He went back to the car and got water bottles. He told us to follow him to a table. The second person in the car joined. A third person showed up out of nowhere and person one asked him for 3 chais. Then another person showed up. 

Person one turned out to be a veterinarian (vet) who travels often to Canada to visit firms that produce bovine sperm. He had a trip coming up in the next couple of weeks to Toronto and a side trip to Niagara Falls. We had a Google Translate chat. He too refused our money for the chai. 

We got back on the bikes, ran into a shepherd and met up again with our vet in Kaynarca who guided us to a restaurant for a quick bite. 

We finally made it to our lodging for tonight, a small A-frame cottage next to a pool. There were some issues at check-in. It was the business that wanted up front payment a few days ago. Again things were resolved in our favour.

Tomorrow we have a 60 kilometre day to Saray. We will have a few decisions to make since we are a bit ahead of schedule. 

Day 81 - Edirne to Kirklareli

63.2 km - Total so far 4,240.70 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 81                         246 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in Kirklareli, Turkey.

Since Hélène and I are not feeling well, it was decided that we would forgo the Sultans Trail route and take the most direct route. 

Cycling through Erdine was done quickly.  The D100 road we were on went from a boulevard to a highway with a huge sign indicating no pedestrians, no horse and buggy and no bicycles allowed. We did about 1.5 km on the forbidden highway before we got to the side road that would get us to the intended route, the D020 road.

The D020 is a four lane highway (90 kph) with a large shoulder to accommodate farm equipment making it less stressful to cycle. What struck us the most is that the landscape and rolling terrain reminded us so very much of cycling Saskatchewan in 2015. The hills were a bit higher and there were quite a few of them so we could not see as far as we could in Saskatchewan, other than that pretty similar. 

We stopped for çay (chai tea) with the guys in Häskoy and did lunch in Inece in a place with no guys, two plastic tables and a couple of chairs outside. On the way into town we encountered two barking and growling errand dogs and the same thing on the way out. There were three errand dogs near where we had lunch and they weren’t at all bothered with us.

After lunch, the temperature had climbed from the mid 20’s to the mid 30’s and the wind had picked up quite a bit. It was more of an effort to pedal but that headwind was refreshing on the downhills.

We got to our hotel at a reasonable time, found a store that sold beer and chips and we are now chilling. We still feel like crap but we are done cycling for the day.

Tomorrow we have a short day as we head to Pinarhisar.

Day 80 - Edirne

 4,177.50 km - 322 Left to pedal

Video of the day: Europe Day 79 & 80    

We headed off on foot this morning to go visit the Grand Synagogue of Edirne.

On the way there, we stopped at an apothecary to pick up cough syrup and drops. I’ve been coughing for a good week and Hélène has a sore throat and is almost loosing her voice. Ricardo, our friend from Portugal and Jim, from the UK are also under the weather.

We made it to a supermarket to check it out and managed to buy beer. Our hotel is alcohol free because it is within 150 meters from a mosque. 

We enjoyed a nice lunch of salads on a patio and watched city workers dig a hole to fix a water main. It almost felt like home for a while .

Windy area, which we liked

We made it to the synagogue and they let us in after scanning our backpack. The synagogue was finished in 1909, abandoned in the 1980s and restored in 2015. Today there was an exhibition of drawings of mosques found throughout Turkey. 

Mosque drawing

State of synagogue before restoration

We made our way towards the taxi stands but managed a quick stop for chai and baklavas. 

Day 79 - Edirne

4,177.50 km - 322 Left to pedal

We slept in this morning. After breakfast we planned for the remaining 322 kilometres to Istanbul. Hélène refined the route to be used each day. We got most of the daily lodging sorted except for this one establishment where language was a problem. We enlisted the help of the hotel front desk. The place we wanted to stay at wanted full payment now but our hotel person found that to be unreasonable. The matter was resolved in our favour.

We took a taxi to the city centre and the Selimiye mosque saving us a 45 minute walk. The mosque is being restored and is not open to visitors.

Selimiye mosque

City Centre is a busy and happening place with lots of pedestrian and vehicular traffic. There are loads of shops selling, making and repairing just about anything and everything. There are also loads of small restaurants making very difficult to decide where to sit and what to eat. We almost experienced analysis paralysis but in the end, we managed to have lunch. 

Choose small restaurant, few tables and tiny menu.  Problem solved

We checked out a number of bazaars co-located with mosques, had ice cream and Turkish chai while sitting in the shade.  

                                            We added sugar as recommended, pretty good

We then headed towards the Macedonia Tower only to find it wrapped in scaffolding and building wrap being restored.  From there we made our way to the Serefeli mosque and museum. There was a very impressive collection of mosque renditions that included in what cities those mosques were built and the name of the architect. Mimar Sinar was the name that appeared most often.

As we made our way to the taxi stand, we stopped for sweets and coffee. I noticed a touring cyclist and thought he looked familiar. I asked if he was from “Stow” and he replied “Yes”. He was the young Englishman, Jim, we met a while back when entering Bulgaria. We had thought he would be in Instanbul already. Turns out he got to cycle more European countries than we did. Unlike us, Jim will be cycling home after spending sometime volunteering on a farm in Turkey, if memory serves me right.

Jim & Daniel

Another cab and we were back at the hotel ready for supper. They have a nicely priced restaurant and the food is tasty and plenty.

No plans yet for tomorrow but we will sort that in the morning.

Mosque up the street from our hotel

Day 78 - Svilengrad to Edirne (Turkey)

58.8 km - Total so far 4,177.50 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 78                         322 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in Edirne, Turkey.

We had three significant encounters today. 

First one was with a Greek gentleman farmer and his daughter who were busy irrigating their cornfield. They told us that the weather to date has been very sunny with little rain. The individual is in the military and farms 10 acres to grow corn for sheep’s to feed his extended family.

Second encounter was with Ricardo Mendes, a fellow rider on the Sultans Trail. He was a couple of days behind us but being a 100+ kms @ day, he quickly caught up with us. He has travelled extensively by bike and it was nice to exchange our gained experiences. We gave him our travel card but failed to take a picture with him. He got pictures of our bikes. 

Our third encounter was on the outskirts of Edirne. We had rested our bikes across the street from the Waggon Café for a snack, water and a rest in the shade. This young man from the café came to us trying to generate business. Thanks but no thanks we have all we need. Five minutes later he was back with a Turkish chai in each hand. He informed us it was on the house and insisted we sit at a table and enjoy. Enjoyed we did, it was nice to sit with a hot beverage on a very hot day and forget for a while that we still had 8 kms to go. We thanked the owner for their generosity.

Day 77 - Haskovo to Svilengrad

73.8 km - Total so far 4,118.7 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 77                        380 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in Svilengrad, Bulgaria.

Because it was going to be a long ride we had planned to get an early start but we couldn’t get breakfast until 8 am. 

It was relatively easy to get through Haskovo and we realized that there was more to the city than we had seen. I guess that would not be an issue if we were 30 years younger.

Haskavo pedestrian street

We also rode by the village of Rodopi (same name as our hotel). We did not ride through many villages today and the few that we did, did not have much of a stork population. I only remember Hélène pointing out one nest to me.

Today was all about scenery. The route took us off the main road twice. At the first opportunity, we did about 100 meters an decided that a sandy trail was not for us to do today. At the second one, the route was paved. As we were going up a climb, a local stopped and got out of his car. After a lot of gesturing by both of us, I guessed that his concern was that the road we were on did not go to Istanbul and we should turn around and take the highway. I think I got through to him that we were on that road to take in the spectacular scenery and that Bulgaria was a beautiful country. That got me a big smile and a pat on the back. He got back in his car and I back to slowly pedal up the hill to rejoin Hélène. We were now in the hills that we had looked at most of the afternoon. That extra effort was well worth it. We got views that most people driving on the highway will never see.  

Tonight is our last night in Bulgaria. Much of our time here was nothing short of tremendous. Friendly people, a lot of history and an appreciation for a people that have not always had an easy time, often under the hand of a foreign occupation.

We have also experienced something that very few people have had to do and that is to “bicycle into Sofia”. Our friend Henri wrote to us about his experience cycling into Istanbul. We have read that cycling into Istanbul is not a pleasant experience. Henri summed up his experience this way: “L'arrivée sur Istanbul se fait relativement bien, elle est plus facile que sur Sofia.” (The arrival in Istanbul is relatively smooth, it is easier than in Sofia.) 

Tomorrow we cross the borders of Bulgaria, Greece and finally Turkey. 

Day 76 - Parmovay to Haskovo

 45.2 km - Total so far 4,044.9 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 76                        453 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in Haskovo, Bulgaria.

We went through four villages today and looked for stork nests. In each village, we saw seven, four, two and seven nests respectively. 

Breakfast stop and stork nest

Storks are considered harbingers of spring and are often associated with good luck and fertility. What is particularly interesting is that the two villages that had the most storks looked the poorest of the four. 

We had to shop for groceries around the neighbourhood and figured its like every other town in Bulgaria where there is the equivalent of a well stocked dépanneur on almost every street corner. Turns out it was not. At one of the few shops we found, we literally had to grocery window shop. You can’t go into the tiny store, so you point at things you want or ask for it using Google Translate and then you pay at the window. The choice is very limited and we could not get most of what we wanted. We chose to get less of what we needed in order not to walk 20 minutes to a supermarket in the blistering heat. We did manage to find a small town square with the clock that celebrated the town’s 1,000 years of existence.

New clock tower built in 1985 for the 1,000 anniversary 

Haskovo old clock tower (restored in 2012)

We had supper at the hotel restaurant. We had the traditional clay plate of chicken and vegetables. It was a bit different from what we got on Sunday in Plovdiv in that it had a lot of white cheese on it. We must have gotten a regional variant today. They were large size portions. 

Supper, it would have been better with no cheese

Tomorrow we head to Svilengrad, our last town in Bulgaria.

Day 75 - Plovdiv to Parmovay

 57.9 km - Total so far 3,999.7 km - Route pedalled.      Relive Video (with pictures)

Video of the day: Europe Day 75                        497 Left to pedal

We are safe and secure in Parvomay, Bulgaria.

We got on the road at 7:30 am and used the very nice Plovid bike paths to get us to the edge of the urban area. We crossed a few bridges over water and made quick time to get around. Once you get outside the urban area into the more industrial sections, your on your own baby. We had to share collector lanes with big transports and aggressive drivers heading who knows where in a hurry. Things settled down once we got to our first village.

Street corner vegetable vendors

No breath taking scenery today. What really caught our attention today was the number of stork nests in villages. It was not unusual to see 5 or 6 nests per village and many nests with two or more fledglings. That is a lot more than we have seen in other villages.You will see and hear in the video, that a nest  is a very loud and busy place. Many other species of birds find residence in and around the nest and they create quite a racket.

Unbelievable racket

We had a easy going climb and a nice downhill that took us to a very smooth tractor path across the fields.

Smooth tractor path

It was an easy ride to the hotel and finding out we had a room for the night. The reservation was made over the phone using Google Translate a few days ago. We continued using Google Translate at the hotel front desk.

We went out for supper and discovered that the folks here are not as capable in English as they had been in more tourist areas. We still managed to get fed. 

Tomorrow we are heading to Haskovo, our second to last town in Bulgaria.

Day 74 - Plovdiv

 Total so far 3,941.8 km - 554 Left to pedal

Video of the day: Europe Day 73 & 74   

We went back to the “Old Town” to visit Nebet Tepe - Archaeological Complex on top of the northern most of three hills. An amazing place that dates back to the Stone-copper Age (IV millennium BC) to present. “Nebet Tepe” is a Turkish name (meaning watch/tower) and conveys its importance as an observatory of the traffic on the river and valley below. 

There are still a number of family homes and businesses around the Nebet Tepe fortress and it’s difficult to imagine how they do simple things like carry groceries or bring in furniture. Every road there is narrow, steep and paved with rocks, not flat pavers.  

Rocks instead of pavers

We had a nice lunch of vegetables and meat medley served on a clay pot. We split the huge portion as it was too much for one.

Great lunch

Heading back to our place, we stayed in the shade as much as we could. It was around 35 degrees after lunch and it was very hot. Since it’s dry, just finding shade is a tremendous relief.

Keep on the shady side

The forecast for tomorrow and pretty much the rest of the week is sunny and hot. We plan on being on the road by 7 am to take advantage of cooler morning temperatures and less wind.

Plovdiv turned out to be an amazing place to experience. Just 4 months ago, it was just a funny name on a map not far from Turkey. Definitely worth a return visit. This place has over 20 museums with 13 of them in the Old Town.