After a day and a half of traveling from Van, I made it!!! I can hardly believe I’m here in Tehran, the capital of the Islamic Republic of Iran! Woohoo! It was quite a journey here though… I left Van early yesterday morning on a bus that would take me over the mountains of, Read More
Look at a map of Western Turkey and you can't miss Lake Van. It's a giant natural lake formed centuries ago when a volcano closed the valley mouth. Its water level is maintained by natural evaporation, and this has led to an extremely high mineral content in the water – it's so alkaline that, Read More
I woke up at 3am quite excited – Nemrut had been on my "to do" list for years and I couldn't believe I was finally going to get to see it. We piled into the minivan and drove for about an hour and a half along some of the worst roads I've ever traveled, Read More
It was an early start but it wasn't long before we left Cappadocia behind and headed east. First stop was one of the Seljuk caravanserais at Karatayhan. While the caravanserai itself wasn't in the best condition (it's waaaaay off the beaten track so it doesn't get the tourist dollars that some of the others, Read More
On my second day in Goreme, I rented a scooter for the afternoon to go and explore some of the parts of Cappadocia that I didn’t get to see the previous time I was in the region. I loooove riding scooters and bikes and reckon they’re one of the best ways to get around, Read More
I’m here in Goreme, in the Cappadocia region of Central Turkey, and it’s great to be back in one of my fave places of all time. Actually, come to think of it it’s quite apt that I’m kicking off my Silk Road trip here, as it was near here that my interest in the, Read More
Well when it rains it pours! That’s sure what happened in Istanbul the evening I left – and it was their first rain in 4 1/2 months!!! It was a HUUUUGE thunderstorm, the streets turned into muddy rivers, and I had two bolts of lightning strike less than 50m away from me – yikes!, Read More
I arrived in Istanbul at around 2am on Friday morning. Easyjet had however failed to notify me that I was not arriving at the city’s main Ataturk International airport but another airport waaaaaay on the other (Asian) side of the Bosphorous. It turned out to be a huuuge hassle to get from there to, Read More
This blog is still under construction and I’m slowly bringing my entries up-to-date. Please come back again soon, when I should have the following pages up and running: More Swiss Alps: mountaineering, hiking, snowboarding Rugby: Rugby Club Zurich, Swiss Rugby, Berkeley RFC Trip summaries (text with a few select photos) from my travels around, Read More
Here’s a copy of the over-effusive group email I sent around after my Turkey trip. I’ll get around to copying in some photos sometime… Merhaba! YEE HA! Turkey turned out to be an ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC place and I CAN’T RAVE ENOUGH ABOUT IT!!! I love the country AND the people! It’s a beautiful country,, Read More