As usual we get lost leaving Lattakia. Instead of heading north and crossing into Turkey, we are heading East towards Aleppo. We are not too worried about this as we know that there are border crossings north of Aleppo. We have only experienced good roads in Syria so far. Therefore, we are surprised that we find ourselves up in the hills of Northern Syria on two way road heading for Aleppo. As soon as we come up behind a slow(er) vehicle, overtaking becomes a nightmare. There are a lot of blind bends and hills and I refuse to go for an overtake on any of them. This goes on for what seems for ever. After 3 hours of hill driving we arrive in Aleppo and see signage for the Turkish border. We are heading North so we figure we can’t go far wrong. We drive through small towns and villages until the border signs simply aren’t there anymore. The SatNav shows we are still heading towards the border, so we push on. We are on single track roads and farm machinery is regularly in the road ahead of us. Finally, we are in a village where the widest street is the width of one vehicle. Something has gone wrong. We head back after marking in the SatNav where the border crossing is. We drive through towns and adjacent to the border until we follow a right turn through a village heading South. Suddenly we are at the Syrian border post. We run around for an hour getting stamps on car documents and passports before finally being ready to leave.
There are two border crossing that have concerned me since the beginning of the trip. The first is the crossing from Syria to Turkey and the second from Turkey to Greece.
With some trepidation, we approach the Turkish border station. We hand over the passports and are told to go buy visas and come back. We drive into the compound and park up. The visas are $20 each. Charles, as always, is hungry and orders two burger meals inside the terminal building. I go to buy insurance for the car. In the insurance office the young man tells me 1 month’s insurance for Turkey is $50. I agree and give him my passport, the money and the car registration. He tells me that 3 months insurance is the same price. I tell him that I will only be in Turkey for a few days and I only need 1 month. He repeats the 3 month offer, and I agree, to which he asks why I need 3 months if I am only staying a few days. I think he is taking the p**s, so I tell him to do whatever he thinks is best. With insurance in hand I return to the shadiest hamburger meal I have ever seen and, despite being hungry, only manage to finish half of. I suspect the half burger may come back to haunt me in days to come.
Insured, visaed and still hungry we head for customs. The customs officer is a rude SOB shouting that the car registration is not valid. I stay calm as he starts to raise his voice. Finally, we go to his supervisor who speaks good English. He soon works out that the name on the car registration and the passport are the same. He apologizes and proceeds to rip the customs officer a new orifice in Turkish. The officer takes me back to his counter with his tail between his legs and stamps the car documents. We are clear.
We drive from the border towards Adana. It is already 5PM and it looks like another 3 hours at least of driving. The roads are in good condition and, despite making good progress, we only reach Adana at 7.45 PM. We have reservations in a hotel in Mersin which is another 1 hours drive from Adana. I have been behind the wheel for 12 hours so decide 1 more hour won’t make much difference. We get to Mersin and have no idea where the hotel is. We decide to stop at the first hotel we come to and stay there. It happens to be the Mersin Otel. It is funny how in Turkey hotel is otel. I have been pronouncing it like this for years so it’s nice to be somewhere that thinks the same as me.
We have a bite to eat and watch the first half of the USA versus Turkey in a football friendly. Returning to the room, I decide to watch the second half until I doze off. Going through the TV channels looking for the match, I come across Hustler.com TV. There is a free hard core porn channel broadcasting throughout the hotel. Now I know that this is not uncommon in hotels throughout the world. To find it in a hotel in the “Islamic Republic of Turkey” comes as a bit of a surprise.
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