Turkey Part 2: or the way to become a "movie star"

I was heading into the Kazgkar Mountains as they are called the Switzerland of Turkey and are supposed to be a great hiking terrain. Heading up the main valley towards the highest peak only the many tourist huts, rest houses, and ugly, modern hotels reminded me of the Alps. Clouds were moving in and it started raining heavily…. I headed up as far as I could which was towards the end on pretty rough trails. I finally could test my wading system as I was taking the axles for a little dip in ca 80 cm deep mountain streams (the bridges seemed too flimsy).

The remaining farmers in the last little village welcomed me with a hot tea and invited me to stay, which I did by adding my “hut” to theirs. I managed to get in a couple day hikes as the weather was not stable enough for a summit attempt… all the peaks were snow capped already…a very pretty sight. As the season was already over I was roaming around all by myself on the mountain meadows.

To get across the mountains heading south I found a track on the GPS map that was following a very long valley up this side of the mountains and was connected by a few dots to another track that climbed up the other side. I could save about 200 km’s detour back to the coast but had to negotiate passes at 3000 meters. That could actually turn out to only be donkey trails and cost me a day or two to get back… a risk but what the heck…

The valley was simply magic! Once passed the first 10 km of very bad road connecting to the main valley it suddenly passed into a nice cobble paved road that apparently was not driven very often. The deep dark forest was clinging to the steep slopes with clouds and mist of the recent rain just about hanging on…. much as some of the old houses that one could sometimes make out high up in the cliffs. Long cables spanning across the river and high up seemed the only connection to these places. People pulled wooden boxes with supplies along those cables and later I was told these are also to bring down the tea leaves they grow up there high on the slopes. The road was winding itself up along the river that was tumbling over house-sized boulders in steep gorges and rapids…It looked like a fairy forest trail…. And to top it, all of a sudden an old castle appeared out of the mist towering over the trail….some old silk route watch tower…

Darkness came and I was starting to look for a nightspot when I passed a few little farmhouses along the trail…. A guy big like a bear and in funny rubber shoes in ballerina style jumped into the road in front of me waving his arms yelling something. After a stunned instant I realized he was speaking broken German asking me to stop and join him… he did not want to have dinner all by himself…. This man was speaking out of my heart and despite his appearance I decided to stop and stay. Latif owned this old farm and used it as a pension to host guests in the season and now was staying here with his 2 dogs, 1 milk cow and about 10 little calves. He had a German girlfriend (that’s where the German came from) as he also owns a place on the Southern coast (where a lot of Germans pass their holiday ;-). We had a great BBQ and conversation (in English by then) with Koefte and fish from the river… I learned that there are many bears and wolves in the forests and that’s why he keeps these huge dogs…. Well protected I slept like a baby only to wake up in the morning to making cheese with fresh cows milk and a copious farmers breakfast. Before I headed on (Latif actually confirmed that the trail across the mountain existed and was doable by a 4x4) he absolutely wanted to show me a nice vista above the valley. A beautiful old village with wooden houses was sitting above a flat meadow overlooking the valley and mountains around…

....on the meadow we spotted a Landrover Defender with a trailer and a few people around a tent. They looked puzzled with us passing by and when we came back from the canyon edge a few were walking towards us. A beautiful young lady gave me a big smile and asked me in perfect German what on Earth I was doing in this spot? Now I looked puzzled….

Turned out this was a Turkish cinema movie set turning a documentary-fiction movie we stumbled upon. They were following old Turkish tales throughout the country searching for characters such as fairy eating bears in the mountains... I confirmed they were on a good track here ;-).

The crew was entirely Turkish, but a few were speaking English and the lead actress of Iranian (Turkish) descent grew up and studied in Germany. The director of the movie was really impressed by the Unimog and proposed to give it a part in the movie right away ;-). So the rest of the morning I became a “movie star” and played myself telling travel stories in German and Dutch (another Turkish male part actually grew up in the Netherlands), cause it sounded so exotic ;-). If my head is not chopped off on the cutting table watch me in March 2013 in Turkish theatres! Thanks everyone in any case, I had a great time, it was a pleasure meeting you all, and I wish you every success for the movie… and watch the bears Taies!

The trail across the mountains kept it’s promise, fairy land continued, only a bit more harsh and high… endless and very tight cut backs were snaking up the mountain sides bringing me eventually to the 1st pass at 3000 meters. It was hard work as every cut back needed me going back and forth a couple times on a little platform before I completed the turn. The night I spent a little further down at 2700m as nightfall hit before I could negotiate the following pass. In high spirits of being a movie star I fell asleep with the noise of the rain hitting the metal roof ….it got quiet later in the night.

It was a cold night and I woke up early. Trying to see out of the windows I realized they were fogged up badly, only white haze even after wiping them… I had to open one to really see….

…. snow everywhere! A closed cover of snow did only leave the biggest rocks sticking out. Ouch, I had thought about a situation like this but judged the risk as relatively low with the snowline being above 3000 Meters before. Snowline had come down by 600 meters at least now and it was snowing heavily with no change in sight. I neither intended to spend the winter up here nor did I want to leave the truck behind so I drove off right away before it got even worse. Four-wheel drive engaged I crept up cut backs again. I had to carry away fallen rocks a few times but I managed to make the pass without too many scares. By now it was a real snowstorm and almost a white out. And I was not looking forward to the descent…. It really was hair rising with steep cutbacks winding down almost vertical cliffs that descended into the grayed-out abyss. Each cutback I hoped not to slip off the clutch, as this would have been the certain end…. The Unimog performed masterly, even without snow-chains no glitch whatsoever, it certainly helped that the snow was wet and packing well but I was impressed.

The mudslinging below the snowline down into the valley almost to sea level ended up being even more slippery….