It required 5 changes of transport to get from Istanbul to Çanakkale, a town on the Dardanelles straits: a ferry, a bus, train, bus, another bus and finally a minibus — all that to travel 300-odd kilometers. I think that apart from the back of a mule we’ve pretty much got it all covered. Canakkale itself is a small, pleasant but generally unremarkable place, however there’s one reason why people come here a lot, and that is the nearby ruins of Troy.
As the world celebrated the space age, on the 50th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s historic first flight into space, we went to Troy and celebrated the bronze age. Troy had been settled since about 5000 years ago, through the age of Homer’s Illiad (around the 8th century BC) until the 5th century AD. During these years successive cities were built, destroyed by fires, earthquakes or wars, and built again at the same location on top of the older ruins. There have been 9 such cities and remains from each one of them can be seen today. No less fascinating is the story of the modern discovery of Troy by an amateur archeologist in the 19th century, who was lone in his belief that Homer’s poems were actually set in real places, and bet his life and fortune, rather successfully, on finding them.
From Canakkale we continued to the island of Bozcaada further south. Bozcaada is famous in Turkey for its wines, an industry originally started by the Greek inhabitants of the island and then passed on to the current Turkish proprietors. The island’s population of one thousand swells to 15,000 during the summer tourist season, but luckily for us we visited just before the season had started. The little city by the island’s ferry port has dozens of “pansiyons”, tiny family-run hotels, and ours was “Kale Pansiyon”. When we arrived, I had a very short conversation in English with the lady who runs the pansiyon: I asked “English?”; she laughed, shook her head and said “Turkish”. From that moment on we had to use sign language. It’s unbelievable how much conversation you can achieve using imitations by hands and voice — we talked about our families and she was very eager to tell us everything about her life. She’s been running this pansiyon for quite a while, and she proudly showed us a page in the guestbook signed by Michael Richards, better known as Kramer from Seinfeld. In his entry, besides the usual thanks and praises, he also laments about the language difficulties: “I’ve exhausted my Turkish vocabulary, can someone who speaks Turkish please explain the lady who I am?” Apparently, someone did.
We rented a scooter for a day and explored the island. The spring has arrived here and the hills are awash with flowers. The lower slopes are covered by vineyards. It is really quite beautiful.
We spent our evenings with Lisa in her cafe by the ferry port. Lisa is Australian, of Chinese and Indonesian descent, living in Turkey and speaking probably around 8 different languages. The cafe is full in the summer but pretty empty during this time, like most businesses here, and apart from some random types who wandered inside once in a while, we had the place and Lisa pretty much to ourselves. We had local wine and Lisa cooked pasta with whatever sauce her imagination created that day. It was always very good.
On our last night we were sitting with Lisa and a young fellow who turned out to be a composer from Izmir, when an older man entered, swaying slightly from side to side. This was Mustafa, the island’s tax collector, known for the little drinking problem that he has. Lisa allows him in but keeps him on a tight leash. It’s important to be on good terms with the tax man, but when he lit a cigarette inside the cafe, Lisa kicked him out. He tried a few times so give me a cigarette so I go out to smoke with him but I refused as politely as I could.
We intended to continue to Selçuk after two days on the island but because of rough seas the afternoon ferry was canceled. We took the evening ferry and arrived in Selçuk at 2 AM. The next day we went to see the ruins of Ephesus, a historic Greek and Roman city that had survived amazingly well, and had parts of it restored with great care. A section of the city which contained especially sumptuous residences is being restored right now, and it provides a very curious glimpse into the lives of the rich during the heyday of the Roman empire. It was ruined by an earthquake, and the broken pieces survived very well, so the restored sections include walls richly decorated with colorful paintings, mosaics, and massive marble sheets which were broken to pieces and are now being painstakingly reassembled in what is billed as the world’s greatest puzzle game.
We left Selçuk the next day for Fethiye, in the southwestern corner of Turkey, and we hope to do some trekking there. I’m actually writing this post in a bus, which has an Internet connection. It’s amazing how backpacking has changed through the years.
April 16, 2011