• 2580 miles (official distance according to us, GPS wasn't on for a couple of hours)
• 0 punctures
• 4 deformed calves (plural of calf? nobody here knows)





We rolled into Istanbul this morning destroyed after turkey made us fight for the last four days to get here. We left the black sea expecting a big day over the mountains into turkey. The mountains duly delivered and we sweatily crossed the border expecting it to be downhill into Kirklareli, it wasn't. We ploughed on regardless and were rewarded with a rubbish town where we were greeted by a dump of a "hotel". The beauty of staying in horrible places is that you get away nice and promptly in the morning. Turkey day 2 was considerably nicer although shrouded by the nagging doubt that we would need to sleep in another flea pit. As it turned out Saray is fine and we spent the afternoon researching how to cycle into Istanbul while maintaining all our limbs. We had dinner in a fast food restaurant where the owner was so pleased to see us he took a photo and gave us a copy.

Yesterday was a monster, 13.5 hours on the bikes including multiple hills, a broken down tank (the driver looked suitably embarrassed to be overtaken by two heavily laden cyclists), brand new roads, very old very broken roads we shared with about 1000 trucks ferrying building materials to build the new roads, roadkill snakes and an unhelpful 2.5 hour frantic search for a hotel in northern Istanbul as the sun went down. It made finishing this morning even sweeter.

Dog update: in turkey they feed the stray dogs meaning they are bigger and scarier than in Romania and Bulgaria but also a little less likely to chase you. We still had to utilise a few rocks though.

We spent this morning cycling down the Bosphoros and into Sultanahemet where much photoing and back slapping ensued.

Thank you to everyone who sponsored us. We love you all.

Kebabs,
Ed & Lizzie

P.s Lizzie would like to clarify that it is Ed's calf in the photo (bit of leg not baby cow)

Location:Istanbul, turkey