Istanbul, Turkey

The sound fills and echoes through the derelict building next door. Tumbling around its empty walls before bursting from the hole where a window once opened, as if pumped from a bigger speaker than that of the minaret it first came from.

The song of the mosque pulses over the rooftops. The voices collide as they take flight. The call to prayer multiplies tenfold, even one hundredfold, as every mosque in Istanbul calls worshipers to Friday prayer.

Burgazada, Turkey

Happy birthday to meeee, happy birthday to meeee, happy birthday dear Krista, happy birthday to meeee!

My birthday treat was a great escape from Istanbul – the city that has stifled us for a month, the city that we both love and hate, are excited by but frustrated with.

So, on the 1st November, we took a boat ride across the Bosporous, to Kadikôy, on the Asian side of Istanbul. From there, we boarded another ferry, which chugged by sunset to one of the five small islands that rise steeply out of the Marmara Sea.

By the time we arrived at Burgazada, one of the smaller islands, it was late, and in the black, we watched the slither moon sink over the sea. It was going to be a difficult task to find a camping spot in the dark, but our friend Gokhan had told us about a secluded beach where we could safely put up our tent.

Following his slightly sketchy directions, we pedalled out of the ferry port, excited to be in the quiet and tranquility of the island. Cars are not allowed on any of these five islands, so people get around either on foot or with horse and carriage. The only sounds that evening were the clopping of the horses’ hooves and the sound of the wind and waves. Oh, what joy!

We set up camp, following the routine we know so well. When we climbed into our sleeping bags and lay on our backs, we remembered the travelling life again – and how good it can be.

The next day was camp cooking, swimming in the sea in autumnal November sun, yoga stretches and reading. Then a pack-up and a bike ride back to the port. I kept looking over my shoulder to check for traffic – which of course never arrived!

Istanbul, Turkey

The Bosphorus strait separates the two halves of Istanbul, placing one half of the city within Europe, the other half in Asia. Spanning this channel of water is the Bogaziçi Köprüsü – the bridge that connects the two continents.

Our great new friends, Bryan and Gizem, who cycled from Holland to Kazakstan and now live in Istanbul, told us that this bridge is usually closed to pedestrians and cyclists. However, just once a year, the Istanbul Eurasia Marathon takes place and on this day, all cars are banned.

What an opportunity to cross the bridge on foot and walk from one continent to the other!

Bryan, Dan and I caught a ferry across to the Asian side of Istanbul. In the pouring rain, with the roads like rivers and the plastic bag covered marathon runners far ahead of us, we traversed the long bridge, celebrating the marathon’s aims of friendship and peace.

If only it were so easy to bridge the gap that divides… the gap between countries and continents, between governments and people, rich and poor, between people of different tribes and cultures,,, the gap within our minds.

Can we not all walk across the bridge together and realise the fact that we are after all, living on this earth as part of the same great human family?

Istanbul, Turkey

I feel a great sense of achievement. In 1996, I set out to cycle solo from Australia to England. Two years, 12,000 kilometres and many adventures later, I arrived in Istanbul – the Gateway to Europe – … only 3,000 kilometres to go to reach my goal.

But it was November and Winter had arrived. Facing Winter in Eastern Europe, fresh from Communism, was not an attractive prospect. So I took a detour and cycled south through the Middle East and North Africa, hoping to reach England via sunnier climes.

However, this was not to be.

I was refused entry into Libya and upon my return to Cairo, my bicycle was stolen. My trip ended there.

Now, 10 years later, Daniel and I have finally reached Istanbul, having cycled from London across Europe … and I have completed the missing piece of my previous journey.

We left the plains and the 40 degree heat hoping for an inspiring time in the Carpathian mountains – excited at the possibility of a mountain scape illuminated by the full moon. However, we never saw the top of the mountains or the full moon as temperatures plummeted and cloud fell from the sky. The road turned to stones and mud and on the first evening we couldn’t find anywhere to camp or sleep and so continued to pedal uphill for 80km until finally we fell exhausted into a mountain hut.

We were chased and ambushed by wild dogs repeatedly over the course of the next few days, our first tactic was to pelt them with stones and threaten them with sticks, this worked well until we couldn’t out run them.

We learned that to let them approach and talk to them as if we weren’t scared was a good method. The first time we did this, a dog befriended us, and she guarded us a safe passage over the final 1600m pass. She ran with us for 15 km, down to a cabana. I fed her bread and we named her Larry. She caused a diversion each time a pack of dogs came out onto the road putting herself between us and them, giving us just enough time to reach into our pockets to pull out stones and take aim. We reached the bottom of the mountain safely, and in true style, just like the littlest hobo, while are backs were turned she wondered off expecting we’d be safe, no doubt in search of her next adventure.

Salzburg, Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest, Gyomaendrod, how do you pronounce that last place name, Krista? Gyomaendrod was of course a Hungarian town.

Germany was beautiful and Salzburg, the introductory city to Austria, was just as great. We made some fine friends there and stayed for a week, and it is by far my favourite city yet. It was in Salzburg that we received our first Poste Restante parcel – courtesy of Bram – had guided tours from Christine who kindly hosted us for that time, went on bike rides and had swims in mountain pools.

From there, we made a concerted effort to rejoin our original route and pick up the pace. The Danube is a great vehicle for cycle tourists and for those making longer journeys by bike, it’s an easy way to cross Europe from Germany to Bulgaria.

We followed its path across the north-east tip of Austria, the smallest slice of Slovakia and into Hungary, where, in Budapest, our love-hate relationship with this ‘radweg’ (bike path) ended. However, the track gave us the opportunity to meet some great people: our new friend Philip, who was making his first solo bike journey; Pushkar, who has been cycling around the world for 11 years for peace; and brothers Julien and Fred who are making a journey to Vietnam from Belgium.

After following it for ten days, Krista and I began to crave to be out on our own again, away from the crowd, searching out the heart of each country. When I am amongst hundreds of other visitors to a country, I feel as if I am non-distinct – just another tourist eager to spend. And like a walking dollar sign, we began to feel like a commodity, and as a result, we began to find it hard to make genuine connections with local people. So from Budapest, we chose our own path once again and began to see life without the polish and sheen put on for the tourists.

And our pace picked up… we took only one day’s rest in two weeks, crossing Hungary in five days.

The impact of Communism began to show itself in Slovakia. Many of the buildings were drab and grey, and there were lots of derelict factories and houses everywhere. People of the older generation were shy and protective, locked gates and aggressive dogs secured the perimeter of every house.

Hungary, for the most part, felt a featureless place – flat, hot and void of character. We pushed on hard everyday, past monotonous cornfields, sunflowers and genetically modified crops labelled by serial numbers.

However, at the end, our Hungarian experience was made in Gyomaendrod (how do you pronounce that again?) by Istefan and his family and friends. They invited us to join their meal of Hungarian goulash, cooked on the open fire in a huge pot. The evening we spent with them remains my favourite chance meeting so far, perhaps because I was still being encouraged to drink a shot of alcohol until I brushed my teeth for bed!

Before leaving Hungary, we took four days rest in a campsite in the border town of Gyula, just 20 kilometres from Romania. Unknown to us, we had entered Hungary’s tourist hotspot. Krista made a friend at the tourist office, a lovely woman named Ibi, and in their conversations, confirmed our suspicions that Hungary is fast becoming affected by consumerism and marketing, arguably desperate for a modern identity after Communism suppressed individualism.

We were lucky on our first night in Romania. We stopped at a church to ask for refuge and the priest and his wife were more than happy to help. Dana offered us a shower and priest Dan talked with us. Neighbour Nikolae insisted we would be more comfortable sleeping in his house, rather than in our tent in the church grounds. Priest Dan told me about life in Communist times, some 148,000 people were murdered in Romania – mostly intellects – such as doctors, writers, poets and priests and that it was compulsory to watch two hours of television a night, consisting of Communist propaganda. Aswell as this, people lived from meagre food rations and shops were bare. As a result, even now we’re seeing how resourceful people are – growing their own crops and keeping animals such as geese, chickens and pigs.

Now we’re taking a path that’s destined for the mountains. We’ve had some unbearable heat to deal with recently.

Click here to see our new photos of Austria!

We’ve met a few cyclists who are crunching figures, so now we’re halfway to Turkey, we thought we’d do the same.

Distance cycled: 2559 kilometres
Biggest day: 93 kilometres
Top speed: 73.2 km/h
Average distance cycled per day: 55 kilometres
16%: steepest hill up
14%: steepest hill down

Punctures: 4 (all on Dan’s back wheel)

Major cities: The Hague (Holland), Antwerp (Belgium), Cologne (Germany), Salzburg and Vienna (Austria), Bratislava (Slovakia), Budapest (Hungary)

Most surprising camping place: Lake Tinninger, Bavaria, Germany (we were heartened by a kind local man named Walter, who quite unexpectedly brought us a bottle of wine in the evening as we huddled in our tent in the rain, then he revisited us in the morning bringing fresh pretzels and croissants! He told us that “in former times” he camped a lot)

Most difficult language: Hungarian

Last night we slept in the long grass again. Nature’s music was the ratcheting sound of crickets clicking their legs as they jumped around outside the tent. Gone is the gamelan music of the clanging alpine cowbells, now we enjoy the rapid buzz of dragonflies’ wings and the widening rivers as we descend from the mountains and ride towards Vienna.

The Alps have been an inspiring presence – majestic yet friendly – and a vision of the sights we may encounter in our future landscapes. We’ve enjoyed many detours to its lakes and peaks, however, in Salzburg we made a reluctant decision to leave the Alps behind and rejoin our original route through Eastern Europe.

Here on the river the early signs of Autumn have arrived and the first leaves are beginning to fall. Although we’ve already clocked 2000 kilometres, it’s time to cover more distance and reach Turkey before winter descends.