Turkey - European Side
Istanbul
The Blue Mosque, Istanbul, into the sun. The view Pete saw sat on the fence in front of Sancta Sophia. The truck was parked between these two magnificent centuries old buildings.
We met with our first real taste of street hawkers. "You buy this Mister, very cheap" and others "I buy everything". They even offer shoe-shine when you're walking around the town with sandals on. After about three days of wandering around the town we came across a huge area of shops devoted to the motor trade. About the size of old Romsey. There just happened to be two Bedford dealers so as we thought we had a squeak in the region of the clutch we put on our dirty togs and dropped the gearbox out onto the road. Anyway we couldn't find anything wrong but put a new thrust bearing in just in case. Upon putting everything back together we saw the pivot to the lever arm was out a long way and slightly bent, but it would not budge and there was no new one to hand, so it was left. We still had an occasional squeak.
I am glad the authorities were relaxed about us both camping and doing truck repairs outside the Blue Mosque, near the man with the dancing bear. We had found what we were looking for in Thessaloniki. The clutch work was not very difficult as access underneath is reasonable. However, everything is very big, so I guess it balances out. The truck gearbox is just a bit smaller than a small car engine. We probably stayed in Istanbul about a week. Apart from the stay at the campsite in Thessaloniki. This was the first place were we had stopped and taken a breath as it were. Until now it had been about getting to here, not about the journey, more about the achievement of miles per day.
Then we had rested and were ready to take the next leap of faith. Into Asia. Next day we left to cross the Bosphorus for Ankara, and Asia.
