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Tagged from Gypsyprincess with A K Place

Travel blogs tagged with A K Place:

The Nightmare Ends

06. September 2008 | en

For those anxiously holding their breath to discover what happens next, the story continues with an amazing stroke of luck. I drove for 30 minutes, took an exit that I was sure was safely out of Istanbul, and as dusk fell I began to look for a hotel that I could stay at until I could make contact with Patrick. I forgot I still had 35 Euros, so that would cover me for the night, and anything extra I figured could be covered once Patrick finally found me again. (Truthfully the temptation to keep driving to Greece was overwhelming, but I fought it off).

I had no sooner pulled over to ask about hotels (and lock myself in there for another fit of overdue hysterics, and to berate myself for not having my own source of funds, stupid stupid stupid move) when my phone rang. It was Patrick calling from an internet cafe. one more hour later, and in the pitch dark, we were reunited, and about to face our second worse fear. Driving in Turkey at night. Potholes and crazy drivers, roads unexpectedly and without warning covered in loose gravel, and bus drivers.

With my knee passed into another realm of pain and out the other side, we decided to ask the Jandarma for help. Blustering about blindly in the dark hoping to find a hotel was not the ideal situation, and yet here we were.

We were greeted with a pompous and bloated with self importance jackass of a youth, who spoke no English or German, insisted we stay and entertain him, as he called in another young guy to translate and make fun of when he was not making fun of us. By now we had driven 500 kilometers, and had spent almost 3 hours lost after driving through what was for me the most torturous couple of hours of my life. neither of us were in the mood, but we had no idea how to escape, as every time we tried we were stopped.

Then an older man comes in and jackass shrivels to a tenth his size, and moves from arrogance to sniveling as he jumps out of his chair and runs to do the older mans bidding, namely show us where the hotel was.

The hotel turned out to be 90 Euro a night (closer to 100 actually, as it was 90 Lire EACH). We had yet to spend more than 30 even at the nicer hotels we stayed at, and we escaped the clutches of the police and headed out our own way. A guy at a gas station told us where a hotel for 20 Euro was, and we never found it, but did find on for 30, with an ocean view, breakfast, and a balcony. Too bad we were too exhausted from the day to really enjoy it!

Tags: A K Place Turkey Istanbul
Map: N 41° 03.209 E 28° 46.059

Created at: 15. September 2008

To logbook | Author: Gypsyprincess

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