Not having been shot or wounded in the night I get up grab a welcome shower as my foot bandage came off in the sea and with all the shenanigans I hadn't even realised. A big flap of skin is opening the cut and all sorts of nasties are working their way in. Mehmet was most kind/odd/drunk in the night. He came back rather late, crept into my room and put a blanket on me. Later on he came back and tucked it in. Go with the flow I did and I here I am. Mehmet was still asleep when I woke up so I eat what I have in my bag for breakfast and pack up. Still no stirrings in the other room but the telly is on and the phone is off the hook with the message repeating over and over every five minutes. I give the guy a knock and wake him up to say goodbye and thanks at the least. He stirs a bit but nothing is registering, then he looks me straight in the eyes and straight through me. It's like he hasn't even seen me and rolls back over. I call his name a few more times and nothing, a bit louder and he grunts and I look at him until he focuses. I'm a bit worried he doesn't know who I am but when I mention the bicycle he jumps into life has a quick wash and we're off looking for the local bicycle shop which may or may not be open as it is a Saturday. We find the shop which is a shed with less spare parts than my garage. He does have a spindle but is too big. He says to Mehmet that I will have to go to Istanbul but I'm sure a city of Silivri size will have something I can use even if not the proper part for the job. On the way back to somewhere for coffee I go back to the cafe where I met the guy from Hackney to see if they are about and say thank you and explain what happened to me last night. They are closed but opposite is a hardware shop. I know exactly what I want, march in, ask if they speak English (no) and go looking around the shelves for a piece of long threaded metal to use instead of a spindle. I manage to get the message across by pointing at various bits, and lo and behold out he pops with exactly what I'm after, only not. Because it's 2mm too big in diameter. He has no smaller but I take a photo and get the name of it for future reference. I meet up with Mehmet who has forgotten about coffee so I say my thank yous and wave goolay goolay. On the way to the main road to Silivri with my 1mm of nut holding the wheel on I pass the cafe again and this time there is life. I explain what happened but there's no translator here this time to help. I'm invited in for tea, we work out how to use the internet and I'm also invited for breakfast with the family. They are Kurds who have moved here from a town called Oflar in the south east of Turkey. They play some Kurdish wedding music and do a little dance linking their little fingers together. Sedir pulls a face that I know well, whilst listening to the music. He's just in a state of bliss. On the road to Silivri a van pulls along side me and starts to chat. It happens all the time but it's normally locals. It takes me a little while to realise they aren't. They are two guys from Austria. I notice a cycling sticker on the back of their van. They are off to Istanbul too. I limp into Silivri and have no problem finding the part for my bike. Even though I know they've charged me more for the part than it should normally cost it still only costs about £3. In order to redress the balance I ask them to wash the bike, which they do with the jetwash and they give me a coffee so all in all we are both happy. Now the bike is roadworthy I'm ready for Istanbul. It's about40km away.
I get some miles done and pull down into a small town to ride along the coast. It's dotted with picnic tables and two guys sat at one beckon me over for a coffee. They ask if I have eaten and
and I say yes not long ago, but they still go off and get me food and insist I take it with me if I'm not hungry now. I say ok as long as I can give them some Serbian raki in return. This gets a strange reaction but I insist. About 5pm I find a little village and go looking for a good place to camp by the sea. As I'm looking someone puts their head out of a window and shouts Liverpool. It's the two Austrians. They are looking for somewhere to camp too. They invite me to have a cold beer, which naturlich I do and we have a good old chat about all sorts. Then we decide to chuck my bike in the van and go looking for a camp together. This doesn't go very well as it's too built up and we stop in Buyukcekmece. They decide the car park is fine for them tonight and so they buy me a fish sandwich and then I go off looking for a camp. I find a building site that is locked and the head of security has decided to let me camp inside the compound. I say I'll be back in a bit and go back to the Austrians who ply me with Austrian beer they have brought with them and it turns out one of the guy's wives is a Steiner Teacher the same as Maddy's mum. We chat about the virtues of this particular educational idea and they head off to bed. Luckily they have parked next to a five aside football pitch which has showers and toilets so we make use of the facilities. I go off to the building site but the guard has changed and is a bit surprised at my request to camp and says no. Can't blame him. Then I bump into the other guy, who has a word and I'm let in. Before this though it's chai time, the small kiosk selling beers, cigarettes and food has an extension specifically for chai. I think it's for the people working on the site. It's blowing a gale and rain is due. The ground is too hard to get the pegs in so I have to tie some of the tent to the fence and use some rocks. The tent is a bit pathetic but a few beers have enabled me not to worry and I creep in and disappear.
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