Taking the train through Biblical lands

Thursday, May 23, 2019

Istanbul, Istanbul, Turkey

Our primary reason for going to Turkey was to experience the cross-country train journey.

Train trip - Kars to Ankara 1,000 km, Ankara to ..

From Kars, in the far-east, it’s a 25 hour sleepover aboard the Dogu Express to the country’s capital, Ankara. The cost for this segment of the journey was just under $75CDN for the two of us. From there it’s another five hours on the 250 kilometre per hour fast-train to Istanbul.

The train leaves Kars at eight every morning and the first four or five hours are fairly mundane. One snowy mountain peak after the next. Fields of cows and sheep, hardly any people, no cars. Just outside the city of Erzurum you start to pay more attention. Not just to a new and ever-changing landscape, but to your own perception. You’re in Bible-land. A hundred or so kilometres south is Mount Ararat, the peak where Noah’s Ark sat stranded after more than a month of heavy rain. But it’s what’s right outside your window that will blow you away. You’re now at the spot where two highland rivers converge to form the Euphrates River. Ninety-four percent of the water that flows along the Euphrates comes from the mountains in Turkey.

Heading across Turkey to Istanbul ...

For more than 450 kilometres you follow and criss-cross the Euphrates until it starts heading south to where the Garden of Eden was said to be. You almost want to stop the train, hire a boat and go in search of that special apple tree.

It’s hard to imagine how large and modern and vacant the fast-train station is in Ankara until you’re there. For 24 hours you travel through an almost people-less countryside, and then find the cities feel that way too. Like the land of “The Walking Dead” television series without zombies. The speed of the fast-train is rather scary. But it’s comforting to know that this is the part of Turkey — between Ankara and Istanbul — where you’ll start seeing plenty of other humans.

That we are and will always remain GPS-less, makes it extremely important that we’re friendly toward others. We were soon to arrive at the train station in Istanbul when we began introducing ourselves to fellow passengers in hope of finding someone who spoke English and could point us in the direction of our hotel. After eight or 10 tries we found a young woman who worked as a stewardess for Turkish Airlines.

Our two person sleeping compartment ...

When we told her where we’d been and what it was like there, she was amazed, and embarrassed. She’d never been to Eastern Turkey and had little knowledge of the landscape in her home and native land. This wonderful woman led us from the train to the subway entrance and even gave us a Presto-type card which would pay our fares to where she told us we’d need to get off. Poor Elenka felt like a beggar. I told her that was alright, that when people find you don’t own a Smartphone they understand immediately that you have problems and that most likely you’ve been hard done by in this life.

Once in the heart of Istanbul we ate the food and drank the wine, did the same tourist things we did here 14 years ago, and stayed in a very nice little hotel. (See Elenka’s photos for the details) From our balcony looking out over the Bosporus, Elenka asked me what the hi-light of my journey was. I told her that it was Turkey. She smiled and said Turkey was her hi-light too. So it all ended on a high, as in hi-note.