9. Bartın Bisiklet Festivali

Posted on March 15, 2025 by Bryan Keith

The 9th Bartın Bicycle Festival. Notice that this is called “festival”, not “tour”, making it quite different from the two organized bicycle tours that I’ve done in Turkey (Kayseri and Gökova). The big difference is that we were based in one place the whole time — Amasra — instead of moving every day, like on a “tour”.

For years at my office at work I had a photo of Amasra from the first time I pedaled through in 1998. It was taken from a similar location as this photo which we took this year:

20241017_130015 by bryandkeith on flickr

No one ever guessed that that was Turkey. Amasra is a beauty on Turkey’s generally ugly Black Sea coast. Not surprisingly lots of tourists come. The festival organizers got permission for us to camp on one of the beaches in town, Büyük Liman Plajı. It’s the beach you can see in the center of this photo:

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A week in Saint Petersburg

Posted on March 5, 2025 by Bryan Keith

Don’t think you can see the highlights of Saint Petersburg in a week. We barely scratched the surface, and after a week our list of things we wanted to see and do was still longer than what we actually managed to see and do.

I guess I’ll start with the riding to get into the city. The outer suburbs like Pushkin and Petergof are mostly connected with auto-centric development, somewhat miserable for cyclists. However, after riding about 12-15km east from Petergof, we arrived in more dense urbanization. It was still another ~20km into the city center, but the riding was surprisingly easy and pleasant considering the size of the city. Compared to other large cities I’ve pedaled in I’d rate Saint Petersburg favorably, above Tokyo, Mexico City, Cairo, İstanbul, Los Angeles, Bangkok, but not (yet?) up to the standards of Seoul, Madrid, or Fukuoka. Since I’m here comparing the ease and joy of bicycling in large cities, my experience in Saint Petersburg was on par with Manila and Barcelona.

Some Asian stir fry out in these residential blocks powered us the rest of the way to the city center.

IMG_20240926_124841 by bryandkeith on flickr
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Bicycle touring Russia: Ivangorod to Petergof via Gatchina, Pavlovsk, and Pushkin

Posted on February 23, 2025 by Bryan Keith

Wow, what a week of bicycle touring! Of course, I had been to Russia before, but not by bicycle, and I was a little concerned with how we’d be treated as cyclists. We needn’t have worried.

First, though, we had to get there. It took about seven hours (perhaps a personal record?) to cross the border from Narva to Ivangorod. Much of that was waiting to be interviewed on the Russian side. They were more polite than the immigration officers doing a similar job at the Tel Aviv airport but less competent than the officers I spent a day with in Ust Koksa.

Ferda made a friend while she waited for me in the sun.

20240918_141523 by bryandkeith on flickr

Finally in Ivangorod we changed money at a bank and went straight to a restaurant ’cause we hadn’t eaten anything all day.

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Two days in Helsinki

Posted on February 13, 2025 by Bryan Keith

What a fun short visit to Helsinki. Since we were in Tallinn, we figured we ought to make the trip, but I must admit that I wasn’t so excited about the Finnish capital. The ferries wanted too much extra money for the bicycles so we decided to leave them in Tallinn. That was fine. It’s easy to get around central Helsinki on foot. Also we used the tram twice and took a ferry to visit Suomenlinna.

Finland’s history seems similar to Estonia’s. The Swedes were ruling until they lost the Northern War to Russia (Peter the Great), and then Finland became part of the Russian Empire. Finland became independent in 1918, but unlike Estonia did not become part of the Soviet Union. Suomenlinna (UNESCO-listed) is a fortress built on four islands by the Swedes. It protected a city larger than Helsinki (at the time) but wasn’t strong enough to keep the Russians from taking it. It’s a pleasant area to walk around.

This must be Vallisaari Island. by bryandkeith on flickr
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Train touring Estonia: Valmiera to Narva

Posted on February 3, 2025 by Bryan Keith

From Valmiera to Narva we traveled largely by train. The only bicycling was two days from Tartu to Viljandi and a little bit in the cities of Valga, Tallinn, and Narva. It was a good call as we would have really been pushing the fall weather this far north (60°) by the end of our trip (beginning of October).

The train from Valmiera in Latvia actually crossed the border to Valga in Estonia, and we had a little time to look around Valga/Valka (Estonia/Latvia) before catching another train to Tartu. Interestingly here on the border with Latvia we saw a red brick Catholic church:

Valga Pühavaimu kirik by bryandkeith on flickr
Valga Pühavaimu kirik

A week later in Narva on the border with Russia it was a red brick Orthodox church:

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