The hardest thing about this one-night backpacking trip with Özgür and Burak was remembering the name of the first peak we summited: Tastaratacağı. Çalbalı’s a little easier, but maybe that’s because I’ve climbed it before.
We drove up to Hisarçandır and then took the dirt road that heads up to Sarı Çınar, the summit with the large antenna on top. In the forest there’s a marked intersection with a sign indicating Üçsöğüt Yaylası is to the left. It’s not. We went right and then left onto a smaller road at an unmarked intersection higher up. We followed that road most of the way to Üçsöğüt Yaylası until the going gets too rough for a normal car.
From where we parked our car to the summit of Tastaratacağı took less then two hours, even carrying our big packs. I was surprised as I’d heard that access to Tastaratacağı was rather difficult. It turns out that the difficult thing is getting to the bottom of Tastaratacağı. There are a couple 900m trad routes up the steep east face of the mountain. Getting to the start of those routes takes some effort apparently.
Here are some views from Tastaratacağı’s jagged summit:
