Auto-touring to a couple yayla in Rize

Posted on December 8, 2016 by Bryan Keith

The Kaçkar Mountains!  A great escape from Antalya’s summertime heat.  This summer Ferda and I signed up with one of Rize’s hiking clubs, KDRK, for their casual six-day trekking trip.  But first we arrived in Rize early with a couple days to spare.  Semra, who I climbed with on the Matterhorn, moved from Ardeşen to Antalya this summer, and we got to Rize just in time for her going away party on July 16th (yes, the blog’s a little behind, but it really was summer).  However, politics thwarted those plans.   An attempted coup, recommendations not to go out, cancelled transportation — it looked like we might be holed up in a mosquito-infested hotel room in Rize for a couple days.

DSC05230 by bryandkeith on flickr
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Paperwork in Ankara

Posted on November 28, 2016 by Bryan Keith

Ankara’s not a particularly exciting city.  I’ve been a number of times, mostly to visit Banu, Deniz, and Sabiha, but I haven’t bothered writing a blog about it till now.  Banu and Deniz  now live in Amsterdam, and Sabiha was on vacation on the Aegean so my excuse for a visit this time was a couple days of paperwork — you know, present such-and-such paper to such-and-such official, then pay for a stamp and a signature; all to make some other official happy.  Since the first office I had to go to was only open in the afternoon and the second office I had to go to was only open in the morning, I had some time to look around the city.

DSC05206 by bryandkeith on flickr

I stayed with Oğuz, one of the owners of the bouldering gym, Kısa Kaya, near centrally-located Kızılay.  We had just met climbing in Kapıkaya a few weeks earlier.
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Classic Route on Sivri Dağı

Posted on November 18, 2016 by Bryan Keith

It seems that the easiest route on any mountain in Turkey is called the “Classic Route”.  In addition to being the easiest, it also tends to be the route that gets climbed the most even if it’s not the best.  We can certainly think of Erciyes and Tunç in that respect: everyone seems to climb the “classic route” even though there are better, more interesting, perhaps more challenging options that wouldn’t take any longer.  That’s part of the herd mentality in Turkish mountaineering.  There’s a reluctance to try anything new and to try anything without a guide.

Nürşen, Özlem, Seval, Ferda by bryandkeith on flickr
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Ahmetler Canyon descent with Evren and Bekir

Posted on November 8, 2016 by Bryan Keith

This was my second descent of Ahmetler Canyon.  It’s a super fun day, something worth doing a few times.  On my first trip through the canyon, I was cold almost the whole time.  This time I had a full (as opposed to shorty) 3mm wetsuit.  That was enough for the water temperature in September.  I happily wasn’t cold at all.  The other thing I wanted to improve upon from the first trip was finishing in the light.  We dilly-dallied too much the first time and ended up finishing in the dark, unable to see what’s arguably the most beautiful part of the canyon.  I saw it this time.  However, by the time we got there, I was too tired to take any photos.  🙁  Guess I’ll just have to go back.

DSCN0185 by bryandkeith on flickr
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Four-day auto-tour east of Antalya with Gertjan, Jacqui, and Mateo

Posted on October 28, 2016 by Bryan Keith

Well, this blog post was a long time coming.  When we did this trip last September, I was still fairly good about keeping the blog going, and this entry was the next one I was going to write.  Somehow I never got around to it, and the blog lapsed for months.  So, finally here it is — Uçansu Waterfall, Manavgat Waterfall, Altınbeşık Cave, the famous “button” houses of İbradı, yet another Uçansu Waterfall (!), and the tourist trap of Side.  It was a fun full four days.

Jacqui and Gertjan managed to take long leaves from their jobs in Vancouver last year and spent quite a bit of time visiting France, Wales, the Netherlands, Germany, Turkey, and who knows where else.  Ferda and I had the chance to visit Gertjan and his mother in Groenekan, and while we were there, Gertjan took us to the tallest pyramid in the Netherlands.  Wow, how exciting.  Challenged to top such a spectacular site, Ferda and I invited Gertjan, Jacqui, and Mateo to Antalya and put together this short driving tour.

We started by visiting one of two waterfalls in Antalya with the same name, Uçansu (Flying Water).  To add to the confusion the first Uçansu we went to (near Gebiz) actually has two waterfalls (does that make three Uçansu?).  They’re both spectacular, with great swimming holes, like something out of a movie set.  The dirt road to get back to this area was longer than I expected so it was nice that we got permission to camp at the lower waterfall.  It was less nice when, after the employee who gave permission left for the evening, the overnight guard decided to enforce the no camping rules.  With some smiles and a promise to take down the tents early, everyone was happy again.

DSCN9835 by bryandkeith on flickr
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