Görüşürüz Turkey - we’ll be back

Thursday 5 September 2024

Crossing the border from Turkey to Greece at Ipsala brought mixed emotions. Sad that we were leaving a country and people we know and love so well, but excited to be heading into a part of Greece we’ve not explored before. We spent eleven days in Turkey and travelled 1600 miles. 

Five of those days we spent with Annie in her house in amongst the forest trees on the outskirts of the Bodrum Peninsula. We didn’t do much but unwind after our long trip out, eat, drink and swim. We reminisced about the 6 years we worked with Annie & other friends back in Bodrum in the 80’s and the trips we went on together. When we visited in 2013 her dog Jake came out for a day with us in our coach built camper. Her latest dog Finley looked at home in our current van but as it was so hot he didn’t get the chance to travel in it. Annie knows so much about the country, its people and its history. She’s recently brought her BacktoBodrum  blog back to life - her musings about life in Turkey make interesting reading.

There’s many strings to Annie’s bow - including working on boats, as a travel rep, running a travel agency and working as a PA/cook all around Europe. During Covid she took up art and she’s proved to be very talented in that field too capturing on canvas working women going about their daily lives.

We’re honoured to have come away with a gift of one of Annie’s original pieces of art and it will have pride of place on our lounge wall when we get home. 

Ironically as we drove away from Annie’s we followed this tractor for a while! 

One of the first sights I saw when we arrived in Turkey a couple of weeks ago was three women working the land, bent double with their baggy trousered bottoms in the air. Leaving today we got a cheery smile and wave from another group picking crops in a field. 

There’s a number of ways to say goodbye in Turkish - one of our favourites is “Güle güle” which roughly translates as “Leave with a smile.” And we did.