Adem Bay, superstar

We are travelling along the ancient caravan route, which linked the orient with Europe.  From Safranbolu to Amasya to Tokat and now in Sivas, we are following that road in reverse, going east, as if going to retrienve more spices that were so very valuable to the rest of the world at the time.

But our transport is not camels or horses, but a rather huge, air conditioned bus.  It's large enough for us each to have a double seat with space left over.

 Our driver is the very polite and formal Adem Bay (Mr. Adem), who always wears a time, and sports a wall of pins from different passengers from different countries beside his seat.

Adem Bey earned every penny he makes on the day we left Safranbolu for Amasya, when we made a quick stop to look at an incredible mosque, built all of wood and without a single nail.  The mosque lies in a village of perhaps 5 houses,in the middle of the countryside.  We bumped along dirt roads for what seemed ages, without a mosque in sight.

Eventually we came upon the village, and the lane took a dive to the left, before making another to the right.  Houses were traditionally built immediately on the road in Turkey, and our bus, seeming more enormous by the minute in this place, had to shimmy up to the pointed corner of one house in order to turn past the corner of another. 

Unfortunately, this manoeuvre coincided with one of the regular rain squalls. Being that much closer to the mountains meant that this squall ouot-squalled other squalls, and a torrent of water crashed down, making it almost impossible to see past the windscreen. The rain also overwhelmed any form of drainage (none) and a river the width of the road swarmed under us, pulling debris down the fairly steep incline (did I say we were on a hill?  we were on a hill). And just to cap it off, flashes of lightening and loud cracks of thunder broke overhead.

Using his mirrors only, Adem Bay slowly inched along.  From the inside it seemed imossibly for him not to take out the wall of the house and the bus missors at the same time, but he cleared it, then slowly cleared the next. 

Of course he also had to do the same thing on the return journey and we sat in silence as he slowly inched forward, then back, then forward, then back, hard turning his wheel with each stap.  by this time of course, the news that there was a huge bus full of foreigners had passed through the village.  How could it not when the windows of our vehicle were inches away from the second storey windows.  Undaunted by the dump of water from above, the men tried to help by standing next to the bus and tut-tutting while making the odd useless gesture to move more to the right or left.  The women just stood their with disapproving expressions as if to say, "you come to our country in this stupid vehicle, you deserve to be stuck"

But Mr. Adem persevered and with one last painful tug of the wheel, we cleared the final hurdle, a barn full of languid cows where were the only ones with sense enough to come in from the rain.  As the thunder continued we all let out a cheer and applauded, something I don't think Adem Bay had ever experienced before and he shyly nodded.

Our way along the spice route clear, the rain decided to let off and a steamy humidity made the road ahead look like a shimmering silver thread twisting over and around the countryside.