The sun was falling right into our tent and around 8:00am I woke up. But because I was very tired, I got up one hour later. We packed our staff and went to Ayvalik for breakfast.
This little town on the bitch was full of people. It was deferent than the previous night. At the port you could find lots of coffee shops, taverns and shops where you can buy souvenirs. Small roads made by stones lead you to the sea and where you can find any store you want. Most of the shop owners, speak Greek because of the tourists that goes to Ayvalik every day from Lesvos island.
We left for Bergama following a very easy course without any interest. Bergama has 3 main views: Basilica, Acropolis and Asclepius.
The amazing Basilica is inside the town which we visited it. On the other side of the road we met Sahli, from Kurdistan, who has a shop with carpets. We had the chance to meet him when he came to talk to us, as he saw the Greek plate numbers of our bikes. We spend some time with him telling us the story of his shop, his family, his life…He also told us that he supplies the famous Greek carpet supplier Miraraki with carpets.
We said good bye to Sahli and took the road for Acropolis (ticket: 10YTL/person) which was 5km away. It was at the top of a small mountain, from where you have a very nice view of the whole area. There you can find very interesting things but the most important is the ancient theatre, build in at the hill-side.
With the temperature rising, we took the road to Asclepius (ticket: 10YTL/person). After searching for some hour, we managed to find it. It was the best that we have seen until now. We studied the story of Asclepius for a few minutes. Once again the ancient Greeks prove their wisdom…
Later we left for Sart (Sardes) which was 150km away. Following an interesting road, not so well made, we arrived around 19:30pm. The agent territory was closed so we decided to spend the night somewhere near and visit the views in the morning.
So we took the road to Bozdag, following a very beautiful course with trees and panoramic view. We believed that we could find somewhere to stay outside the town of Salihli. We passed 2-3 territories with new and nice build houses, but not even one place that we could stay.
We found a tavern and Ploumisti said that we could eat something there and then if it’s possible to camp there. While parking our bikes and a young man -Serdar- came to welcome us. Into the trees, at the next to a small river, we cooked our own food, in our own barbeque, choosing the meat for our self’s. This was different!!
Serdar with a big smile all the time provided us we everything we wanted. He was the only one that new English, so he was the only one that we could speak with. Serdar invited us into his house to pass the night. We tried to avoid going because we didn’t want to disturb him. But he insisted saying that he called his wife and that she will be very happy to meet us.
So we waited until he finished his job and around 00:30am we took the road to Salihli (20km). Our visit could be titled as “The unknown visitors from far - far away”. At his home was Sukran (Serdar's wife) with 3 friends of hers. They accepted us with joy, just like they know us for years. They offered us the traditional Turkish tea and we kept talking until 03:00am.
This young couple gave us a good lesson of true hospitality…
