OK, I´ll admit - as I had made 185 km on this trip once, surely I might be able to make 200 kilometers in one day, so I had the ambition to reach Batumi that night. Not that I was in a hurry, Ella had to work till Monday (October 28th), but it would habe been cool to cover that distance in one day.

The night before, I asked the reception to prepare a sandwich for me, which they did, thanks! At 6:30, I was already on the road (actually, I wanted to be up even earlier).

Looking east, I yet again had a pretty sunrise...

Sunrise

...looking back, towards the west, was the castle I decided not to visit and an ancient bridge.

Strange hotel, next to a petrol station

Then I saw a sign, one that showed that Batumi (Batum in Turkish) was now really no longer too far...

Batumi getting close...

So I continued on D010...on which, one can experience all kinds of culinary events, from the simple so-called "bufe"-s to restaurants - and you can even dine on an out-of-service Boeing 737. This was still in the vicinity of Trabzon.

An old Boeing 737 awating hungry people

Trabzon has a modern center as well, with elegant shopping malls and modern cafés. Here the traffic is steered underground, a six-laned tunnel catering for a pleasant shopping experience.

In the coastal towns, I would leave the main road D010 and in hope for quieter traffic and reaching restaurants and shops, I would veer towards "sehir merkezi" , the Turkish expression for "city center". In one such town, a freak accident took place, luckily, I was eagerly watching and listening to traffic, as I always do.

As it happened, a van was coming from behind me, I was riding on the right side of the road, as usual. A car approached the main road from the right, I had the right of way, but thought he would cut ahead and turn left in a tight radius. Now the van, which was by now almost next to me, wanted to turn right. I noticed this big object getting dangerously close, closer and closer. Luckily, my brakes were working well, I pulled on them as hard as I could - still, a collision could not be evaded, I hit the right side of the van, as it was cutting my way. By that time, I was almost stationary, so all I had to do was put my feet down, so I did not fall. Still, it was a hot situation, I screamed and screamed at the driver, who screamed back, but he was in quite a shock. I thought of reporting this to the police, but then nothing really had happened. I bought two sinits and devoured them to calm down and soon I was back in business.

The culprit

Further up the road, there was a nice view of the coast and soon I had the first view of the snow-clad Caucasus mountains.

So, in normal countries, roads and institutions are not named after living persons - but then I am unsure whether Turkey belongs to the normal countries - politically. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has created quite a dictatorship - so I found boulevards named after him, worse, even a university. Weird. I met two students, they spoke broken English and as far as I understood, they found it also strange that the university was named after him, still, they did not find their prime minister all too bad. Even though Erdoğan was born in Istanbul, his family has ties to this region.

The university was in the city of Rize, a bustling town of some 120,000 inhabitants. Even before reaching the center (with a wide range of restaurants), I stopped at a very modest bistro and had a quite delicious Turkish omelet. Rize is quite famous for its black tea, the steep coastal hills and the climate provide good conditions for tea production, I later saw large factories producing caj.

There were some interesting buildings on the road - an old fortress guarding the coast and an ancient wooden house.

I entered a smaller town (Ardesen, if I recall) and it there was a pleasant smell of cooked corn being sold in a cups. I only wanted a small portion, the owner smiled and did not charge for it. Next to it was a shop selling a vegan Turkish specialty I had not known till then, Cig Köfte. Bulgur is kneaded with chopped onions and water until it gets soft. Then tomato and pepper paste and spices are added. Lastly, green onions, fresh mint and parsley are mixed. The owner gave me a taste and I asked him for a portion, but only if I was allowed to pay.

My Cig Köfte being prepared

Sadly I had to realize I was not really making the kind of progress that I was hoping for. It was about 4 pm and still had 75 kilometers or so to go, with a border in front of me. Perhaps if I had started an hour earlier, I might have been able to make it, maybe I took too long time to take photos...who knowns. The final blow in my effort to reach Batumi that evening was the weather - it was turning sour.

I spotted a shiny 4-star Ramada hotel in the town of Findikli, with 66 kilometers to go, but I had an hour of daylight. The manager tried to convince me to stay by giving me a big discount, it would have cost €55 with breakfast and telling me there were no nice hotels further up the road. Still, I had an hour of daylight left, so I pushed on.

A few minutes after leaving the hotel, the skies opened up, first slowly, then a regular downpour began, similar to hotel close to Samsun. On the road, there were quite a few tunnels, which I did not really like, as there is no shoulder and cars, especially trucks, come rather close. Here, with the downpour, these tunnels were a welcome change, for a few minutes I would not be rained upon.

Soon I was yet again soaking wet, this is how I arrived to Arhavi Resort Hotel, where I got quite a good deal for a relatively nice room. One issue I had was that the heating was centrally controlled and they seemed to be saving - the little gush of heat coming out of the vents would not do the trick of drying my stuff. I asked multiple times for it to the turned up, it wasn´t up for the job. The thought of continuing in wet gear the following day was not appealing.

Well, I missed my goal by a wide margin, I rode "only" 154 kilometers that day, with about 700 meters of elevation (the road was not always flat), with roughly 50 kilometers for the following day - unless something earth-shattering happens, a very much doable task with 3 days remaining. Here is the map.