The road climbs continuously from Gumushane through a number of tunnels until it reaches a pass at a height of 2,409 metres. There are snow-covered peaks on three sides while the road serpentines on the fourth side down to Bayburt and on to Erzerum. The pass has a monument to mark the deaths of Turkish soldiers who ounght the Russians in this area in 2016.
The road runs eastwards from Erzerum towards Pasinler, but turns north before long towards Artvin.The bush-covered hills gradually get higher until the path runs tough a jumble of hills and mountains, some of which are high enough to be streaked with snow. At one point, the road runs past massive smooth rocks from which the vegetation has been torn off, revealing a kaleidoscope of colours: red, scarlet, gold, yellow and white. At another point it runs through a specacular gorge with soaring cliffs on either side and a white-water river accompanying the road.
At Gole, the landscape changes abruptly to a wide grassy plain, much of it covered in small yellow flowers simiar to celandines. This is cattle country and every so often we had to slow down for large herds of cattle being driven along the road. The route then begins to climb, reaching a height of 2,550 metres and a huge black cloud opened up on us with torrential rain. Shortly after leaving the pass, a beautiful vista of a wide green valley appeared before us with the small town of Posfir on the mountaside to our left. At this point we came across a huge load being driven at barely 5 mph, and we got past it with some difficulty. There were then a further 8-10 such loads before we got past them all, and drove down into the border crossing of Turk Gozu.
As I expected, there was a fine to pay on the Turkish side for speeding because I hadn’t worked out what the EMS signs meant until it was too late. Ten speeding fines totalled about £40, which we can’t complain about considering that just one costs £100 in Britain. Getting into Georgia lead to another shock. We didn’t buy insurance in 2018 and their computer remembered it. So we had to pay a fine of £30 and then buy insurance for the current trip of another £30. Feeling totally pissed off, we drove into Georgia thinking we might enjoy a bit of luxury by staying in a hotel. Sadly the road through Vale, Akhaltsikhe and a succession of villages didn’t have any hotels and not even a truck park where we could sleep for the night. So a nerve-wracking journey along a very narrow and bumpy road with lorries speeding towards us took us to Borjomi where we bedded down in the market place,
Turkish cafes have these fires burning to keep the insects away
Memorial to soldiers who died here fighting Russians in 1916
Weather on the way to