Erzurum, Turkey

1st August.
Travelled almost 600kms yesterday, 300 on either side of the border. The formalities took less than an hour thanks to a couple of helpful 'officials' that we realized to out cost were just hangers on after their cut. They were a help though as none of the offices were marked and the paperwork for the van can often entail visiting a half dozen different officers and buildings.
The Turkish roads are inferior to what we had travelled on in Iran. Of the 300kms, 180 kilometres entailed roadworks. Most of the rest was patched up pot holes and a very uneven surface.
We stopped at Agri, a town 110kms into Turkey to draw some money out. This is the town 31 years ago we ended up after our accident. I took a photo of the hotel where the police had rushed us to once we had hit town, the radiator bars are still in the foyer where Adam & Emma were huddled against to warm up. The temps at the time was -40C we were told and I had skidded on the ice into a truck, tearing off the roof rack I had built over the front bumper. It gouged across the windscreen but hadn't broken it which may have saved or lives. In the 20 minutes I stopped to hack saw off the roof rack the radiator froze even with 90% anti freeze. By the time we reached Agri the water around the engine block was boiling while the radiator stayed frozen. The Anatolian Plateau is 10,000 feet high and experiences severe winters.
Even diesel froze and when we finally left Agri all that time ago we were in a surreal landscape of TIR trucks parked along the highway to Iran with fires under their fuel lines to try and defrost the diesel. There were also many trucks that had skidded on the ice and were now lying on their sides where they would stay until the spring thaw. All around us was snow and ice, you could even see the ice crystals in the air.
The visit this time around was on a warm summer's day, the town is bigger of course and the main road bypasses the town.
It's good to once more see women in jeans and t shirts and no scarves on, plenty of eating places to chose from and the opportunity to have a beer or a wine though we didn't find an outlet last night.
Later.
Travelled on to Malatya today and will reach Cappadocia tomorrow. Before leaving Iran we filled up the two 20 litre containers with diesel that I had bought for the desert crossing to the Paki/Iran border. Pleased I did because from 2 cents a litre (AU) in Iran it is AU$2.20 a litre here in Turkey. Saved ourselves quite a bit and the downside was a bit of diesel smell in the van that should dissipate.
We travelled through the Kurdish sector of Turkey today. There were many army check points along the way and were advised against sleeping in the open tonight.