Packing Day 23: Conclusion
We spend the next 2 days hunkered down in the aircon and only venture out to eat. On day 1 we decide that a late breakfast and early dinner should suffice, but by 14h00 our resolve has crumbled. We are all starving – seems we have underestimated how hollowed-out our exertions have left us. We brave the 39 degrees to walk 7 mins to the food court in the air-conditioned mall. When the plates come, we think we have ordered far too much, but we mop up every last morsel. “I guess 18h00 is maybe a bit early now for dinner”, I venture, but by 19h00 we are warming up and by the time we’ve Googled all the options, agreed on a suitable venue and hailed a cab, we are READY for the next round! After crisp, white wine, salads, sushi and dessert, we hurry back to catch the last of the Wimbledon Final – it’s tricky finding the right Chanel on the Kyrgyz menu … We go to sleep at the unaccustomed hour of 00h30 – talk about living on the wild side!
On day 2 we re-box the bikes (Ok, that’s not exactly true. Steve re-boxes the bikes and I type the blog 😊). We manage to skip lunch, but are heading to dinner by 17h00. We find a gem of a Japanese restaurant and Kati and I polish off 2 entire bottles of wine!! (Maybe a bad move, since we have to be up at 06h00 for our flight to Istanbul). We really have not had a bad meal in Bishkek, quite the opposite, in fact. We have discovered a distinctly cosmopolitan side to the city, which totally belies the country’s rating as second poorest in Central Asia. At the start of our trip we drew far too much cash, not realizing there’d be next to nothing to spend it on, so we are blowing it wildly now in an attempt to deplete our stash.
The next day Kati is a tad hungover, but amazingly I feel 100s (practice makes perfect?).
The whole airport rigmarole is predictably tiresome and altogether absurd (I mean really, why not just have you take a swig out of your bottle of water to ascertain it’s not some sort of liquid explosive?!) I resort to my coping mechanism: breathe in, breathe out, equanimous, equanimous, equanimous. Kati resorts to her coping mechanism: F@&&$$)(;;://)$’!! Steve is unaffected. What’s more, he gets his water through undetected!
In Istanbul we have 12 hours to kill. We again join the free city tour. This time we opt for a boat cruise on the Bosphorus and we are blessed with perfect weather and a full moon – what a great way to pass the time! Well done Turkish Airlines!
Finally back home and we have 1 day in which to recover and wash our kit, before we head off on the trial ride for Absa Cape Epic 2020. We’ll either be super-fit or totally knackered- time will tell. At least we’ll be on super-light dual sus bikes, though, bonus! There’ll be no blogging about the route, however, as it’s still Top Secret!
P.S. Further to my earlier call for sperm donors, Kati has asked me to put it out there that she would much prefer an awesome, adventure-loving, male travel companion, so that she doesn’t have to play spare wheel to me and Steve. Applications can be sent in triplicate to Kati, Steve & Di (it IS a democracy).
And with that, I’ll sign off. Thanks for listening and do remember, Life is short. You can choose to dig in or you can seize the day. Carpe Diem!
