THE PROBLEM with Istanbul is that it is on a narrow strip of land into which all roads must funnel. It is also one of the world's largest cities and a confluence of East and West, where Europe and Asia join. The result, as we warned Swiss Miss, is that even the lesser route from the west is four lanes each way, an international artery, with repeated junctions leading to the main autoroute just to the north. A journal elsewhere on this site speaks of riding miserably into Istanbul while seeing other terrified cyclists riding in the opposite direction eight lanes to the left.

'It was the only time I have really feared for my life,' one traveller put it. And our French friends, Alex and Lydie, also heading for Mount Ararat, sent a message saying it hadn't been the joy of their lives but 'On y est! The relief leapt off the page.

Well, we tried to be cleverer and come round to the south, taking in the landing beaches of Gallipoli and then the ferry to central Istanbul from Bandirma. We're certain it's better than the direct route but it's a miserable experience. Since leaving Greece we have been in a bottleneck with little - i.e. no - choice of roads. We accepted that but what you know in advance, because you have seen it on a map, isn't always what you get in real life.

In real life we have run into a long spell of harsh easterly winds in prairie countryside. Instead of riding the rolling hills and tolerating traffic philosophically, our days have been reduced to hours of struggle. Drivers have been tolerant, understanding and courteous. They have also been friendly to a fault, tooting or flashing their lights in welcome, passengers half climbing out of their window to wave.

But the volume of traffic as we move east has grown and where once we felt happy on the main part of the road, we feel it right now to ride only on the narrow and often broken patch to the right. So as well as the noise of the traffic and the wind that rises each day more than the day before, we are pinned to a road surface that cuts us on long hills to 5kmh and on the flat to only twice that. We are having to pedal hard downhill.

I couldn't recommend coming this way - although the gale darkens my judgement - but it must be better than the other way. At least we never felt in danger.

There have been happy moments, though. Coming from a rare café stop, we began yet another climb, up past still more farmers selling melons from farm trailers. One was a lad in his teens to whom we had chatted briefly at the garage café.

'I live in Istanbul,' he told us, 'but now I'm on holiday and I'm selling melons for my grandfather.'

So much for western ideas of a holiday!

We had just got going when we approached him by his trailer.

'Stop, stop!' he implored. We stopped. And he came to us and said 'You must be very tired' and cut each of us a slice of the most succulent melon we have ever tasted.

Heart

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'You like?'

We said we did.

He pointed to the valley to the right and said 'This is my village,' meaning it was where he grew up and where he returns each weekend. 'It is famous here for the best melons in Turkey. People come from all over the country to buy them here.'

He told us his name but the wind blew it away. We did gather, though, that he had been at his sister's wedding the night before.

'I am very sad,' he said, 'because she won't be at home any more.'

'Has she moved far?'

'Just to the next village.'

'So not too far,' Steph consoled him.

'No,' he agreed. And he smiled. Like a slice of melon.