The day after our return from the mini Kackar Expedition we were were treated with some fine surprises! First, we were woken up by the sun beaming through the window and secondly, during our tour this day into the Davut Dagi range, which lies to the S/SE of Yaylalar, we had the most amazing experience of watching a massive bear climbing a big slope to the col in front of us! See video above. The second half is better and a bit closer. Watch how big its paws are, how fast it moves and how it turns its head around to look at us!
The whole week we were talking about the small possibility of encountering one and were hoping for some good luck after seeing so many tracks everywhere… big tracks! And then ..there it was, moving fast and turning his head around towards us.. it was obvious that the animal wanted to get away from us! Later when we got back from the trip, the hostel owner explained us that this bear crossed the street in the village and apparently does so on a regular basis. It moves between the mountains on the north side and the south side of the village. There are two, a couple, and sometimes 3, when there is a young. I think it has been my best wilderness experience I have had till so far.
The ranges on the south side of Yaylalar are used a lot for heli skiing and we could understand why!! Big open slopes, where you could cruise your little hard out. Nice gullies too! The mountains were still thick in snow but this time of the year (April) it is getting warm quickly and the snow tends to be heavy and wettish. For skiing powder the best time is February/March. Touring probably best in March. The mountains in Turkey are high, most higher than 3000. This time of the year, lower down, the mountains are really getting stripped of the snow which means that you have to do a bit of walking to reach the snowline in some areas.
To get into the Davut Dagi we followed the gorge of the Mahlen Deresi until we reach the snowline where we clambered on the steep left bank and continued our way up. The slopes are big and steep on either side of the Mahlen Deresi and hold a lot of snow and when avalanched leads into quite a man trap. An area to take care in.
We toured to just below the col to the right of Sarkinet Tepesi (3283m) but as the snow conditions weren’t good and views of very recent avalanches were surrounding us we stopped on a little platform at about 3000m. Andoni and Iker were persistent and continued to the col. We decided to slowly start our descent and when we all gathered together on the way down it turned out that Iker had broken his ski below the col and thus couldn’t descend skiing….apperently it was a very long walk down!!!!
As for us the descent was a delight…another sweet Turkish delight!!! A magnificent area, worth while a return!
After returning to the Camyuva pension we gathered our kit together, had some lunch and bought some supplies from the local shop which also belonged to owners of the Camyuva and started our descent down the valley. The plan was to stop in Barhal on the way down and do a route the next day to Altiparmak (3501m). We certainly stopped in Barhal and we even got to go to Altiparmak….well some of us!!
The route down the valley is rough, very rough and since our hire cars weren’t particularly suitable, very low and nothing near anything off- roady or 4 wheel drive, (but mostly unsuitable for rally driving), the route was quite an adventure. Especially when after only 10 minutes into the trip one of the cars was leaving a trail of thick oil behind. We flagged the other troop down to stop and basically it didn’t look good…not much help on these roads either... So we decided to tow the other car up and down the gorge…I say up and down as the problem here is that the route doesn’t properly descent and so we couldn’t just drive the car without motor in neutral down…we had to tow a lot of up, followed by a lot of down and sharp turns on a one way off-road track next to a raging river in a big gorge….. whoopee! Our towing system wasn’t of the best either… and so we added some extra damaged to the car, oepppss. What did they say again about insurance at the car hire?? Did anyone understand that part of the conversation…ehhh can anyone read the papers? Nooop, and nooop!
We got as far as Barhal and thought that surely in Barhal we could find a mechanic to sort a ‘minor’ problem. No way man..instead we were so naive and thought that on of the young local shop keeper dudes was really helpful and was offering us (in Turkish) the help of his friend..who of course was a mechanic. But our friend didn’t know when he would arrive…tomorrow morning mechanic…no problem… and then he showed us his brothers teahouse!! So that is were we ended up and guess what…Next morning no mechanic and of course our little friend knew of nothing, well that is as far as our Turkish understanding goes, ha,ha. Well at least we did something beneficial for the local community!
Next up: Altiparmak
See you there!!! XXX Chris
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