Talkin' Turkey

 

Update #3: The Eclipse!

March 27-30 2006		         

 

Choosing a place from which to watch the eclipse was actually pretty simple, based primarily on two maps which I've combined here:
Eclipse track + projected cloud cover (based on maps published by eclipse guru Fred Espenak, , NASA's GSFC).
The yellow lines indicate the track of the total eclipse (you want to be as close to the centerline as possible for the longest eclipse); the colored areas represent projected cloud cover (the lighter the area on the map, the better the odds of having clear skies). With this information at hand it quickly becomes apparent that the village of Side ("SEE-deh") is ideally situated for the eclipse - best weather, beautiful coastal location, and right on the centerline. The bad news is that everyone else heading to Turkey for the eclipse had access to the very same information — including NASA, not one but two hippy festivals, and about a gazillion tour groups. So I knew we could expect lots of company.

Then, as I sat contemplating the swarm, a small detail on the map caught my eye: See that little peninsula sticking straight down into the Mediterranean just south of Olympos (yellow star)? That's pretty close to the centerline, and looks to be well off the beaten track (Google Earth users can see the spot here). Then the name "Olympos" rang a bell, and a little research revealed it as a place I'd already put on my Turkey wish list: A place on the seacoast where you can go sailing, sleep in a tree house, and chill. So on our last day in Göreme, we inquired of the owner of the Shoestring Pension — who, naturally, knew the owner of one of the tree house pensions, and phoned & made reservations for us. With accommodations set, so were we.

 

Olympos

 

The pace of life in Olympos seems to agree with Mark.

 

Bayram's Pension.
The bus from Antalya dropped us off at a small rest area (by now you know that "rest area" means "place where my cousin will sell you tea & sandwiches"), then we caught a shuttle down from the hills to Olympos — not so much a village as a series of small hotels & pensions. Bayram's Treehouse Pension is one of the last on the road, only half a mile from the beach! We checked in (more of a bungalow than a tree house, really, tho' the lemon trees outside the windows were a nice touch), got breakfast, greeted some other folks who also came in from the Shoestring (!),
then began exploring. Well, first a nap to recover from the overnight bus ... then exploring. And there's plenty to explore here, for — as you might guess by the name — Olympos was once occupied by the Greeks! The ruins of temples, tombs, fortresses, baths, and an amphitheater are all within 15 minutes walk from home ... and under the gaze of Mount Olympus (albeit the Turkish version).

 

You don't have to go far — about five minutes — before you start encountering ruins.

Another five minutes and we found — and followed — a sign saying "Acropolis"; what we got was a short climb to high overlook, and our first view of the Mediterranean! And as the gears turned, I realized that this might be a great spot from which to watch the eclipse ... hmmm.

A walk along the beach, and Mark makes yet another friend.

 

Olympos was different from Istanbul or Göreme in that it was the first place where we mixed significantly with other travelers, with the help of the common dinners, nightly bonfires and cheap alcohol & tobacco (Turkish water pipes, of course). A couple of Aussies, some Brits, Turks, and several Americans (including some folks who live in Istanbul — and assured me when I lamented that I didn't take the time to learn a little Turkish before I came that I needn't worry; it's much too hard). Began to get really jealous of folks who were traveling for 3 months, 6 months, a year ...

The following day, the day before the eclipse, meant a little more exploration, and also brought about a scare: Shortly after noon clouds started forming in a previously clear sky, and by 2pm (the time of the following day's eclipse) it was overcast. Yoiks. This rekindled my worries that the mountainous terrain around Olympos might generate its own weather at a sensitive time. Several of us discussed the possibility of renting a car or van from a nearby agency so we'd have mobility in case the weather around Olympos looked snarky on eclipse day.

In the afternoon Mark & I explored a few miles of the 300-mile Lycian Way hiking trail and investigated more of the local ruins.

 

View of the Olympos valley from a few hundred feet up the Lycian way (Bayram's is at center).

I think Mark has found the tombs ...

... which have ancient Greek inscriptions you can touch.

Theater entrance.

The baths.

Room with a view.

 

That evening we decided it was too risky to leave the weather to chance, and hired a local driver and his van to take us to — fanfare, please — that little peninsula I found two months ago! A German guy at the pension was familiar with that peninsula & recommended it for a viewing spot, and (British) Michael, who had been trekking the Lycian Way, had a topographic map that showed the hiking trail from the place our van driver would leave us to the lighthouse on the point 1000' above the sea. In the end we collected 8 people to share the expense and got set to depart at 9:30 the next morning.

 

Eclipse day!

The weather was perfect as we loaded into the van & hit the road.

Our van driver got us to a small lot near this spot on the west side of the peninsula (the dirt track was too rough for him to continue in his van). An hour's hike, and an elevation gain of about 1000', found us ...

... At the lighthouse! We arrived about an hour before first contact, and people were streaming to this spot at a high rate. Note the guy setting up to take photos (right).

Just as we were looking for a spot to set up, some folks in our group got the idea to go a little further up the ridge (right picture, behind the lighthouse) where we could get above the trees. So we climbed up another 10 minutes to our final viewing spot.

 

Our viewing spot, looking down to the Mediterranean Sea. Spectacular, no?? We had better than 270° of panorama! (See the lighthouse? And yes, that's a sheer drop off to the right of where that guy is standing — and where I'm sitting.) This pic was taken about 15 minutes before first contact.

 

Looking 180° around, Mark appears ready.

 

Turkey being my third eclipse, I think I've decided that my favorite part of the show (apart from that flaming corona, of course) is that last 5 minutes before it goes total. A solar eclipse takes about 1¼ hours from first contact (moon just begins to overlap sun's disk) to second contact (moon completely covers the sun, totality begins), and the first hour takes a looooooong time. The light fades slowly at first, and your eyes & brain adjust so well that you might not notice the change if you didn't know it was coming (although the winds that whip up and the drastic drop in temperature — about 15 fahrenheit degrees! — are definite giveaways). But it's those final few minutes before totality that really put the bubbles in your spine; the light level just falls right off the table, and that's surprisingly unnerving. When the sun is around 90% covered you can start stealing glances and see that crescent with the naked eye. Not only is it getting dim, colors seem to shift from yellow towards blue/gray, and shadows get unnaturally sharp. Then that final sliver of light gives way to that corona ... whew!

Now, the bad news: I didn't get any good pictures. I did lug a tripod all the way to Turkey, but instead used it for a video experiment: A solar eclipse is, after all, just the moon's shadow, a hundred miles in diameter skimming across the Earth's surface at a cool 1500 miles per hour! And since we were high above the sea, I figured we might be able to see that giant shadow streaking towards us! So I mounted my Canon Elph camera (which takes video clips) and pointed it in the direction from which the shadow would come; then 5 minutes before totality, I started it recording. Great idea. The reality, however, is that I didn't get anything except the sky getting darker. No shadow bands either. But it still was pretty cool to watch the lights go out, and hear us (well, me) screaming like idiots; I may post it if I can find a way to get it down below 1GB!! But here are 2 frames, just to give you the idea:
Five minutes before, and during, totality. See the orange dusk light? It wrapped all the way around us!

 

As for the eclipse itself, only one of the photographers in our group, Anita, got a good picture:

 

The eclipse! Photo courtesy Anita Hummel.

 

I like this pic because it shows (1) the color of the sky during totality, and (2) how bright the corona was, far brighter than the one in Africa (at least that's how I remember it).

For more pictures & video, here are some other good eclipse '06 links:

 

And just like that, it's over (we had about 3½ minutes of total eclipse). Funny, after the sun starts peeking out again the sequence is the same only backwards — and yet the tension isn't there anymore, I suppose because the light is now on the rise.

 

The traditional post-eclipse group photo. Top to bottom: Mark, Richard (Wales), Michael (England), Helen (England), Michael (Australia), Jo (England), me. Missing: Anita. Note the lucky break: A big cloud moved in over us, but not until five minutes after totality!

 

When we got back to the parking lot we met this group of nice folks, who kept our van driver company and gave us tea.

 

Eclipse epilogue: That evening you could see the best evidence of the addictive qualities of eclipse chasing: The internet room was filled with folks Googling to see when the next one would be! (Anyone up for a road trip to northern Canada in 2008?)

Oh, and the next day it was almost completely overcast.

 

 

The day after

Mark & I found we enjoyed this thing they call "chilling": Lazy afternoons exploring the beach, or back at the pension with our feet up drinking the cheap local beer and munching Gözleme ("GOOZ-le-meh", Turkish crepes filled with potatoes or honey & banana); evenings around the bonfire chewing the fat with other travelers drinking raki (45%-strong, anise-flavored booze, did I mention it's very strong?), and yes, I partook of the social ritual of the water pipe (light, fruit-flavored tobacco; special that night was apple). And since we hadn't yet figured out where we were going next (only four days left in Turkey!) we decided to stick around one more day.

 

On the last night in Olympos, I went to see one of the area's most famous sights: The Chimera Flames. Best seen at night, the flames rise from rocks on the side of a hill and have (allegedly) been burning for centuries. A one-and-a-half-hour hike and I was dodging tour groups to get my pictures. If it's hard to tell from these pictures, most of the flames were 1-3 feet high.

 

 

Of course, some might wonder whether the Chimera flames are authentic or a cynical tourist attraction fed by underground gas lines. I don't know but had to look twice when, during a lull between tour groups, I saw a gentleman in a green jacket trying to relight some of the flames with a Bic lighter.

I got back to the pension around midnight, and for some reason that's when the party started. It ended ... well, estimates vary from 5 to 7 a.m. And we had a 10 o'clock bus to catch.

 

Bonus Pictures

 

Turkish Santa?

 

The night of the eclipse I was at the outdoor bar flirting with the barmaid (New Yorker working her way around the world) when this giant moth — wingspan must've been 4 or 5 inches — came in for a landing right above my head. Appropriately, it's a luna moth.