High mountains, low voltage

Day 225 | Tuesday October 25

Unfortunately it was time to leave my hosts Ali and Burak. I really appreciate how they took care of me and wish them all the best.

Range Excitement

The plan for today was uncertain. Erzurum is where I want to go to arrange the visa and I found some people on CouchSurfing who could host me. It is 260km away so not reachable on one charge but with a pitstop I could make it. Exact in the middle of the route is Bayburt, I tried to find a host there but no luck so I won’t have a place to stay. So time for some #RangeExcitement.

Hitting the road

The nature on the way from Trabzon to Bayburt was unbelievable beautiful. From my window I saw a lot of green, hills and water. Stunning to drive through. The hills became mountains though, which were also beautiful but it took a lot from the car. And it seemed they were reaching to the heaven as I kept rising. The temperatures didn’t rise sadly and even dropped very quick, after a while the meter on my dashboard told me it was 3.5C. Probably the coldest temperature I noticed so far. While Bayburt was 70km away my battery level reached 20% and in stead of trying to reach Erzurum it became already hard to reach Bayburt. I wanted to stop at the earliest convenience but it took a while before I found something. With 7% left and a lot of stress I came by a tunnel which was under construction. There were some containers and I was hoping to find electricity there. I saw it was there but no-one to ask if I could use it. I started to get a bit desperate and afraid as it got so cold (it was almost freezing) and there wasn’t anyone on the road. Luckily after 30 minutes some construction workers came out the tunnel and they were happy to help me. Like everyone in Turkey so far. They were interested in the car and thought it was a ridicules idea, they are probably right.

The guys invited me in their container, offered me some coffee, put me in front of the heater and took some selfies with me. When I had 30% battery I continued my way and after the tunnel the road only went down and I had no trouble to reach Bayburt. I decided that I couldn’t go farther today as I needed to charge a long time. I decided to book a cheap hotel with the money I had left from my mother. It might the easy way out but after all the stress I wanted to recover.

Carnet de Passage

The last weeks I have been very busy with preparing the trip through the Middle East and Asia. In these countries you can’t just appear at the border and enter the country. You need to request a Carnet de Passage. After you delivered a 5000 euro deposit you receive a document. For the country this is a guarantee that the car will be exported after your trip. When you decide to leave the car in the country you lose the bond. Now I borrowed the money from a friend of mine (Thanks L) and requested this document from the German Automobile Club (ADAC). On the application form you need to fill out a lot of details about the car and these need to match with your vehicle documents. Now that’s were some issues arose. On the Carnet form I needed to enter the capacity of the cilinder. Now an electric car doesn’t have a cilinder so thats n/a. However my vehicle document said there was a 1350 CM3 capacity. I contacted the RDW and they confirmed there had been a mistake. They sent a new card to my mother and luckily this arrived the day before she flew to Istanbul so she could take this with her. Now I could apply for the Carnet, problem was they need to sent it to Turkey and when you go to another address everyday, not knowing where you are in 2 days it’s hard to find a postbox. I thought the best possibility was to sent it to the guys in Trabzon and it arrived there last Friday. I had to pay another 57 euro for DHL express. Luckily I have some donation money now.

It’s not easy sometimes to arrange all these things while on the road and being on your own. A few weeks ago I was uncertain if I would manage to fix all this but I believe I got it under control now.

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