Team: Phil Luff, Steve
Tooms, Rob Murgatroyd and John Wlldman.
This was a one week trip
to visit the intriguing little area
about 20km North West of Antalya
in
The plan was to walk along the
ridge and then back along the depressions, looking for and asking about, caves and potholes. Unfortunately there is no word in Turkish for pothole, which makes life a little
difficult. Another problem is that some of the area is an
archaeological reserve where the mere mention of caves earns immediate arrest.
We flew from Heathrow and arrived
at about 10pm at
The next morning (well, afternoon) found us at the roadside near the
North end of the ridge with four rucksacks and a trackless
sea of thorn scrub through which
we had to make our way. John found that
his rucksack (borrowed from his girlfriend) had been trashed
by Turkish Airlines making it almost impossibly uncomfortable to wear. We set
off up the hill through the scrub. By mid afternoon we had reached the end of the ridge and sat down to admire the view. The temperature was about
25 degrees C and the sun was shining
with a fresh breeze to keep us cool. The first karst features were found
but there was nothing promising and no locals to ask. Phil found a small snow
patch and we played around in it for a few minutes, taking photos to show the supposed rigours of this trip
into the ‘High Taurus’.
We walked on for about two hours and found a pleasant campsite beneath a small cliff with a fine view. Firewood was provided by the Turkish peasant habit of cutting down trees (or at least bushes which is all
that is left now that they’ve cut the trees down) for the goats to eat.
We all lay down in our (or in Johns case his girlfriend’s) bivvi bags to sleep.
By morning about six Inches of snow
had fallen, It was near freezing and
the snow was still falling. John had managed to get a large quantity of snow inside his sleeping bag and soaked almost everything that his girlfriend owned. He was
in a bad way too, having spent most
of the night lying in a snowdrift. We
could not continue along the ridge and John needed to dry his things. We decided to drop off the ridge and get to the nearest village
where we could get a bus back to
Well, that’s what we told John.
We knew
that John hadn’t a clue where he was so when we got into the valley we just
kept walking. He followed and by the time he realised that we were walking away
from the village it was too late. Luckily, the sun came out and we stopped to
dry our things. Some shepherds came over to chat and feed us, we kept asking
about caves but didn’t meet with much success. People knew of their existence
but no-one could actually take us to the entrances. We camped under an
overhanging cliff but we were kept up all night by the shepherds manic dogs.
The next
day we continued walking South and met an old man with some cows. He abandoned
his cows in the woods and showed us a short cave and a pothole near a major
seasonal sink with at least two pitches. But it had been entered some time
before. The old man took us home for a lunch of olives, unleavened bread,
yoghurt and milk. That afternoon we walked down a canyon towards the road and
camped under another cliff. We found a few more small caves but nothing major.
The
following day we walked out to the main road and got a taxi back to
We had a
days rest and then a further day on the South end of the ridge. We found a few
small caves and some short pitched but nothing major. The only people we could
ask about caves were forestry officials, and as caving in
It was a
pleasant trip but pretty useless as far as caving went.
The area is obviously not riddled but there are certainly things to be found.
If we could have spoken better Turkish we have had more chance. If anyone has
time to spare in
Steve Tooms
BACK
TO: Volume
Contents