Well today was an adventure of back streets and low underpasses. Early on in the day we were feeling good, we left last nights camp in bright sunshine and got onto one of the many freeways heading into Istanbul and all seemed to be going well. Then we made a small navigation mistake by missing a fork in the freeway. But initially that did not seem too bad as our GPS quickly re-routed us and we started following the corrected route. But quite quickly this new route dropped off the freeway, into a crowded intersection and we found ourselves confronted with a 3.6M clearance sign. Fortunately we found our way past that one only to be confronted by one that read 3.8M and at this one there was no way out other than a long reverse through heavy traffic. Now remember our truck is actually 4.0M high. But I noticed that there was a slope on the road and that the clearance was greater on the left hand side of the road. Against Nina's protests I gingerly tried that higher side and squeezed through with no damage.
We were in the clear for a while and still following our GPS's advice. This eventully led us to the series of narrow streets roughy in the neighbourhood of the Sutan Ahmet (for those that know the area). We squeezed along these streets for what seemed like hours, sometimes having to wait while one vehicle at a time could pass a tight spot, often with the gap on each side measured in 1-2 inches. The final straw was an old archway through a historic wall. It was definitely too low and narrow and no fancy observation or driving was going to get us past it. So in this narrow place with traffic everywhere, and Nina in the role of frantic traffic cop - I turned around - that caused a lot of beeping. That got us facing the way we had come, back through all those narrow streets.
At this point we flagged a passing taxi driver and with the aid of a map we told him we wanted parking along Kennedy Cadassi (the name of the road that runs along the water front). So for the next hour I followed he and Nina while we extractated ourselves form the narrow streets and crawled through Sunday afternoon traffic and eventually found our way onto Kennedy. However the driver did not know the parking lot we were seeking so at Kennedy he turned the wrong way.
After a long roadside discussion using the iPhone to translate he offered that he knew a good place to park for the night near the airport. Exhausted and having no other good options as it was now late in the day we agreed. So another half an hour of follow the leader through heavy traffic brought us to a very large concreted area with dozens of cars, mini buses and large buses parked.
After saying goodbye and thank you to the taxi driver we settled in for the night.
Thoughout the evening vehicles came and went in a steady stream. We eventually deduced that this was where some rent-a-car companies stored their vehices and where buses and hire cars waited for their clients to arrive at the nearby airport.
Regardless of the drama of the day we were somewhat excited as our Vladivostok to Istanbul journey was complete - though we would not really see it that way until we were in the parking lot we had been aiming for since April.