Longer than usual ride from Goreme to Sanliurfa through the mountains so decided to hop on the freeway and see how the toll system works. Besides Istanbul this is the only other part of Turkey with a freeway. When I entered the freeway there was a gate I had to ride through, no indication at all just rode through slowly and kept going. Good 6 lane road, hardly any traffic except through the mountains where there were quite a few trucks travelling at walking pace with slow trucks overtaking even slower ones. This must be the only way they can get through the mountains. Then from cold temps to sea level and 37c hahaha. Went through 2 more Toll gates and at the first one an orange light came on and a siren sounded, kept going hahaha, next one I watched the car in front and he got a green light but when I went through I got an orange but no siren, on exiting the freeway same thing. It must be because bikes do not have a front number plate and they have to verify it later some other way.

The main reason for stopping at Sanliurfa was to visit Gobeklitepe, a site that has the oldest known temple dating back to 9000 BC, older than Stonehenge or the Pyramids, quite amazing. Sanliurfa is also home to Balikligol where Abraham turned fire into fish or something like that making it a holy place. People are very curious and I am constantly being asked where I am from and offered a glass of tea which turns into a Google translate exercise that last half an hour hahaha.

Balikligol.

Gobeklitepe – 30 min ride from Sanliurfa, 25 lira entry, a short movie produced by National Geographic and a few artefacts from the site, everything immaculately presented. You have to walk 700 meters uphill to the site from the gate, I started walking and got picked up by a shuttle bus when I was half way there but on the way down, even though there were two busses at the top, they were not moving and there were two more at the bottom, must have been the hourly tea break, hahaha.