Departure

It was around September 2018 – more than four years ago – that we decided it was time to finally make our dream come true and go on a long journey along the Silk Road. Our 3-4 week trips during our annual holidays were no longer enough to quench our thirst for discovering the world, for which the Germans have invented the name “Fernweh” and of which we had no intention of curing ourselves.

The initial departure date was set for February 2020, which meant almost a year and a half to prepare everything: defining the itinerary and the places to visit, finding out about visas and border crossings, planning the necessary equipment, getting vaccinations, sorting out a ton of administrative issues, learning a few notions of Russian, etc.

A few days before the big departure, an accident forced us to postpone it for a few weeks, and then Covid arrived. Weeks became months, months became years. But the passing time only strengthened our conviction that we had to realise our dream as soon as the opportunity would arise.

Thus to say that we are eager to set sail would be an understatement. But many emotions are stirring within us. Because leaving our nest for a year means making sacrifices. It means not seeing family and friends for a long time, knowing that we won’t be there for important moments, like our grandmothers’ 90th birthdays or our nephew’s communion, saying goodbye to our beloved cats, postponing other personal or professional projects, and being aware that we are causing some of our relatives to worry about us…

We also think of all the people who have supported us, those who have taken us in when we were temporarily without a flat, who have adopted our cats, who keep our furniture, and our parents who have always stood behind us.

At the same time, we can’t wait to start our journey. The world has changed over the last 3 years and our project had to evolve, but the ambition remains the same: to travel the Silk Road, this network of roads that since Antiquity links Europe to China, passing through the Caucasus, the Middle East, Iran and Central Asia. The mere mention of the places that stand on our way takes us on a journey: the lunar landscapes of Cappadocia, the immensity of the Kazakh steppes, the glorious Samarkand, once the centre of the world, the mountains of Pamir,…

3.25pm, our Airbus touches the tarmac of Istanbul airport. The jolt pulls us out of our daydreaming. After having collected our backpacks, we hop on the bus that will take us to the city centre. Our host, who will accommodate us for the first few days, lives in the Kadiköy district on the Asian side of the city. When we cross the bridge over the Bosphorus, we leave Europe behind.

So it really begins…