Climbing in Turkey

[cj001f]

I'm looking at a climbing/skiing trip to turkey. So far I've found slim to no information (well - a couple of cicerone guides, an old LP trekking, various magazine articles). Anyones have any advice to offer?

[glassgowkiss]

there is an article on climbing in turkish rivera on www.8a.nu

there is a link to the map to Antalya area: http://www.adiyamanli.org/MapofTurkey/turk_map.htm

there is a link tio the climbing part: http://www.8a.nu/site2/

anyway, there is also bouldering and longer routes on limestone, but the info is limmited. I am sure once you are at that campground you'll be able to find a lot of first hand info.

realtivley cheap (with current shape of $$ no country is cheap) and very nice country to visit. learn some basic turkish, you can get by with german, but not too many people speak english.

as far as skiing, i would not bother. there are peaks up to 4000m (14 000ft), but they are by the border with iraq

Cilo Dagh (pronaun Silo Da) is the mountain range. Gelyasin, Keskin Tepe, Karatepe have walls up to 3000 ft.

Another range is Sat Dagh with 600m N Face of Kizilyar.

Edited January 20, 2005 by glassgowkiss

[erden]

* when are you going to be in Turkey?

* how long are you staying?

* what kind of skiing do you want to do? backcountry? downhill?

* what kind of climbing do you want to do? peak bagging? big wall? volcanos? trekking?

 

Lemmeno, I may be able to point in the right direction.

 

There are volcanoes in eastern and south central Turkey. Erciyes is 3915m, Ararat is 5165m, Suphan is 4058m. Ararat has been approached/climbed by touring skis, but it does not offer ski lifts. In south central Turkey, there is the Aladaglar mtn range that offers many options trekking or walls. Eastern Black Sea coast has peaks up to 4400m that would offer great hiking up to the mountains, much like the PNW. Eastern Turkey has some great resorts at Palandoken mtns near Erzurum and an upn coming area with huge drops near Sarikamis. South western Turkey has plenty of limestone climbing near the Mediterranean. See regions under rockclimbing.com for options.

 

Erden.

[cj001f]

* when are you going to be in Turkey?

* how long are you staying?

* what kind of skiing do you want to do? backcountry? downhill?

* what kind of climbing do you want to do? peak bagging? big wall? volcanos? trekking?

This trip is more at the exploratory stages. Looking at going in March/April for a total of 1-2 months. Backcountry skiing/peakbagging would be the coolest, as right now it'd be just me.

 

ggk-

thanks for the rock links & the map. German you say?

[Dechristo]

Confucious says:

 

"One who climbs in Turkey becomes stuffing."

[Thinker]

Kalymnos is a tiny speck of an island in the Aegean. It's technically Greek, but it's very close to the Turkish coast.

web page1

web page2 web page3

[Dru]

I heard the Wishbone Arete is a good line in Turkey. But you must be familiar with the placement of climbing ankaras.

[griz]

I was just looking at some guidebooks in Neptune's here in boulder and saw this guide book there... looked like it was from the UK or something. hope it helps...

 

The Ala Dag: Climbs and Walks in Turkey's Crimson Mountains

O. B. Tuzel

Cicerone Press

 

 

http://www.stanfords.co.uk/bookdetails/bookdetails?item_code=28720&loc_id=1897

[crackers]

The best sources of climbing information in turkey are only available in turkish.

 

I need the following to answer your question fully:

1) style: FA's, sport, limestone trad, alpine, hard alpine, snowslog?

2) time of year.

3) amount of time.

 

There are some existing multipitch sport routes near nigde. map of the regions shows a little about Nigde. I don't know if its available in the english variant.

 

The stuff on 8a is pretty old and crappy, imho, and it covers an area called geyikbayiri which has two climbing camping spots, one run by germans and the other by a turkish/belgian (? on whether zulehya is belgian or what) couple. These are the germans. The Turks are here. Both of them are really really nice people. The germans are german, the turks are much more bohemian, but both are doing there best to develop the area in the best possible way.

 

There is amazing potential for safe* alpine climbing both in the aladaglar (that's near nigde), and in the northeast near trabzon in the kackar. Unsafe first ascents--if you can get a permit which is highly unlikely and if you don't have a permit you will get arrested--can be had in the Cilo-Sat mountains. (one guess for how my company got the name...).

 

For skiing, I have to assume you go b/c and that you'll bring a friend or two. There are only 10-15 transceivers outside of the military, and the folks who have them probably won't have time when you do. There are three ski areas currently under development or construction (one is near antalya, one is near izmit, and one is somewhere else.) If these open, they will add a lot to whats there. Palandoken is kinda cool, but the development sucked--a frequent refrain throughout the country. There are three areas that are *almost* worth trying: uludag, erciyes and kartalkaya. Each of these areas has some really really worthwhile backcountry that can be fcking scary. Are they worth leaving baker for? not except for part of a larger trip.

 

There are amazing unsupported traverses that you can do though. And some amazing backcountry that takes a lot of logistics and a lot of patience.

 

Let me know which direction you're thinking and i'll post a specific long version.