War Memorial sites in Gallipoli Türkiye
20.9.23
Last night we were parked outside Kilitli Castle it was lovely and peaceful. The only downside was nowhere condusive to eating brekkie outside so we made do with a bowl of muesli.
Lonely Planet & Rough Guide made visiting the Gallipoli peninsular war graves and memorial sites sound so complex, but they are aimed at people without their own transport.
Realistically we knew we didnt want to stop at every single one so I just googled a couple of tour itineraries as a guide.
In fact it’s remarkably easy as the road is a one way around system. There are forks to the right to stop and visit. Cars can then loop all the way round that and go straight instead of taking the fork.
I’m aware that still sounds pretty complex. It’s not.
From our spot outside the castle our first stop was just a few metres away where the guns and ammunition were stored to fire at enemies approaching by sea.




Our next stop was abrupt and unscheduled as John chose this time to fix Naz Vans feeble horn.
Having got it to a reasonable ‘toot toot’ he tinkered some more. Put the bonnet down and then it didn’t work at all. Repeat.
Exited crumbly uneven ground complete with working ‘toot toot’ and badly cracked the front bumper. Apparently that was ok as it was scratched already. It’s a damn site bloody worse than a scratch now. I was silently fuming.
Back to immersing ones self in the history of this most significant area, although I’d rather have gone home at this point..
We were at the Lone Pine memorial. I pulled myself together after reading of the courageous events there. It’s only a bumper. (still pissed off though)


Our next stop was the memorial to the 57th Regiment.





https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/57th_Infantry_Regiment_(Ottoman_Empire)
It was all very overwhelming. Not sure why but it felt even worse in such beautiful surroundings.








We had been hoping we wouldn’t arrive at Anzac Cove at the same time as any tour buses. We were so lucky to have the place to ourselves.
We’ve eaten Anzac biscuits in Australia, heard about the traditions over there but never stopped to think about the events at the cove or been able to visualise it. It was special yet so poignant.





We’re glad we visited, but like our visits to Cambodia, Bosnia, Kosovo and Vietnam it’s difficult to comprehend the extent of the fatalities. How do their families ever come to terms with what happened?
The memorials are there as a symbol that should be reminders of the tragedy of war, yet wars continue across the world today.
We were closer to the Eceabat ferry now, had lentil soup and crossed on the 3pm ferry to Cannakale. 185tl this time.

We drove onwards to a lovely recommended parking spot by a park along a promenade.
At the entrance was a no caravan sign, in Turkey caravan is the same word whether it’s got an engine or not.
There were 4 vans and a caravan all together at the end of the large, pretty much empty car park at this point. We decided to be more Turkish and rebellious after all they won’t bother moving us all will they? We could always be more British and plead ignorance about the word caravan.

A great place to get the table and chairs out. I made chicken fajita wraps for dinner and later we visited Troy Park shopping mall, which was disappointingly small. There was another mall a few metres away was much nicer.
We didn’t need any shopping but John fancied künefe and I ordered Maras ice cream. It got confusing as my ice cream arrived on top of Johns künefe, but no problem they scooped it onto some old cracked glass saucer. That’ll teach us for going for the posher venue with genuine Hatay künefe.
‘Out out’ at gone 9.30pm, we went back to Naz and finished watching ‘Dear Child’. Not sure if we enjoyed it or not.
By now there were more vans including one with a Pomeranian dog that never stopped yapping. Maybe the police could put up a ‘No Pomeranian dogs’ sign.