Here are some of the men you’ll meet in Turkey when you scan the QR codes in The Idiot and the Odyssey III: Twenty Years Walking the Mediterranean which was published last month and is available on amazon.

The best-dressed men in Turkey are in Istanbul.

There are lots of mussel men in Istanbul.

The Idiot made some new male friends on the podium after swimming across the Hellespont.

Turks, like Ergün Turan in Antalya, are well-known for their hospitality, especially at breakfast.

It’s a joy to see Turkish men, like Asir Altınöz (aka Usher), pick up litter while guiding me (guides are required!) on a climb up Mount Ida in the Kazdağı National Park.

Sabahattin Eskindağ, who owns the hole-in-the-wall Sabonun Yeri restaurant on the harbor in Yumurtalik, is the town’s poet laureate.

Mustafa Askin is one of the
best-known suspender-sporting male guides in Troy.

Musa and Eray invited two strangers to dinner in Pig’s Camp near Datça. The welcome was another typically Turkish example of misafir, or hospitality.

A farmer gives The Idiot four pomegranates near Konaçik.

A young “lifeguard” watches swimmers in the water above the underwater village of Kekova.

It never hurts to run into an owner of a yacht.

Returning alive and well to Samandağ after a visit to Turkey’s border with Syria.
(Photo: Liz Chapin)

The Idiot ran into numerous barbers in Turkey.

The Idiot ran into numerous barbers in Turkey, including this one when he arrived in Izmir.

The Idiot ran into numerous barbers in Turkey. So how did he celebrate reaching the 10,000th kilometer on his MedTrek? With a day off in Alanya that began with a shave, haircut and massage.