Caravan
inspiration
40 days pilgrimage to Konya, Mevlana Rumi’s shrine
hiking caravan
Every year in spring we hike with a group of hikers from Yalova to Konya. If you are joining, this page will give you a good idea of previous hiking caravan experiences.
Jeannette Voorbij
What a vibrant, beautiful city!
Jeannette is a journalist and reported our daily adventures like no other. Together with their hiking group husband Fred, Loes and Annette, they added the best we could wish for to our hiking caravan in 2022. Enjoy her Polarsteps, which give a good insight into the daily caravan life.
Right on time at Schiphol, at half past 9. There was a huge queue at our desk, but it went well. After 2 hours we were through customs and there was time for a quick coffee.
Have a safe flight with lots of whining kids.
Recorded Turkish liras at Sabiha Gökçen Airport and arranged a luxury taxi van!
What a vibrant, beautiful city! Our eyes are watching! Our hotel is located right next to the mosque of Eyüp Sultan. Sedat and Iris picked us up and the six of us had dinner and then got a short sightseeing. Now also in possession of a Turkish SIM card and an Istanbul public transport chip card.
If it works out, tomorrow to the first-morning prayer at 5 am 😀
Walk in the footsteps of history. From Istanbul with its busy port and teeming colourful streets bustling with modern-day advantages to storied history found throughout the mainland, through quiet forgotten hamlets, to the great poet and philosopher, Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi’s tomb in Konya, Turkey.
Sufism is a mystical Islamic belief in which Muslims (and many others) seek to find the truth of divine love and knowledge through direct personal experience of God. A religion of love based on poetry, music and practising various esoteric contemplative practices; the most important: dhikr: private prayer.
This walk is a personal pilgrimage. Allow yourself to be lost in the moment, alongside your fellow pilgrims. Let them, nature, the people be the lamp that lights your path.
Hosgeldiniz. You are welcome.
In 130 B.C. the Han Dynasty (China) opened up the Silk Road with the West, and the routes remained until 1400 A.D. when the Ottoman Empire started boycotting trade and closed them.
Caravan’s moved throughout the desert on routes bound for exotic destinations. These caravans connected Europe alongside the Mediterranean and into Asia, Africa, Persia.
Lunch at a little creek on the way to Güneyköy
If the light is in your heart, you will find your way home.
I know you’re tired but come, this is the way.
Some cutting marking and waypoints are made
Meet the flowers
Loes our flower lady
Loes our biology hiker
The flowers in spring are making us so happy, and Loes added so much more joy to the spring flowers and plants. She wrote beautiful stories about the daily hikes and surprised us with information about what plants and flowers we met that day! Meeting people, plants, and flowers thanks to Loes we now know at least their names.
Sufi hiking
caravan blogs
The hiking caravan in 2022 was a great success. The hikers gave the Sufi Trail a soul, and for the first time, we hiked the complete 40 days with a group. We had sixteen hikers to start with and ended with a group of nine in Konya.
The group was colourful and all the hikers left their traces on the route and on their blogs. You can read their stories in the blogs below. They are mostly in Dutch, but can be translated in the browser with G translate.
Jeanette Voorbij
Journalist
Jeannette and her husband Fred are amazing people, and we are so lucky they were with us. Fred was the penny cash keeper and Jeannette made us sit on the tip of our phones to read her next story. The articles are amazing captures of the daily life of the Sufi hiking caravan. A writing artist…and a great photographer.
Hugo and Heleen
Adventurers
Meeting this couple is like meeting adventure, their quick pass and quick intellect is running all over the trail. They found little pearls of tracks. And my o my the can write unbelievably good. They already wrote a book about their hike towards Istanbul on the Sultans Trail. It’s a real honour to have them in the hiking caravan.
Iris Bezuijen
Sufi Trail lover
After making the route, the true mission has to happen, the hiking spirit needs to be given to the path by who else the hikers. A constant big smile of being in the hiking caravan dream, and blogging every day not to forget how fortunate we are.
Loesje
Biologist
What a joy to have Loes on board. She was very carefully categorizing all the plants and flowers, and what a sweet, strong hiker. She cheers us up with hand-picked bouquets and is collecting somewhat strange objects sometimes.. True biologist
Marcel Schuurmans
Pioneer
Just before the hikingcaravan started, pioneer hiker Marcel Schuurmans paved the way. We followed and met each other in Konya. He has a great blog giving a day-by-day impression to eventually Jerusalem.
Annette Cazander
Tree climber
The lady is called the diesel motor of hikers. She is a high-end hiker, watching us all from the top of the tree. She brought all her friends to the hiking caravan. Very modest and very strong. Lovely reads…
More details
Car-a-van. Many modern day interpretations, but the one most famous of all: a classic minivan sold to the masses of soccer moms everywhere.
Practical, but certainly not the images invoked in the last paragraph. Certainly not romantic, certainly not nostalgic.
To, but DREAM that you are in a caravan suggests that you feel as if you may need to travel around a little bit. You probably feel a bit stifled in the environment that you are in currently. You need to get out and experience new things, meet new people. Dreaming of being in a caravan is an extension of that desire that you have to go out and experience new things. What will you do about it? If you do not have these experiences or go out and travel like you desire to do, then you may continue having these dreams like.
Dreaming that you have been left out of a caravan means that you feel like you have not been making any progress while those around you are moving on without you. You do not feel as if you are making progress in life or in your personal ventures. People around you are making all kinds of accomplishments and doing great things and you can’t seem to take any solace in the great things that you have done, if any. You need to accept that all of your friends should be able to succeed on their own terms. Most importantly, you need to learn not to compare yourself to others too much.
THIS. Read it again; it may sound like a horoscope, and perhaps it may be yours.
“The boy felt jealous of the freedom of the wind and saw that he could have the same freedom. There was nothing to hold him back except himself.”
Page 28, The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho.
“No matter how many detours and adjustments it made, the caravan moved toward the same compass point.”
Page 75, of The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho.
“There is only one way to learn,” the alchemist answered.
“It’s through action.”
Page 125, of The Alchemist.
The caravan evokes the image of imagination and far away travel; symbolizes a quest.
This modern-day Sufi Trail caravan will be a roaming place of love, fun, happiness. A lot like a family, with different positive dynamics: Safe – productive – powerful – useful. Use the adjectives to place yourself in and amongst dedicated professional friendly people who will seem like family; from the very beginning.
One of the greatest sources of your energy will is to be surrounded by like-minded people and spectacular nature. A company of travellers on a journey. Group of people especially noted as pilgrims travelling together across a symbolic trail route.
No gold, jade, tea or spices to trade or sell; on this trail to the light but indeed if your heart desires it; this trail, path will provide you with all that your earthly desires. Leave room for your spiritual basket to fill with the esoteric mountain air provided by the maker of the Universe.
No bandits or pirates to steal your wares, just throw your caution to the wind and join the present day caravaners to the walk of your lifetime. A mystical,, spiritual, naturalist, humble awakening is yours for the undertaking.
No deserted mountains, no brutal winds, no poisonous snakes: the journey on this caravan is in the safety of the modern day.
The vibrant color of the countryside; from sunrise to sunset will captivate you on this adventure: Music to lure your soul; a smorgasbord of exotic flavours to tempt your palate; to smell the earth after a rain shower, to awaken a part of you that remembers. Alive and well, with each passing day, as the richness and tradition seeps into the core of who you are, who you want to be.
A path seeped in ancient history, culture, tradition, architecture, friendship. Connect to the people of the land; share customs and cultural traditions in the tea houses, local mosque beauty; remnants of lost cities buried in the sea..
Join us. The caravan awaits YOU.
Like to know when we organize this easy hop on hop off Sufi caravan, you can read all the details for this