Congratulations to Sedat Çakır, who had the great idea of linking existing paths and finding new ones following the route of the Ottoman Sultans in their marches into Europe in the 16th and 17th C. the route connects Vienna to Istanbul in a winding route across the Balkans.
Their routes are known from descriptions of the ‘menzils’ or camping points of the army on the move, and the bridges, roads and caravanserays which marked their progress.
During the last few years, Sedat and his team have published the Sultan’s Trail guidebook in Dutch (2 volumes) and a guide (Sultanlar Yolu) to the sections in Turkey and Greece. Now there is a downloadable guide for the whole route, a passport for the trail, and other guides in German.
Max, who manages the trail, has recently checked the Turkish section and corrected the waymarks. The newly updated version of the route is on the Via Eurasia app.
Each year Ton and Max lead a group of hikers o the trail. In 2021, they will start where they left off in 2019, in Serbia. For more info on the trip check out this link:
Leave a reply