The day dawned hot and sunny, as every day does in this city at this time of the year, last rain after all was in April. Had the hotel breakfast on the rooftop cafe deck overlooking the Marmarar sea and brushed up on the background of the sites we were to try and visit today. A good selection of guide books provided by ex guests of the hotel free to use but stay in the hotel for the likes of us.We sauntered the small distance up to the main road and joined the morning rush such as it was of the city's inhabitants off to work as they scurried along picking up breakfast from the hawkers that line the pavement, mainly selling bread rolls stuffed with feta ,tomato and cucumber.
It is certainly worth making the effort to be just a little earlier than the main crowd and after removing shoes and placing them in the provided plastic bags we entered the Blue Mosque, females needed to be covered and no shorts for males but no fee and a magnificent building of huge proportions. Over 20,000 tiles of 999 shades of blue they say. The mosque is a huge space to gather in and unlike a church has no altar just indication of the direction of mecca.
We walked the short distance across to the Haggia Sophia initially a christian church from 320AD then converted into a Mosque sometime later as fortunes changed now secularised as a museum and an incredibly beautiful space of immense proportions. Many of the wonderful christian mosaics had been plastered over in the transformation and a massive scaffold reaches to the top of the inside of the dome as work continues on its unending restoration.
A short walk again and the interesting part of the this part of town is how close all the sights are to each other is the Basilica Cisterna.
A short walk again and the interesting part of the this part of town is how close all the sights are to each other is the Basilica Cisterna.
This is a hidden gem. It is the old reservoir collecting water from out of town by aqueduct to store it below ground in the most amazing structure you would see anywhere...complete with fish. the underground vaulted and columned structure is 143m long and about half as wide and plastered to hold water to a height/depth of about 20m. It is artistically lit and contains walkways now to allow visitors to marvel at its size and complexity.The atmosphere below ground is cool and comfortable and its a jolt to hit the street again with its noise and warm humid wind that makes you sweat in minutes.
With the pedometer ticking we retraced our steps back to the Grand Bazaar actually only three minutes walk from our hotel. The scale of the Grand bazaar is overwhelming and one has to wonder in deed how much commerce does go on in there as it seems so random as to where one would shop. However the city has 14.5 million inhabitants so even with streets of gold and silver smiths I guess they all get some kind of a go at it.We just wandered as really not looking for anything at all other than I was nursing a half developed idea of some black leather trainer type shoes to wear under jeans or my Spanish black cammos!
Well practiced as we are at avoiding eye contact I eventually fell for a knock off pair of Prada trainers and entered that inevitable spiral into purchase that you know will follow that first expression of interest. They will do the trick back in NZ.
Had to laugh Sare at every carpet parlour as the victims sat and readily accepted the apple tea like flies in the web.
Well practiced as we are at avoiding eye contact I eventually fell for a knock off pair of Prada trainers and entered that inevitable spiral into purchase that you know will follow that first expression of interest. They will do the trick back in NZ.
Had to laugh Sare at every carpet parlour as the victims sat and readily accepted the apple tea like flies in the web.
Lunch time by this stage and retired to a lane and restaurant table, really quite smart for calamari starter followed by Gend with an orange chicken salad and I had the chicken cooked with ginger, tomato and garlic, delicious and a combo I must try to re create.
We had spotted a small travel/ tour office the night before and we have booked for Gallipoli long day trip tomorrow hit the road at 6:30am back by 10:30pm supposed to be good with a group of 12 in an AC minibus....we shall see what turns up. When he heard from us that we were going down south of Fetithye he really changed gear and got quite excited as said he had worked that coast for 5 years and we really didn't have any idea of how good that was going to be, so sounds really cool.
Back in the room for a stop, a beer and a cool shower then out again for dinner and some rambling with the pedometer at present this afternoon at 12.24k already!
Just heard the call for prayer booming in the window...that will be the third out of five for the day.
We had spotted a small travel/ tour office the night before and we have booked for Gallipoli long day trip tomorrow hit the road at 6:30am back by 10:30pm supposed to be good with a group of 12 in an AC minibus....we shall see what turns up. When he heard from us that we were going down south of Fetithye he really changed gear and got quite excited as said he had worked that coast for 5 years and we really didn't have any idea of how good that was going to be, so sounds really cool.
Back in the room for a stop, a beer and a cool shower then out again for dinner and some rambling with the pedometer at present this afternoon at 12.24k already!
Just heard the call for prayer booming in the window...that will be the third out of five for the day.
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