Istanbul - our last stop in Turkey

We arrived in Istanbul with 4 days to spend exploring the city.  It quickly became obvious that we were back in a big city as soon as we walked down the street.  Calls of “Hi Lady, do you want to see my shop?”, “I will give you best price”, “Where are you from, my friend?” and “Ozzie, Ozzie, Ozzie” became the norm along with a few great one liners like “What!?! You are leaving the Grand Bazaar without a rug!?!”.

Foodwise, we quickly became accustomed to the Doners on every corner, as well as a few other favourites including Turkish Delight, Baklava (honey soaked pastry with a nutty filling) and Turkish tea which was bought to you everywhere you went – at the bus station, on the ferry, in a carpet shop…

There were also mosques everywhere which made it difficult finding the “Blue Mosque” which it turns out is more grey than blue.  But we managed to get round all the sights we wanted to see – the Grand Bazaar, Basilica Cistern, Topkapi Palace and Harem, and the Spice Bazaar – plus a few we hadn’t planned on like the filming of the new James Bond movie near one of the many mosques, and a parade of Gallataseray football fans on their way to a game.

Some of the most fun we had was trying to learn how to play backgammon with some of the others at our hostel and the locals – who were all keen to teach us how to play, and especially keen to point out a bad move.  One guy was so keen to play he ended up having a big argument with a few of his friends who wanted to go to the airport.  It probably didn’t help that we had just bought a bottle of his favourite raki (Turkish spirit).

Agia Sophia

Turkish Delight (heaps of different flavours)

Turkish delight

Inside the Blue Mosque

Agia Sophia

Our newly acquired backgammon set

Meze plate and pide

View from the restaurant

Turkish lanterns (which were everywhere)

Basilica Cistern (water supply for the palace) - James Bond "From Russia with Love" was filmed here

Basilica Cistern

Medusa head in the Basilica (no one knows how it got there)

Another mosque

Turkish tea

Agia Sophia at night

Grand Bazaar

Lamps and lights in the Grand Bazaar

Exploring the Grand Bazaar

Doner man

Traditional mixed meat dish with rice

Spice bazaar

Gallipoli

Today we joined a tour to visit Gallipoli. We began with a quick ferry across the Dardanelles Strait from Canakkale.  On the other side we met up with the other half of our tour group that had traveled from Istanbul for the day.

First stop was Brighton beach. This is where the ANZACs were supposed to land their boats. Due to strong winds and currents they where pushed north and landed in the much smaller bay with steeper terrain to the north (now known as ANZAC cove).  The tour guide Murat was excellent and bought the events of ANZAC day 1915 to life.  

Brighton beach 

Poppys at the beach

Anzac Cove

Anzac Cove ( a newish looking road and retaining wall works have changed the original look a bit)

North beach where the dawn service was held

Lone pine and Australian memorial

The ANZAC and Turk trenches were only 8m apart at some points.

Original trenches (barbed wire and posts have been reconstructed)

Turkish soldier holding an english made gun.

Soldier silhouette

Turkish memorial

NZ memorial plaque at Chunuk Bair

Plaque

NZ memorial at Chunuk Bair, Ataturk statue in background

Turkish Haircut in Canakkale & Troy

Today I had a turkish haircut from a man that did not speak a word of English.  We managed to agree that it was a haircut I was after a few minutes of miming and gesturing chop on my hair. 

After a bit of pointing and nodding at photos in the magazine he found he appeared to understand what I was after.  Not a bad haircut considering I couldn't ask for anything .  After the chop he offered to trim the beard which I replied “no 2?” a nod. 

He then reached for a cotton bud dipped it in some sort of alcohol with tweezers then lit it on fire.. At this point I peaked out a bit!  He was saying ok, ok!  Apparently it was a turkish method of burning off ear hair.  He waved the flaming bud around my ear patting (I’m assuming as it caught fire).  

Finally, I had to dip my head forward into the sink where he gave my hair a wash.  Suds and everything in my eyes and mouth, workable but not ideal.. then done. One last thing he doused me in some weird brut cologne, and really layered it on.  No photos of the haircut - or actually the other stuff after the haircut, I had no idea it would be that weird.

That afternoon we caught a shuttle bus out to the ruins of Troy.  The wooden horse was cool. The remains of the ancient city were nothing to rave about, although the history of the city was very interesting.  Having seen the movie "Troy" with Brad Pitt and Eric Bana also inspired interest; as neither of us have much knowledge of the history of the city itself.

Katherine up in the Trojan horse peering out the window at Troy

Old stone walls

Troy's old walls

What else are marble columns for?

The Kats at Troy

The Trojan horse used in the Troy movie on the Canakkale waterfront

The ancient city ruins of Ephesus

Today we went to Ephasus, an ancient Greek/Roman city (in Turkey).  On the way we stopped in to see the temple of Artemis one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.  On arrival we were hounded by gypies trying to sell us books about Ephasus and rubbish old coins, they were persistent little buggers with hunched backs.  Not much was left of the temple, but to put a scale on the original building apparently it made the Panthenon in Athens look like "a school for ants" (Zoolander 2001). The temple had 127 marble columns each a total height of 18m.

Remains of the Temple of Artemis

Ephasus

Block doorway

Temple

Athena Nike Statue

Library building

Agora (Marketplace)

Theatre

After the tour we caught a bus to Canakkale (full of local turks). Canakkale would be our base for trips out to Troy and Gallipoli.