We are now in our final week in Istanbul, and are starting to explore places that have been on our “would like to see if we had time” list. Today, that brought us to the Sea Life Aquarium. Because our first two businesses back in the early 1970’s related to tropical fish (a long story […]
Turkey 18 – Bosphorus Cruise
Today, we cruised along the Bosphorus Strait, a body of water that connects the Sea of Marmara (where we start) to the Black Sea (where we turn around), as well as separating the continents of Asia and Europe. The cruise takes about 90 minutes, plus a 3 hour break at Anadolu Kavagi, then 90 minutes […]
Cyprus 3 – Salamis and Famagusta
We got up early this morning to photograph Ancient Salamis, a 3,000 year old ruins on the East coast of Cyprus, in the Turkish-occupied portion of the island. The site does not officially open until 9AM, but we arrived at 8AM and were allowed in. Being that early, we were the only visitors, giving us […]
Cyprus 1 – Keep to the left!
We are now in Cyprus. The first shock was that these people drive on the left side of the road. We have rented a car to travel around the island, and I keep having to tell myself to “Keep to the left” — particularly when I approach a car on “my” side of the road! […]
Turkey 17 – Historic Churches
We also visited three other famous landmarks in Istanbul. They had been built more than 1500 years ago, converted to mosques 600 years ago, then two were converted into museums, while the third remains as an active mosque. The image above is the central dome from the church of St. Saviour in Chora. Chora is […]
Turkey 16 – City Views and Lights
Mehmet, the leader of our photographic tour of Turkey (www.fantasticphototours.com), took us on an afternoon walk around parts of Istanbul today. We wandered around parts of the Grand Bazaar again, and then up a hidden set of stairs. He talked to a guard, who at first insisted we could go no further. As usual, Mehmet […]
Turkey 15 – Museums and Mosques
We have spent the last couple days seeing various mosques and museums. Both are ubiquitous in Instanbul, with 2,944 active mosques, and (it sometimes seems) almost as many museums. Most mosques are topped by a dome that looks ordinary from the outside, but is elaborately ornate on the inside. Many are painted, others have frescoes, […]
Turkey 14 – A Dervish Delight
Today we watched a Whirling Dervish performance in Istanbul. The dervish were a Muslim sect that originated in Konya, but were outlawed by the first Turkish president, Mustafa Kemel Atatürk, in 1923. The whirling was part of a religious ceremony, in which the person was supposed to lose his ego to the wider universe. The […]
Turkey 13 – The Turkish Pinch
We spent today with Aysin, from Cookistan to learn how to cook a 6-course Turkish meal. We traveled there using Uber for the first time, which worked well in getting us directly to the meeting point, though it took 93 minutes to travel 27 km (about 16 miles) in Istanbul traffic. With Aysin’s directions, we […]
Turkey 12 – Grand Bazaar
Today we visited the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul. This is the largest covered market in the world, covering 61 streets and more than 3000 vendors. In addition, there were many more vendors on the outside surrounding this market. There is no way that anyone can visit more than a small portion of the bazaar in […]