03/02/2012
G’day mate. A lovely wake up at 7:00am got us up to the brilliant chilly weather of Istanbul in spring. After a delicious continental Turkish breakfast, while enjoying our 6”5 companion’s shirt saying ‘Giraffes united against ceiling fans’, which we found out later that Maddy laughed at although she didn’t get the joke until 5 hours later, we headed off to the Blue Mosque which I’m sure I can say that we all couldn’t get over the sheer size and the amazing feeling to be inside a functioning mosque. Upon exiting the mosque we saw our next destination, the Hagia Sophia (Ayasofya). The history and amazing stories that our tour guide revealed to us were so intriguing and we were all captivated by the 56m high ceiling main dome.
After an enormous and delightful three course meal at the Omar Restaurant Café, we headed down to the Yerebatan Cistern. It was interesting getting wet and damp in such cold and foreign weather, but the architecture had such amazing, intricate features that not even Chloe could distract us with her very animated anticipation for the upcoming shopping trip to the Grand Bizarre.
The Grand Bizarre was an unforgettable and ever so slightly stressful experience, after being warned about pick-pocketers, bartering and being ripped off. After I found my Turkish flute (which I will be sure to annoy everyone on the bus with tomorrow), my fez and spending 150 TL we headed for yet another 3 course meal at the Panoramic restaurant, which had an incredible view of this strange and yet magnificent and breath taking city. We then all trudged tiredly back to our hotel, enjoying a good laugh on the way quoting and recapping the funny highlights of the day.
It’s late at night, and I can’t help laughing at nearly everything anyone says, and I need sleep. Tomorrow we have a long trip ahead of and a 6am wake up for a 5 hour bus ride to Gallipoli. Goodnight mates!
What was so bizarre about the Grand Bazaar?
ReplyDeleteJealousy killed the dog