Turkish delights

We arrived into Istanbul in the early evening so all we did was grab some dinner (kebab obviously), and have a wander. We were staying really close to the blue mosque and we found ourselves there around sunset. The mosque itself was closed for prayers but the courtyard was open so we just went and sat down and had our breaths taken away by the beauty of the building in the darkening sky. It really is a stunning building and we were very happy to just sit and look at it. The next day we went to visit the inside of the building and found it equally beautiful inside and in the daylight. We also visited Hagia Sophia, this was not much to look at from the outside but was stunning inside. The Haiga Sophia has had its usage changed a few times, it was originally constructed as an Orthodox Church, before being converted to a mosque in the 15th century before it was museum and then finally reopened as a mosque in 2020.

Istanbul was a very enjoyable city for two people who aren’t massive city fans, we did the obligatory ferry ride over to the Asia side and wandered round there. I was fascinated by the number of fisherman on the side of the Bosporous strait with huge buckets of freshly caught fish. We were also in the city a couple of days before the Champions League final and when we arrived at Taksim Square the city was really gearing up for the game with a giant cup and match ball in place.

Obviously we went to the Spice Bazaar and the Grand Bazaar and we actually preferred the Spice Bazaar, not least because we managed to find a replacement fake engagement ring for me!

We also decided that I should experience a traditional Turkish Hamman and massage, I don’t know if you’ve ever had one but it was an experience! I started off with 10 minutes in the sauna and then I was shown to a large marble slab where I had to lie down and had dinner bowl sized bowls of water thrown over me. I then received a very thorough wash and scrub including my hair. After all this I was taken to another room where I had my massage. It was very relaxing and I did thoroughly enjoy the whole experience. We’d heard that hairdressers were pretty cheap in Turkey so I nipped to a hairdresser to get my haircut and it was the most efficient haircut I have ever had! He had washed, cut and dried my hair within 20 minutes!

We spent every evening at the Blue Mosque just admiring the building, watching the sky deepen and people watching. We visited it 5 times in total I believe, going into the building twice. It was definitely one of my favourite things that we have done.

We took a ferry to Bursa – Bursa is a popular day trip from Istanbul, but not exactly on the backpacker route. It felt very much like ‘real’ Turkey, we went to another bazaar which felt very local. Bursa is the end of the Silk Road so there were many silk shops. We only spent one night here and got up early the next day to visit a vast complex of Mausoleums. Some were very ornate and some quite plain, but they were all very old. Bizarrely in the centre of the town is an exact replica of the Ottoman fountain in Sarajevo.

Bursa’s bus station is 13km north of the town and we treated ourselves to a taxi there, our driver thought he was in a race for sure, and as he was hurtling along he was also adjusting his seat with a pair of pliers!

We were heading for Selcuk, home to the famous Ephesus ruins. We arrived early evening again and were planning on visiting them the next morning straight after breakfast. Breakfast was quite the farce, the poor woman at the hostel seemed to panic as everyone arrived at once and it was 45 minutes before anyone got any food! There were a family with young children staying and the daughter was banging her knife and fork on the table demanding her breakfast and I think everyone wanted to join in! We did eventually get fed and were grateful for the really adorable kittens to entertain us whilst we waited.

The ruins were spectacular, we arrived at the lower gate, the opposite to where all the tour groups start from so we had the first few ruins almost to ourselves. As we went further on the place got so packed, it’s been a while since we have been anywhere as packed as that! The famous sights were incredible though, and standing in the grand theatre and stadium made us feel tiny. There are a few very interesting things to see, such as the row of lavatories and the footprint and what looks like a credit card etched into the ground, marking the way to the brothel!

The thing that we liked most about Selcuk though were the stork nests. If you have ever seen a stork’s nest you’ll know that they are huge! They are so big that other small birds actually nest in little corners of them. There were lots of these around, often on giant ruin pillars. It was cute to see them in the nests, sometimes flapping their wings to cool their chicks down. We saw one land and it was amazing, the stork just floated down, almost like it was wearing a parachute!

We took an early morning train to Denizli, completing all modes of transport in Turkey! We think we were a bit scarred from our time in India as we weren’t really sure what to expect from the train, but we were allocated a seat when we booked our tickets and it was comfortable, cheap and on time. We arrived around lunchtime and were catching a night bus from Denizli that evening so we dumped our bags and caught a bus to Pummukale. Pummukale means cotton castle in Turkish and it’s not hard to see why, the site is on a hill and there’s lots of small pools in the hill, surrounded by white landscape.

We got dropped at the northern gate and walked down through the Necropolis ruins which were fascinating. Most people start at the bottom and walk up through the pools and don’t make it that far, so again we had the run of the place. We paid extra to swim in ‘Cleopatra’s pool’ – the only place where you can really submerge yourself in the hot springs. This was off the back of a tip from our old neighbour (and I know he reads this so thank you Dave!). It was worth paying extra for as the pools have several Roman columns at the bottom. We then walked down through the famous white pools. The pools are really shallow, and get cooler as you go down, some are really slippery and others have loads of clay at the bottom! It was a great way to spend a homeless day.

We had another nightmare night bus journey. We’re really not having much luck with these at the moment, I long for South American buses when I would get on and sleep all the way through! This time we had a baby directly behind us who wailed for the first few hours. I think the whole bus was giving this baby dirty looks. It was classic us as we thought we’d booked really good seats with loads of leg room, but instead we were kept awake.

We arrived into Goreme, Cappadocia around 7am, we made our way to our hotel and they actually let us have our room on arrival. We resisted the urge to just go straight to sleep and we headed to the Open Air Museum. Cappadocia is famous for its hot air balloons and weird rock formations and the Open Air museum is a series of churches cut into caves with intricate frescos and definitely worth an early visit as it’s another place that gets packed during the day. That afternoon we set off for a hike through Love Valley, so called because of the shape of some of its rocks! The hike started off brilliantly, we got up close to these rocks and didn’t really see many other people. It then started to get very undulating and some of the paths we had to traverse were near vertical. One of them I decided that the best way down was with a controlled slide on my bum, I wasn’t particularly happy about this and was on the verge of tears but it was the only way I was going to get down without breaking my leg! The rest of the hike continued in much the same way! We both agreed at the end that the first half was much better than the second half!

The next day it was our fifth wedding anniversary and we decided to mark the occasion with a hot air balloon ride. We ummed and ahhed about doing it as it was quite expensive, but we decided it was such a once in a lifetime thing we couldn’t not do it. Balloons take off just before sunrise which meant we got picked up from our hotel at 3.50am. I was really nervous about the whole experience. I’m not great with heights, bit scared of flying (although much better than I was) and when I’d peered down into the Tara Canyon in Montenegro I did think there was no way I could get in a hot air balloon. I surprised myself! It was really relaxing and peaceful. As the balloon moves with the wind you don’t notice yourself going up or down or floating along and I really enjoyed it! It was beautiful watching the sunrise from the air, looking down at the beautiful scenery and seeing all the other balloons was magical. It was definitely an incredible experience that we won’t forget and is currently the best thing we’ve done on this trip so far.

Later that day we went for another hike, much gentler this time and generally took it quite easy given our early start. The following day we took a local bus to the underground city, a complex of houses built in caves under the ground over 7 floors! You have to admire the sheer determination of people to build these in times when there was no electricity. Some of the passageways were very narrow and you almost had to crawl through, again it was packed and there were lots of queues in these narrow passageways. They had thought of everything though and there were plenty of places for wine storage and even a graveyard!

The following day we caught an early bus to Ankara where we were picking up the Dogu Express train, this train journey takes 26.5 hours from Ankara all the way to Kars in Eastern Turkey. It meanders through mountains and valleys with spectacular scenery along the way. It left Ankara at 5.55pm, we had booked our tickets through a travel agency as they are incredibly difficult to get hold of and as we are a mixed sex couple we had to book the entire cabin. This was good for us as it meant we had our own space. We met a guy on the platform who was seeing off some friends who were in the cabin next to us and they were so helpful and friendly towards us the entire journey, they kept bringing us food and the next day they even invited us for traditional Turkish coffee which they made on the floor of the cabin with a gas stove! Despite neither of us speaking the other’s language we were touched by the kindness of these strangers.

The cabin seats turned into flat beds so we managed to get a decent nights sleep and spent the time just gazing out the window at the spectacular scenery. We were about an hour away from Kars when we were looking at a particularly menacing looking cloud when Joey spotted a baby brown bear. It was incredible to see it lollop along just like they do on TV! It moved far too quick to get a photo of it but just seeing it was so special.

As we were approaching Kars we saw a very spectacular thunderstorm and we’re grateful it had stopped by the time we arrived. We arrived at 8.50pm, only 20 minutes late which I think is a miracle given the length of the journey! The Dogu Express was definitely another highlight, Turkey gave us loads of highlights and amazing memories. Unfortunately for Turkey it has been suffering from hyperinflation and the Lira crashed whilst we were there. We found the whole country to be comparatively expensive to other places we have been. You’d look at Google maps to find somewhere for dinner, check out a picture of a menu from 6 months or a year ago only to get there and find that prices have quadrupled since then! I feel for the Turkish people living with these price increases and really hope things settle down for them soon.