Day 25 - Istanbul

Espresso Freddo: 0

Today we spent all day doing a tour of the major historical sites of Istanbul.  There were only 2 other people on this tour with us.  A couple originally from Romania but who had been living in Canada for 25 years.  They were an interesting couple.  They have travelled widely and have strong opinions about everything, particularly the wife.  

Our tour guide, Burak, was excellent.  He had done a 4 year degree to become a tour guide.  He had to learn about history, archaeology and the various cultures that have populated this part of the world.  He was friendly and informative, even when the wife was trying to pick fights with him.  Romania had once been part of the Ottoman Empire and apparently she hasn't forgotten.

Our first stop was a quick scamper about the Topkapi Palace.  I say a quick scamper because we only spent about 2 1/2 hours here.   You could easily spend all day here.  We glanced in at a special exhibition on clocks before leaving too.  

Istanbul loves it cats.  Even in the time of the Ottoman Empire they were indulged as can be seen from the kitty prints in one of the pavilions in the palace.

Next stop was the Hagia Sophia.  This started as an Orthodox church, then was converted to a mosque, then a museum and then, in 2020, back into a mosque.  It is also currently undergoing renovations/repairs so there is scaffolding inside and out.  The ground floor is dedicated to the mosque and can only be used by believers who want to pray.  The upstairs gallery is open to visitors so we wandered about there.  It was fascinating to hear about its history from our guide.  It is a shame I didn't visit before 2020 when I could have seen it all.

After this we had lunch at a nearby restaurant.  It started with lentil soup, then two types of dip (tzatziki, spicy tomato) and a salad of pickled cabbage and carrot.  Next were some meatballs and chicken souvlaki with a token salad and some bread.  For dessert we had something that was described as special sort of baklava but tasted like semolina dumpling, rather like gulab jamun.  It was all Decent.

After our fortifying lunch we visited the Hippodrome cistern.  It is in the basement of a commercial building so can only be seen by appointment so we had it basically to ourselves which was great.  The palace had been overrun by hordes by the time we left and wasn't very pleasant.

The cistern itself wasn't particularly special but there were a lot of displays about the hippodrome which I loved.  I've just finished reading the Sarantine Mosaic by Guy Gavriel Kay which is a historical fantasy version of the rule of Justinian and the building of the Hagia Sophia and the chariot races in the hippodrome so I was chuffed to see it all for real.

Then we went upstairs and were shown how hand-knotted Turkish carpets are made.  It is insanely labour intensive.  We were then shown various wool and silk carpets by a very persuasive salesman.  It was only because my favourite carpet was too big for my living room (and the knowledge the cats would barf on it and scratch it to death) prevented me from buying a carpet.  The wife got them to show her a good dozen carpets before not buying anything either.

After this we went to the Grand Bazaar which is where the wheels on our tour fell off.  The wife decided she wanted to convert some money, so we had to wander about the bazaar until she found a place with a good exchange rate.  We then had to wait while she (or rather her husband) queued up to do the transaction.  After a bit Mary and I went to another shop so Mary could buy some turkish delight.

When we got back we were hoping to resume the tour.  However, the wife then decided she wanted to get some of her gold jewellery cleaned.  Mary and I left the bazaar and waited outside for a bit.  We were about to send our guide a message saying we were done and were going back to our hotel, when he showed up.  Turns out the wife had even more jewellery to do things with so he had said good-bye to them and rejoined us.  Who expects everyone on a tour to wait around for 30+ minutes while you do some errands?

Free of the others, we went to the Blue Mosque - very pretty and then admired some obelisks in the square that is all the remains of the hippodrome.  It might not sound very special but our guide knew so much of this history of every place it was very interesting.  

This was the end of the tour so we said good-bye and thanks to Burak and headed back to our hotel.  We plan on hitting up the Topkapi Palace Museum Shop for souvenirs tomorrow morning.  Unlike some people, we don't expect others to wait around while we browse.

After resting our feet for a bit we headed out for dinner.  The only thing I don't like about Istanbul is your choices for dinner are Turkish food, Turkish food or Turkish food.  In Melbourne we are spoilt with having such a wide range of cuisines available.  We randomly chose a restaurant and shared a vegetable pide and a meat pide.  They were sadly very Dull.  The cook didn't seem to have heard of using spices or really any seasoning at all.  We had rice pudding for dessert which was Decent at least.

Tomorrow is a little souvenir shopping before leaving to fly home.  I'm looking forward to having my own bedroom and bathroom but not looking forward to doing my own cooking and cleaning.

Day 24 - Istanbul

Espresso Freddo: 0

Today we had a food tour of Istanbul.  It was offered by the same company that we used for our Athens food tour.  Based on how much we had to eat that time, we made sure to be hungry today.  We started the day with just a coffee in the hotel cafe (much to the pleasure of the concierge).  To our displeasure, we weren't able to have Turkish coffee as they were all out.  I had to settle for a (quite decent) espresso.

Next we headed out to brave the weather.  It was windy today and rained on and off all day.  The hotel had umbrellas we could borrow thankfully, but we still got damp and a cold at times.

We had to catch a tram to get to the meeting point.  We are on the European side and in the old city.  The meeting point was also on the European side of the city but across the river in the "new" town - i.e. the bit that is only a few hundred years old.  This part of the city is more residential and less touristy.  We managed the public transport system flawlessly and felt very smug.

Our guide was a young woman called Defne who has a masters in anthropoly and had to do a 2 year course to become a registered tour guide.  They take guiding seriously in Europe.  There were 5 others on the tour also.  All from the USA.

Mary and I were expecting there to be a lot of overlap with Greek food, given how close the two nations have been, but that wasn't the case most of the time.  It was true for our first stop which was at a street kiosk to get the Turkish equivalent of a pretzel.  Here in Turkey they are called simit.  They have sesame seeds like the Greek version, but aren't brushed with honey so they don't have the vague sweetness so I prefer the Turkish version.

Next we wandered through a market/street that was all for people wanting to do household DIY.  We've noticed that streets/areas here in Istanbul tend to specialise.  There was an arcade with nothing but menswear shops, streets with nothing but jewellers and this area which had basically just small shops/stalls selling hardware.  We visited a collection of such shops in an ancient han - the Turkish word for caravanserai.  I think it dated from the 16th century but had bits of Roman marble that had been pilfered from nearby locations.

Here we stopped at a tiny teashop for tea.  I don't remember if the owner was 73 years old or had been in business for 73 years.  Either could be possible.  Turks offer tea at the slightest provocation.  However, we learnt that this obsession with tea only dates from WW 2 when coffee became too expensive.  

We then wandered around a bit more before stopping at a small (slightly bigger) tea shop where we had 2nd breakfast.  This was plates of the Turkish version of pastrami, two types of cheese (sheep and goat), olives, a paste made from tomatoes and capsicum, zaatar (aka mountain thyme), rose jam and a buffalo cream cheese topped with honey.  We had a different sort of bread here.  It was more like a brioche, so slightly sweet.  Also, of course, more tea.

Next stop was a very upmarket baklavaria.  Here we had baklava and Turkish coffee.  The baklava wasn't as sweet as I'm used to so it was quite Good.

After this we caught the ferry across to the Asian side.  This is much newer and not as interesting to wander about in.  It is very much were the locals live and shop, so just large, slightly dirty big city.

We wandered around the local food market which was very interesting.  Unfortunately, the order in which we ate things depended on when we came across the shops so it was a bit odd at times.

First stop was a shop that sold sweets like halva and turkish delight.  We had halva made from tahini.  I'm not a fan but it was a good version of that type of thing.

Next we stopped at a place that had some mystery meats cooking on spits over coals.  This was chopped fine and spices were added.  We had small bites in bread rolls.  The mystery meat turned out to be sweetbreads wrapped in intestines.  Tasty but a nasty shock after halva.

We then visited a shop that sold nothing but dried fruit and nuts.  We had two types of pistacchios, hazelnuts, dried apricots and dried figs.  All very tasty.

After this we visited a deli that was like the Lygon Street Food Store on steriods.  It was the type of place where, as well as cheeses and salamis, you could buy premade appetisers to impress your guests when you are too busy to cook.  Here we had dolmades (with currents and cinnamon in the mix so slight sweet - Disappointing), stuffed eggplant (Good) and a rissole-like thing made from lentils (?) that Defne said you find in the fridge after your mother has had a party.  You could understand why it gets left behind as it was very dull.

The second last stop of the day was for lahmacun which is a flatbread topped with spiced minced meat.  You squeeze lemon on it and top it with parsley before rolling it up and eating it.  This was very Good.  My favourite stop of the day.

The last stop was for gelato.  Italians do it better.  I had pistacchio - of course.

We were then abandoned by Defne on the Asian side but successfully got the ferry and tram back to our hotel.  We had another coffee (they still haven't replenished their supplies of Turkish coffee) before having a post-tour nap/rest.

We are doing another, history, tour tomorrow so after our rest we wandered around the old town for a bit and made sure we knew where the meeting point was.  We wandered about for a bit, ignoring all the touts trying to drag you into their restaurant (very annoying) before randomly choosing one called Ti Amo (?), that specialises in traditional Turkish dishes.  We just shared a mezze platter (dolmades and 5 sorts of dip), bread and a dish of iman bayildi (baked eggplant).   It was all Good.

Oh, I just remembered I've left out a stop on our food tour.  I think it was on the European side.  It was the Turkish version of a burrito.  It was minced meat (beef I think) rolled up in a soft flatbread.  You were supposed to stuff a spicy pickled pepper into the roll (too spicy for me) and then squeeze lemon juice on it and put some parsley & mint in your mouth before taking a bite.  All Good - minus the pepper.  With this we drank ayran, which is a salted yoghurt drink.  It tastes like you'd imagine.

Day 24 - Getting to Istanbul

Espresso Freddo: 0

I don't think I'll have the chance to have any more espresso freddos now we are in Turkey.  I should have had one last one at breakfast this morning.  However, it was cool so I just had a Greek coffee instead.

We flew too Istanbul this morning.  We'd had the opportunity to bid for an upgrade to business class and we took it.  We bid half the amount that was the difference between our economy fares and a business class one.  We got the upgrade!  I'm so pleased.  

Originally we thought that business class wasn't worth it on short intra-European flights but the seats are so close together the extra space was well worth the money.  We also got served lunch, which was a rather amusing experience.  The flight was short - only about 1.5 hours.  We were at cruising altitude for all of about 30 minutes so they had to serve us lunch, let us eat it and then clear it all away in that time.  I don't think I've ever eaten so quickly in my life.

Istanbul airport is enormous.  We'd arranged for a car service to pick us up and take us to our hotel.  They sent us a short video showing you how to get through the airport to the pick up point.  Orginaly I thought it was overkill but we needed it.  Then the drive took over an hour.

Our hotel is right by the river, in the heart of the oldest, most touristy part of the city.  It is a maze of narrow, one-way streets, assuming you can drive down them at all.  It took the best part of 20 minutes to go the last 1km.

We accidentally booked a rather more upmarket hotel than we realised.  We were greeted by a porter who brought in our bags from the car.  Then a concierge took over and gave us a glass of homemade lemonade and a piece of Turkish delight to welcome us to the hotel.  Once the tedious, vulgar business of paying for our stay was taken care of, we were escorted to our rooms.  The porter brought our bags up later.

We are on different floors as we have the special rooms with a view.   There is only one such room per floor.  My room is so special I have a bathtub with a view.

The hotel has just been recently renovated and they don't have a breakfast room (yet?).  However, they do have a cafe where we can have free coffee or tea at any hour of the day or night.  The concierge reminds us of this every time we see him.  So far we haven't taken advantage of it, which I think greatly distresses him.  Tomorrow.

After checking in (and getting rid of the concierge) we went out for an amble around.  We also needed to buy the Istanbul equivalent of a Myki card.  While we were looking blankly at the ticket machine and man came up behind us.  It was about 5pm so he was clearly a commuter on his way home.  We told him to go first but instead he took the time to show us how to buy the card, which was very kind of him.  So far, everyone we've met has been anxious to help.

After this we wandered around a bit.  The traffic here is nightmarish.  To cross a road, we just wait until there are other people crossing in our desired direction and just march out into the traffic with them.   It seems to work.

For dinner we went to a pedestrian street that is wall to wall restaurants for tourists.  We went to one the concierge recommended and had kebabs - chicken for me, lamb for Mary - which were Decent.  For dessert we had rice pudding which was Good.  By Turkish standards it was very expensive, but I spend that much on brunch at home, so it seemed reasonable to us.

Tomorrow we go on a food tour.  We are looking forward to learning about what is good to eat here.  There are so many shops selling so many delicious looking pastries.