Second and third days

We took an organized full day tour of Istanbul, being picked up at .8.30am, and dropped off, exhausted , at 5pm.

We saw the hippodrome, the obelisk, imported from Egypt,


The Blue Mosque


The Topkapi Palace, and the Hagia Sophia, which was a Christian church turned mosque, turned museum.


This is one of two great bronze doors, dating from the 6th century. The cross on the front was destroyed when the it became a mosque.
After lunch in a restaurant, we visited a carpet making establishment where we were treated to apple tea and the full sales pitch. At $4000 for a 3x5 foot pure silk rug, we declined the kind offer.
A visit to the spice bazaar rounded off the day.

Yesterday after a leisurely start , we wandered down to where the hop on/hop off (ho-ho) buses are leaving from, and took two buses, the blue line, and the green line around Istanbul . However, we did not hop off, as the buses were FULL, ,we had no confidence that we would be able to hop on again.



The merchants are everywhere, selling everything, lots of them sell water, it is only 1 lira for two bottles of cold water. That is equivalent to $1. The traders are mostly assertive, some bordering on aggressive, in their selling techniques, you have to have a thick skin to say no to them.


This man was selling his water between two lanes of traffic! I took this photo from the bus window.


We enjoyed lunch under the trees in a lovely cafe.






Salad with Anatolian cheese and walnuts was delicious, and Frank enjoyed calamari with Almond sauce.




We actually managed to stay awake to eat dinner last night, for the first time.

Posted from Istanbul.