On our second evening in Istanbul we found another very good restaurant where they catered for Ian.  Next morning it took a while to get out of bed, and we spent some time on the net trying to find a bigger supermarket or somewhere else to get a better range of food.  With the four day holiday, fresh supplies are running low and our options are limited.  Once we left the apartment we set off to buy dinner ingredients, as Pete and Ilze were due to arrive later in the afternoon.  But we got somewhat sidetracked, wandering the streets and lanes at random and finally emerging on the east side of the Hippodrome, where there is a small bazaar selling handcrafts, headscarves, carpets, jewellery and ceramics.  It was a pleasant place to window shop and we did not get the expected hard sell.  After some debate and a little bit of haggling, we chose a headscarf in a red, white and black traditional Ottoman design, for me to wear when visiting mosques.  I can also wear it as a normal decorative scarf.

Minarets of the Blue Mosque

Later we came back to the Hippodrome with the intention of visiting the Blue Mosque.  We examined the obelisk which was built in Egypt in 1590? BC, and brought to Constantinople in 390AD.  Truly ancient.  The mosque was closed for prayers for an hour so we decided to see the inside another time, and just had a look at the courtyard.

Decoration above an entrance at the Blue Mosque

Mixing with the holiday crowds, we snacked on freshly cooked corn on the cob and roasted chestnuts, sold by street vendors along with popcorn, dried fruit, nuts and pomegranates.  Snack food here is much healthier than our version, and very cheap.

Holiday crowds outside the Haj Sofia

The Haj Sofia was also very crowded so we decided to wander back to the apartment and wait for Pete and Ilze.  They were duly delivered around 5pm having found a driver at the airport.  We settled them in, took them shopping and showed them around the neighbourhood.  Funny how you can become an instant expert in just 2 days!  We cooked dinner and swapped travel stories, until it was time for Ian and I to pack for an early departure to Gallipoli.

We were hoping for a good night’s sleep as we needed to be up at 5am.  First, the neighbours upstairs decided that 11pm was a good time to completely rearrange every piece of furniture, dragging it across the floors.  Next the phone rang – it was the tour company wanting to know where to pick us up from – this was after midnight!  Try explaining that you are in a private apartment on a tiny street with no street sign, with a long unpronounceable name, ”near a mosque”, on a phone that barely works, in the middle of the night.  It was an impossible task so we hung up and went to bed again hoping for the best.  After that neither of us could sleep.  We remembered that daylight saving ended tonight, meaning we gained an hour, so we had to reset our alarms.  Unfortunately we forgot to tell Pete and Ilze so they were up at 4am!  All in all it was a very disturbed night and we were not happy campers this morning.  We had no idea if the tour company would turn up, but they managed to find us and off we went, bound for Gallipoli.

The bus took us to other parts of Istanbul as it picked up other passengers, then we set off on a 5 hour trip.  We alternatively dozed and watched the scenery.  It took a long time to leave the densely packed suburbs behind.  After that it was open brown dry hills with small towns of low rise buildings in various stages of either construction or disrepair.  Some of them advertised themselves as holiday resorts as they were on the coast, but we couldn’t see any beach.  We stopped twice at petrol stations, then on to the Gallipoli peninsula.  We climbed over a pass and dropped down the other side, following a narrow road that hugged the water’s edge and wound its way eventually to Enceabat, where we are staying overnight.  A quick lunch and it was straight onto a minibus for the afternoon.

We took a ferry across the Dardanelles Strait, busy with freight and passenger boats, to Cannakkale, which is a sizeable tourist town.  Then it was on to Troy and the archaeological park, where we met our guide Hasan.  He gave us an excellent tour of the ruins, which are far more substantial than I imagined.  When I was much (much) younger, I was fascinated by Greek mythology and knew all the stories about the gods and the Trojan war, so it was interesting to see the site in real life.  Hasan was a good storyteller who set the scene before taking us around the site and explaining the nine different version of Troy that have existed over thousands of years.  We saw remains of the various fortification walls, remnants of marble ceilings from the Temple to Athena, a sacrificial altar complete with a well for the blood, and a Roman theatre.  The obligatory Trojan Horse cannot claim any authenticity, having been built as long ago as 1975!

Trojan Horse circa 1975 AD

Playing Trojans

Hasan explains the fortification walls of Troy

Marble ceiling piece

Sacrificial altar with fireplace and two wells – one for water, the other for blood

We’re now back in Enceabat in a large comfortable hotel room with a view of the Dardanelles.  Tomorrow is our tour of the Gallipoli sites which will complete our WW1 component of the trip and provide a great contrast to the Western Front.