Beyond Istanbul

Craig’s thoughts:

Finally!!! A Blog update.

It’s not that there are problems finding internet access, it’s because we have been busy, busy, busy. Too busy to update for the fine people back in Canada.

We have only been in Turkey for two weeks, but it feels like it’s been an amazing month. Our days have been full of adventures which has kept us focused on the moment. “Yeah, your having a great time, so what have you been doing”? Glad you asked.

Before I write about our activities since the last blog, I just wanted to say that our first Turkish experience came when we first checked into our hotel and met a friendly couple from the U.K. They offered us some Turkish Delight. How appropriate.

List of activities since the last update:
Sept 14 : visit Ephesus and Serince
Sept 15: a relaxing day trip to the beach in Samos, Greece
Sept 16: visit Aphrodisias and Pamukkale
Sept 17-20: the Blue Cruise on the Mediterranean from Fethiye to Olympus
Sept 21: Fly to Cappadocia and visit the valleys on four-wheelers

Michelle’s thoughts:

Alright, I guess I didn’t write as soon as I wanted to. Currently, I am in my room in a cave. Not just any cave, but the Flintstone’s Cave Pension. Some of the accommodations in Cappadocia are embedded in the mountains. This is a must place to visit if you’re going to Turkey! Okay, where do I start. Under Craig’s thoughts, he listed the activities over the last week. I will just go over my thoughts about each experience.

Ephesus: it’s a ruined city that is equally impressive as the ruins in Greece. It took us over three hours to visit the site because we took our time admiring everything. I was glad we weren’t part of a tour group because most went through it in an hour, not appreciating the site, but just quickly taking pictures. I am sure some of them would have liked to stay a lot longer. When I was walking through the area I was imagining what would it be like living there long ago.

Samos, Greece: Samos is an island about an hour and a half from Turkey. Samos was a nice break from seeing mosques, historical ruins and museums. We just needed a small break. We wanted to rent a scooter to travel to the beach, but we needed a motorcycle licence; but all was not lost because you only needed an International Drivers licence to drive a four- wheeler. It was so much fun driving along the coast of the island and the views were spectacular! The beach was not sandy, but more of a pebble beach. The clientele was mostly older Europeans who were so dark and wrinkly from worshiping the sun. Craig and I used both a beach umbrella and a tree for protection!!

Aphrodisias: this was a shrine as early as 5800BC. At one point it was owned by the Romans and then survived during the Byzantine era. Craig and I thought that this ruined city was more impressive than Ephesus. It also helped that Craig and I had a private tour of the area with a guide before any other tourists appeared. John was an excellent guide. He was an older gentleman born in Macedonia, lived in Germany for awhile before staying in Turkey. He hopes that all the Canadians reading this will come to Turkey to help with tourism.

Pamukkale: This place have these awesome white travertine terraces next to the Hierapolis. You have to see the pictures to believe this phenomenon. For it’s protection, you are now only allowed to walk on a section of the terraces. The water that runs through it is a pleasant temperature of 39 degrees Celsius. I thought I was in another planet walking through the area. It was soooo freaky! Another freaky thing about the area was that there were hundreds of young Russian girls coming out of the tour buses only wearing their bikinis. I have never seen so many bikini clad women walking around and there wasn’t even a beach. They were even walking around at the ruined city of Hierapolis in these skimpy outfits!! There is a small pool called the Cleopatra pool, but that’s where the older and Non-European tourists would be seen. I can’t even describe the poses they were doing when taking pictures. It was hilarious! Craig and I, with another young Canadian couple went into the Cleopatra pool. It was a different pool because the bottom had some ruins you had to climb over. Awesome!

Blue Cruise: We took a cruise on a gulet ( a small yacht) along the Mediterranean. There were 14 people on this cruise. Catalonian couple: Carles and Astrid; Another Canadian couple from Vancouver: Neil and Josie; American newlywed: Peter and Maneesha; UK students: Ruth, Yvonne and Rusmus; Vancouver, B.C. girl: Kim; a Korean travel agent: Sin Jin; and an American College Student: Soo Jin. Our group was amazing and we all got along quite well. We had so many funny conversations. If there was a group to go cruising with, these guys were perfect. We stopped at the Butterfly island and hiked/rock-climbed to a waterfall. We did other stops along the way, but mostly we just did some swimming. I think one of the highlights for me was when the Cook surprised me with a birthday cake!! Everyone on the boat, but me, knew he was making a cake. After dinner, the boat crew turned off the lights and a cake with sparkle candles was presented while everyone else sang Happy Birthday! I almost cried. It was so touching! The funny thing was when Rusmus announced that he had the same birth date as me; so the cook brought out more candles and we sang Happy Birthday again!

Well until next time!
Love, Michelle