Istanbul- Day 1

Never, never, never again will I take a flight at 4:30 a.m. It is sheer madness! I managed to haul myself to the airport for my flight, but I was so exhausted that after I checked in and sat down near my gate, I simply threw my leg over my carry on and fell right asleep. Fortunately, I managed to wake up when they called the flight. I hauled my sad body on to the plane, fell in to a seat and promptly fell asleep again. Truthfully, I'm kind of impressed by my ability to sleep anywhere. :) I woke up a short while later when the flight attendants began paging a "Mr. Lee" to board the plane. Mr. Lee never showed up so we were late leaving as they had to take his bags off the plane before we could leave.

I arrived in Istanbul bright and early (7:30 a.m.) and got off the plane and lined up to pay a princely sum of 45 Euros for the priviledge of entering the country. I'm not sure why, but Canadians pay the highest rate for visas by far. Anyone know?? I grabbed my bags and hopped into a cab and drove smack dab into rush hour traffic Istanbul style. While we sat in the car, I looked around and enjoyed the view. The road ran parallel to the Bosphorus Sea. The Sea was choked up with tankers as far as the eye could see-- it's obviously a major port/ oil transport area. We drove in to the Sultanahmet area and I was immediately captivated by its charm-- narrow, steep, winding cobbelstone roads; skinny, tall houses in shades of red, pink, etc. lined the road as we drove up. All in all, it reminded me a lot of Old Quebec.

The cab dropped me off at the hotel but it turned out to be the wrong one (there are 2 hotels in the same district with the same name), so I had to get another cab driver to take me to the right hotel. The cab pulls up, opens up the trunk and throws my luggage in the wrong way so that it's sticking out of the trunk. He doesn't put the trunk lid down or secure the luggage in any way, but simply hops in the cab and takes off. These roads are amazingly steep and wind around corner after corner and I must admit that my heart was in my throat as we drove up the hill. I kept looking out the back window every time we went around a corner or hit a bump, half expecting to see my luggage tumbling down the road in the opposite direction to the one in which I was traveling and having the car behind us drive over my luggage (Please, not the bag with my expensive camera in it!). Thankfully we made it to the hotel with my luggage still in the trunk and still (relatively) in one piece.

As I checked in to the hotel, the manager mentioned to me that Grayline offered day long city tours and that there was one leaving in 10 mins. Since my room wasn't going to be ready for a couple of hours, it seemed worthwhile to hop on the bus and get an overview of the city. I left my bags with the concierge and hopped on the bus. There were about 15 others on the bus all from different countries and hotels. Our first stop was to the Egyptian, or Spice, Bazaar. As I wandered through the souk, I sampled more Turkish delight that I could hold, bought some apple tea for a teacher friend and at stall #20, had my first taste of apple tea. I'm addicted!

From there, we crossed the Galata Bridge to the Beyoglu/Taksim side of Istanbul. We drove past the military museum, a summer palace on the edge of the Bosphorus built for a daughter of the Sultan and Dolmabahce Palace. Shortly after passing by Dolmabahce Palace, our bus pulled over and we disembarked and headed to a boat for a private cruise of the Bosphorus. We cruised down the European side of Istanbul/the Bosphorus to the Bosphorus Bridge, the crossed over and cruised up the Asian side of the city. There were many beautiful Ottoman houses that lined the shore of the Bosphorus and it was easy to imagine the Sultans and their family, inner circle, summering on the Bosphorus. It was also easy to see that Istanbul was built up from the Sea as the older buildings are typically on the shore of the Bosphorus and the newere buildings are further up the mountain/hill away from the Bosphorus. The cruise itself was a bit rough as the waters were very rough on this day- the guide said it was partially caused by opposing currents from the Bosphorus and the Black Seas-- apparently they meet up on the section of the Bosphorus where we were cruising. Whatever the reason, we definitely bounced around a bit! While cruising around, we were able to see Rumele Fortress-- it was quite impressive.

All that cruising got us hungry, so we headed off for a traditional Turkish lunch at one of the local restaurants (stuffed peppers-- rice and currants I believe, plus some kind of a curried chicken dish), then it was off to Domabahce Palace. The palace was built in 1865 by Sultan Abdul Mecit. I was floored with how much crystal was in this place-- apparently the world's largest crystal chandelier hangs at this palace. The palace also contains the 3rd largest carpet in the world and even has a crystal staircase! (well, the spindles on the railing are crystal at any rate!). Apparently the Sultan took out a loan to finance the building of this palace-- I can see why! He even had an entry way built and reserved especially for him and another one built especially for his harem (there were at one point 1 000 concubines in the harem!). The Grand Hall is beyond description and as you look around, you can notice windows with what looks like carved 'grills' in front of them. It was behind these windows that the harem and other palace women could watch the goings on, formal gatherings, etc. that took place in the Grand Hall as the only women allowed in the Grand Hall was the Sultan's mother and perhaps his wife. This palace was so over the top that we were all made to wear pink plastic covers over our shoes lest we dirty anything. Oh how I suffer to get a peek at history!

Once we were done gaping over Dolmabahce Palace, we climbed back in our bus and headed for the Bosphorus Bridge. We literally left Europe behind and as we crossed the bridge, we crossed over to the Asian continent. Part way across was a sign saying, "Welcome to Asia". 2 yrs later and I'm back in Asia again! We headed for Camlica Hill which is a hill from which you can get great views of Istanbul. Unfortunately the temperature had dropped dramatically and a fog bank had started to roll in, making it impossible to stand outside for any length of time due to the cold weather and impossible to see much of anything due to the fog. I went in to the coffee house and had some Turkish coffee in an effort to thaw out and while waiting for the bus to come and get us.

I was dropped off at my hotel at 6 and went out to the main drag, found a nice restaurant, had dinner and drank some more of that yummy apple tea. I managed to stagger back to bed and collapsed on to the bed and fell sound, sound asleep.

Check out photos from my first day by clicking on this impossibly long link:

Dolmabahce Palace