A cruise up the Bosphorus!

Friday, May 21, 2010

Greetings to all!

It’s Friday already – not sure where the week has gone, but it’s certainly passing quickly! Today’s plan is to take the public ferry boat that goes up the Bosphorus (the water course that divides Europe from Asia) almost to the Black Sea, with various stops, and then back. In all it is a 6 hour journey – not that it’s all that far to the end of the line, but there is a 2 ½ hour stop for either exploring the castle at the top of the hill or eating! We’re both looking forward to a day with not too much walking and lots of sitting and seeing! The guidebooks advise getting to the ferry boat at least half an hour early if you want to get a good seat…so of course we were there an hour early, and got great seats on the top deck! However, it seems like everybody wants up there too, so it was quite the scrum for a while before things settled down…but I caution people that I’ve had experience holding places against the railings on the first stage of the Tour de France … no problem! We decided that we would sit on the European side on the trip to Kadivoy, and return to Istanbul by the Asian side. That way we could see everything at least once! With the wind blowing, it got REALLY cold on the top deck, and with about 15 minutes left to go on the up leg, we took refuge downstairs inside just to try and get warm!

Really great trip; lovely day, but right here and now I’m going to put my plug in for a better CAMERA! With the present camera – an Olympus, but an automatic – there are very few adjustments you can make – it has only so far to use the zoom, etc. – and I think we need more latitude! Sometimes we just can’t get close enough to take the kind of pictures that I want to take – and post! At any rate, we had a lovely day. We passed several royal palaces – summer palace #1, summer palace #2, royal hunting palace, etc., several really upscale hotels (no kidding, they looked amazing!) and some absolutely beautiful private homes, called yali, lining parts of the Bosphorus. Some of the older places were originally built out of wood – which would worry me because of fire danger! – but have been lovingly restored to pristine condition. We saw enough to realize that Turkey is truly an amazing country, and that we’d like to someday come back here, rent a car and do some exploring on our own! (Robert had some interesting preconceived ideas about Turkey in general and Istanbul in particular. And when we got to our hotel – located smack dab in the middle of the “old” town – he felt they were correct. But tours like today’s, as well as last night’s trip out to the end of the tram line, have convinced him that Istanbul really is a very modern city with some interesting architecture and definitely its share of high rise buildings.)

We arrived at Katakoy, the end of the line, on the Asian side, about 12:30 and got off the boat. The small town of Katakoy is comprised almost entirely of restaurants, and everyone is looking for business off the boat; talk about hard sell! (Apparently in the summer, lots of locals go out there just for the day, and it gets REALLY crowded! Glad we only had to deal with tourists!!) We found a restaurant – oh! The entire boat is NON-SMOKING!! YEA! And several restaurants along the waterfront where we got off have no-smoking signs posted indoors – but of course people can (and do!) smoke outside…UGH! So, found a place indoors – for both warmth AND to avoid the smoke! And had lunch. I started with eggplant salad (ok) and R started with the town’s specialty, fried mussels. I didn’t much care for them; way too fishy for me, but R enjoyed them! For mains, I got – yes, of course! – chicken kebob which came with tomatoes and French fries. R got a fresh fish – blue fish, called Luker (with an odd accent mark over the “u”…)…picture enclosed so you can see what R had to work with! He is amazing boning the fish himself, and he said it was wonderful…I’m so thankful for chicken!

Had some time left, so walked around the little town and had my Magnum Classic while R had coffee. R also bought some fresh cherries off a small truck in town which he hopes to get to this evening. Finally, back on the boat. Asian side this time, but on the second deck, which is enclosed. Much more comfortable trip back, but both of us were having a hard time staying awake! Not sure if it was the wine at lunch or all the fresh air, but naps felt like they were really in order – except we still had an hour and ½ to go! Landed about 4:45 p.m. and headed straight back to the hotel.

As we had such a big lunch, and R has some Caltech work to do, we’ve decided to skip dinner tonight and stay in…we are such party animals! Tomorrow will be our second and last try at the Grand Bazaar, as it’s closed on Sunday – so we’ll see what that may bring!

Lots of love!
m
x

This next is posted against my wishes, but it’s very sweet…m

Addendum from Robert –

Margaret’s blogs of our travels are interesting, informative and amusing, yet there is one aspect that she does not mention that I would like to talk about – that is how well planned these trips are. And that is all because of Margaret.

She puts a lot of work into our trips – reading articles and books, pouring over maps, checking hotel reviews, finding special places to see… She has the remarkable ability to absorb all this information about places we have never visited – something I can’t do at all – and put it all together into a complete plan. But a plan with plenty of wiggle room so that we can make it up as we go along.

The result is that we – I – always have a great time, seeing all sorts of things, from the must-visit places that everyone knows about to the out-of-the-way sights that are often off the usual tourist trails. (How many people do we know who have stayed in a cave, for example? See trip to Matera, Italy in 2009.) Over the years, I have been to places I never would have reached on my own and this I owe to Margaret – the best travel arranger, booking agent, guide and travelling companion ever!

Robert