Istanbul

Monday 14 Oct

We took the bus from Hamilton to the Toronto airport, put Jen in a wheelchair and we were through security and customs in no time. This booth on Jen’s foot has proven to be useful again. After a very relaxed 10 hour flight, where both Jen and Arno had a good sleep, we arrived around 4 PM at Istanbul International Airport. We have seen some big airports in our travel, but this one is up there. Luckly Arno was able to score another wheelchair for Jen and we zoomed through all controls quickly to get our suitcases.

Jen had booked a pickup from the airport and after a good hour, with lots of crazy traffic, we arrived at our hotel. What we didn’t know was that the driver had called the hotel owner to tell him that Jen was wearing a boot and had a bit limited mobility. When we arrived the hotel manager was waiting for us outside and told us that he moved us to a more suitable suite. We now have a 2 bedroom suite that comes with its own Turkish bath. Not a bad start for Istanbul, he also recommended a place for dinner and helped us plan our next two days.

After dinner we went for a walk, the hotel is literally a few minutes walking distance from the Blue Mosque and it was a beautiful evening. We walked over the bazaar and were amazed by all the herbs, flowers and other ingredients they sold to make tea.

Tuesday 15 Oct

Time to explore Istanbul, our hotel manager provided us with a public transport card that we can easily top-up and use across the city. We took the metro to the funicular that brought us to Taksim square home to the Republic Monument and the start of Istiklal Caddesi (main car free shopping street). We took strategic positions so we could take some pictures from the city, we didn’t realise that this funicular was underground 🫢.

This is also where we visited our first mosque; Taksim Mosque. Not that impressive but still worth the visit. Arno walked to the Hagia Triada Greek Orthodox Church while Jen gave her foot a rest.

From here we walked down the Istiklal Caddesi. This is the city’s main pedestrian boulevard, which is lined with 19th-century buildings housing international shopping chains, movie theatres, and cafes. The dense network of side streets is filled with bars, antiques shops, and rooftop eateries with Bosphorus views. It also has a small tram that goes up and down the boulevard. And it was very busy!

We admired the shows that the icecream sellers put on. It is so funny but hard to explain, beter to watch the video that Jen took.

At the end of the boulevard Jen took the metro to the Grand Bazaar while Arno would cross the bridge on foot to shoot a few pictures before meeting Jen there.

The Grand Bazaar is just amazing, so many people and so many shops. You can hardly understand how they are all making a living.

The Grand Bazaar (Turkish: Kapalıçarşı, meaning ‘Covered Market’; is one of the largest and oldest covered markets in the world, with 61 covered streets and over 4,000 shops on a total area of 30,700 m2, attracting between 250,000 and 400,000 visitors daily. In 2014, it was listed No.1 amongst the world’s most-visited tourist attractions with 91,250,000 annual visitors. The Grand Bazaar at Istanbul is often regarded as one of the first shopping malls of the world. We were there on a Tuesday, and as far as we know, no special day in Turkey but it was so busy. The images below speak for themselves.

One thing worth mentioning here is the amount of sweet stuff you can buy here, there are many shops that sell baklava, kunefe (Kunefe is made with cheese which is the local version of Mozzarella, butter, and sugar syrup), Turkish delight and many others. Dentist must be doing great business here.

We made our way back to our hotel with a few more souvenirs and a very tired Jen. Once back in the hotel we decided to try out our private Turkish bath, very relaxing and that made us ready for the evening.

For this evening we had booked a dinner and show cruise on the Bosphorus. It was a lot of fun and we enjoyed the show. After the show the boat turned into a loud discotheque and the dance floor was packed. We (for obvious reasons) sat this one out.

Wednesday 16 Oct

Arno had an early start to see if the nearby fish market was worth a visit. It was only 20 minutes away from our hotel. Arno was hoping to see the fish coming in from the fishing boats as we’ve seen before in other countries. But that was not the case here, this is a fish market where you pick your fish and they will bring it to a restaurant next door where they will prepare and serve it to you. Arno was too early, the real action starts around 9.

We had an hearty breakfast and made our way to see the Blue Mosque. Jen’s boot proved it worth again as we could skip an hours long queue and walk straight into the Mosque.

The Blue Mosque in Istanbul, also known by its official name, the Sultan Ahmed Mosque (Turkish: Sultan Ahmet Camii), is an Ottoman-era historical imperial mosque located in Istanbul, Turkey. It was constructed between 1609 and 1617 during the rule of Ahmed I and remains a functioning mosque today.

The mosque has a classical Ottoman layout with a central dome surrounded by four semi-domes over the prayer hall. It is fronted by a large courtyard and flanked by six minarets, although one is being rebuild. On the inside, it is decorated with thousands of Iznik tiles and painted floral motifs in predominantly blue colours, which give the mosque its popular name.

We bought ticket’s for the Cistern and the Hagia Sophia and made our way to the Cistern first. Again we managed to skip the queue and went straight in.

This one is the largest of several hundred ancient cisterns that lie beneath the city of Istanbul. The cistern, was built in the 6th century during the reign of Byzantine emperor Justinian I. Today it is kept with little water, for public access inside the space. It is quite amazing and very impressive.

Next stop was the Hagia Sophia, we bought the online ticket and the queue was not too long.

This mosque and former church serve as a major cultural and historical site in Istanbul. The last of three church buildings to be successively erected on the site by the Eastern Roman Empire, it was completed in AD 537. The site was a Greek Orthodox church from AD 360 to 1453, except for a brief time as a Latin Catholic church between the Fourth Crusade and 1261. After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, it served as a mosque until 1935, when it became a museum. In 2020, the site once again and became a mosque.

We stopped for lunch before visiting our last site in Istanbul. We went for a short visit to the Istanbul Archaeological museums. These museums house over one million objects from nearly all periods and civilisations in world history. We walked through one hall, but quickly realised that you could easily spend a whole day here. However, after all the walking we already did we decided to go back to our hotel for a cold beer.

We did some more shopping and bought ourselves a beautiful silk rug for in our home. Another bucket list item completed. We loved Turkey and were impressed by its beauty, the friendliness of the people, and the history it has to show. However, we were surprised how many people here still smoke (everywhere) and how expensive everything is. On to the Netherlands now to see the family 😍