Troy (Truva) Turkish Aegean Coast

11-17-08

Day 2

I only slept one hour on my flight to Istanbul and I entered my 31^st country. It was a 3.5 hour flight. I was kind of afraid of landing in a country in the middle of the night. It was 2 AM when I landed. I don't want to get welcomed to a city at night because I usually take a look at the city on the way …

Tonight I am sleeping in Canakkale (Sha-knock-ah-lay), which is between Gallipoli and Troy and lies on the Dardenelles, near the Aegean Sea. We arrived at the "Golden Hour" so I raced up to my room to drop off my gear and then back outside to catch the sunset.

We left Istanbul early this morning and spent much of the day on the bus. We …

Our first rainy day of the tour,

We headed out for Askeplion and Troy today. Another fabulous day with a mix of driving and walking. Troy was not what I expected. The replica horse was huge and the ruins were remarkable. Did you know that (mythology not withstanding) Troy has been rebuilt 34 times (before it finally bit the dust in the …

... , from New Zealand and Australia mainly, as you'd expect, but also some from Italy, Ireland and Denmark. The guide, Ali, a retired Turkish navy captain, is a tiny little guy in his late 60s with a wonderful sense of humour. He has spent his whole life ...

... streets and cafés with open air tables right by the water. The warm breeze coming in off the Dardanelles from the Aegean Sea. The laid-back atmosphere and boardwalk and lights from the town reflecting off the water into the distance. Wonderful place. ...

... stopover for visiting the battlefields and memorial sites of Gallipoli.  I had never heard about Gallipoli until I arrived in Turkey.  This is where the soldiers from Australia and New Zealand fought in their first battle and many lost their ...

... without the time to stop: Pergamum, another phenomenally well preserved and important Greek city that was actually in Turkey; Aristotle's House and Troy. Lonely Planet gives Troy a rough ride but we stopped anyway and had fun walking around. Firstly ...

... run out. It is extremely funny and embarrassing. We all have so much fun with it:) Getting back on track, today we stopped off in Troy. Here we had a guided tour, which again was pretty boring. There is a few ruins and a remake of the Troy horse, but not ...

Spring Break arrived and we decided to take a quick 50 minute flight to Izmir on the Aegean Coast... rent a car and drive up the coastline to Troy... enjoying a few sights along the way.  As I have mentioned so many times before, Turkey is endowed ...

... . Later on, he would lead the Turkish to victory of the Greeks, reclaim a large amount of Turkish land and become the first President of modern day Turkey. We had a great guide who repeated himself several times, which helped all the information to ...

... was amazing to see the places that the we see and hear about on ANZAC day in person. As it was a Sunday there were lots of Turkish tourist and a lovely Turkish man and his family shared there cherries with us up on the hill overlooking ANZAC Cove and ...

June 2nd - Eceabat to Selcuk After a traditonal turkish breakfast of feta, bread, tomato, cucumber and olives we caught the ferry over the Dardanelles to Canakkale. We had a quick photostop in front of the Trojan Horse used in the Brad Pitt movie 'Troy' ...

    We  rose early the next morning for a bus trip along the coast of European Turkey, to a ferry which took us to the Asian side.  From there we headed to the  ruins of Troy where we climbed a mock version of the Trojan ...