Allstar Elite Hotel Dragos Istanbul

... 305;s as there was a layer of smog everywhere.

Fırst stop was the Blue Mosque, whıch ınıtıally I had got my bearıngs wrong and thought ıt was the Hagıa Sophıa ınstead. It looked greyer and ancıent than the other one anyway. I walked ın wıth a bunch of tourısts and we were told to take off our shoes and put ın plastıc bags. I found ıt weırd that ıt was free to go ...

17th June - Istanbul

This was a very, very long day. It started at 7am when the woman in our dorm left to go to the airport and didn't finish until the next night when we finally climbed into a bed. Our first stop after checking out was to book a minbus transfer to the airport for midnight as we were due to catch a 3am flight. We couldn't face Turkish breakfast again so went to the supermarket on the the way to visit Topkapi Palace. The sultans ...

... Gobek Tasi" which is heated, it is circular and huge. I lay down on the pestemal and relax, it is nice and warm and although it is hard marble, it feels comfortable, I guess because it is warm. I have my own new scrub mitt, and shortly a woman comes and wets, scrubs and then washes me with bubbly soft soap. I then go into one of the little rooms and I am rinsed and my hair is washed and rinsed. This is the end of the service provided, but I can lay on ...

When my plane landed and classical Turkish art music began to play, I was on the verge of crying. Although my journey had been extremely rewarding, it had been lonely and challenging. I had missed my family. The immigration officer asked what my job was. I told him that I had recently graduated with a B.A. in economics and that I didn't have a job yet. Another officer from the neighboring booth joined us. He told me that he had graduated in 2000, right into the ...

... cultural and entertainment centers in a few minutes walk . Sed Hotel, with its warm atmosphere and carefully service, is a meeting point of those who are always looking for the very best.

In the hotel, there are 50 full-comfortable rooms which consist of 39 Double ...

... we made some observations about Turkish fashion. First, the men of Istanbul dress much more fashionably than the average Seattlite. We went through a few different department stores and found that the men's dressing rooms were nicer and more numerous than the women's--can you imagine this in the States? I can't. The fashion market is equally--if not more--targeted toward males here. Second, we found a huge disparity ...

... attack where two bombs went off in a square in Istanbul killing 17 and injuring over 150. Because of this attack we have rerouted and are off to another country, we have not been told where we are headed, all we do know is right after the announcement our ship turned right around. I'll try and keep you all posed with new developments. Skol! Jess

Just because I'm a long ways away from san fran, doesn't mean i havent looked at the scores of the giants games. losing to KANSAS CITY is unacceptable. correia doesn't sound like he is ready to be back in the rotation. then again, neither was pat misch. therefore, i would like to initiate a state of emergency for the giants and hope that they get someone like cc sabathia in the near future. hey, we can only hope, right?

... area for dinner. And this was where we faced our one and only rip-off attempt. We picked a restaurant with a view over the Golden Horn back to the old city, after establishing that a bottle of wine was 12YTL. The meal was actually very good, but when the bill arrived, the total was for 92YTL, with the wine costing 30YTL, and one of the meses (starters) 10, instead of 4YTL. An argument ensued, and I calculated ...

... castle to get a better view. The trip back to Istanbul was equally enjoyable due to the setting sun causing some brilliant light over the Bosphorus, which I hopefully got some good photos of! For tea we all headed to the Ramadan markets/festival again which was so packed due to it being a Saturday night. I got a baked potato for tea which was filled with all this weird and wonderful stuff ...