Hotel Penelope Kokkari

... He spoke all through the tour about the extensive history of the place with pride and passion.

The ruins are buried under layers of earth and this process whereby a thriving community gets lost over centuries by being interred is a mystery to us really. The quality of the stonework at Ephesus mirrored that we had seen in Greece and the expertise of the stone workers astonished us. Also the extent of the complex with its way down to what used to be the Aegean Sea until ...

... both sides and marble pavements made a dazzling first impression. The Temples of Hadrian, Library of Celsus and the Great Theater were some of my favorites. We also saw the Temple of Artemis...one lonely column remains there. While there we also strolled a street on which Cleopatra and Mark Anthony spent their honeymoon!! As with the other ruins..feral cats everywhere. People actually brought cat food ...

... area into marshland and eventually flat lowlands, creating a new shore that is today 7 km away from the ruins. The excavation work has been ongoing for the last 100 years and has uncovered approximately 8% of the ancient city; baths, houses, an ancient library, theatres and colliseums, marble walkways, apartment-like complexes, pillars and the foundations of many buildings once used and lived in centuries ago have been unearthed and ...

... eastern neighbor are the cradle of humanity, Here there are artifacts and sites that date back to 5000 BC. We visted ancient Ephesus
which is one of the greatist archeological excavations in the world. This is the home to the Great Theater where St. Paul preached. All of this has been really fasinating. Kusadasi is in southwestern turkey and is islamic, but as the interperter said yesterday the people here are "open" while ...

... coffee with creamy milk. Feeling a little out of sorts today bit tired after all the travelling and miss everyone back home including dan dan lots and lots.

Going to go out and have something to eat this evening and then up very early for the ferry to Paros but tomorrow we have booked a 4 star hotel with swimming pool on my fave Greek place Paros its so cool so excited about going there tomorrow.

... trip so not done too bad. As the waves where nearly 5 foot high it was impossible to swim on this part of the beach but Ian had saw that there was another part of the beach around the harbour where you could swim so we headed there and went for a lovely swim together.

Manchester united where playing Manchester City and we saw that one of the bars next to the harbour had it on so off we went for a few beers ...

... and I had a greek meat plate yum yum. After food we went for a walk along the shore this area has strong winds in September called Meltimi that make the waves really high like being in Cornwall so we were sat watching them when we saw either a shooting star or an UFO we are still not sure what it was it kind of fluttered in the sky for a bit then shot off convinced it was aliens!!!! Anyways after that experience off to bed before they try and come and get us.

... the day they did this thing called a rain dance. There was a dancefloor and the music came on really cheesy euro stuff like Boom Boom Boom by Black Eyed Peas and the Turkish Eurovision song and everyone gets on the dance floor and dances then at a point in the song all these water fountains underneath you start to shoot up water its really good fun and very cheesy but both me and Ian had a go with all the Turkish youth we looked hilarious. Ian had a fave slide ...

... originally from Malaysia and Seoul respectively. Paul popped in to say goodbye mid-way through dinner which was really sweet of him to do so. We had dessert at the Purple Onion this time on the rooftop and it was fabulous to get a glimpse of the Blue Mosque, the Aya Sofya and Topkapi Palace at night for the last time. It was finally time to bid farewell to Alex, Erkut and Fiona and wished Alex and Erkut well as they start their married life together.

... for calendars if he was a little more confident. The first full day Rosie decided we should make the most of the weather and get up and go to the beach for 9am. However, at 11.30 we woke up, struggled out of bed, took ages to get ready and made it to the beach for the mid-day heat. It was more than enough though, and several hours, a couple of ice creams and a dip in the ice-cold sea later, we were a beautiful shade of crimson. It is hard to believe exactly how red Me and Rosie ...