Istanbul - Traveling Around Like Locals

Trip Start Aug 11, 2007
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Trip End Nov 08, 2007


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Thursday, September 6, 2007

We thought we'd have a relaxing day on a boat cruise up the Bosphorus, but slept in a bit late, then spent too long getting organised and then realised we wouldn't get down to the ferry in time for the 10.30 am sailing. There was another one going at 1.30pm so no problem. Decided to go off to see the Blue Mosque and the AyaSofia in the morning instead. They are only a few blocks from our hotel, so a nice walk away. Arrived to find a squillion people lined up for the AyaSophia. There were 3 big cruise ships in town for the day and everyone was one a 1 day tour. So we crossed the park and went into the Blue Mosque. By the time we came out, the lines for the AyaSofia had died down, so in we went. Decided to go with a guided tour, partly because this place has had an interesting history and partly just to see what value a guide might be. And it was interesting - a lot more info than I thought. One of the bits we would have missed without the guide was the excavations of the second church (the one still standing is the 3rd church and the 1st one was wooden and burnt down, so not much to excavate) - down about 2 metres from street level today Chris in front of the Blue Mosque
Chris in front of the Blue Mosque
 !

Then a rush down to the ferry, only to find we couldn't find it! There are multiple ferry wharves spread out along about 1 km, all signposted in Turkish (or not at all) and it proved impossible to figure out which ferry we wanted in the 5 minutes we had before it sailed. So we hopped another ferry and went where ever it took us. Turned out to be a place called Uskudar across on the Asian side of the Bosphorus. So wandered around there for a bit and had some lunch, then got another ferry back across the Bosphorus to another suburb. Some more wandering and then caught the tram all the way back to the hotel. It was fun just doing the local transport thing, and very easy once you figured out how you buy the tokens - the hardest bit was sorting out the names of all the places and which ones were going the way we wanted.

We got so comfortable with the using the local transport, we used it that night to go out for the evening - tram to Kabatas, then Funicular (cable car) up the hill to Taksim Square, where we started to walk down a road called Istiklal Caddesi, which is a pedestrian street in the heart of modern Istanbul. It was an incredible sight - 8.30pm and this wide 1 km of road was completely jammed with people. And all the little side streets were full of café's bars and restaurants, with hundreds of people out and about. We wandered down though all this, eating at one place, a beer at another, and just people watching, and finally arrived at a little narrow street called Nevizade Sokak. It is a tiny little street, full of little tavern restaurants with tables and chairs all over the street, and it was heaving with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people - it's obviously the place to go if you live in Istanbul!
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