2011 Med Cruise – Day 5: Cruising the Dardanelles and first night in Istanbul
We weren’t due to dock in Istanbul until 4:00 p.m., so most of the day was free as we sailed through the Straights of Dardanelle from the Mediterranean/Aegean sea into the Sea of Marmara. Tom The Travel Guy gave a talk about the Dardanelles at 7:00 a.m. – we missed it.
The day was pretty uneventful. We had lunch with a mom and her two teenage sons. Apparently she’d been taking her sons on cruises to see the world since the younger one was two. They live in Santa Fe, and it didn’t sound like they liked it much.
Around 2:30 we started to make our way to the best position to watch as we approached Istanbul. There was a lot of confusion as to whether or not the bow would be opened up and on which deck, so we went up and down to different decks, getting different info from each crew member we asked. Finally we ended up where we started on Deck 5.
Istanbul is one of those cities that have a very recognizable skyline – the classic view of what was the “old city” of Constantinople, with all the huge mosques and other large buildings. It was a way more impressive arrival than to Piraeus, which was pretty ugly.
Once we were close enough to the dock to watch people eating at a restaurant, we realized we could watch the final docking procedures from the veranda in our room. We were able to see the dockhands grab the huge bungee cords flung from the ship and tie the ship securely to the dock.
Our excursion for the afternoon was Istanbul Deluxe Part I. The brochure said it was supposed to be about 3 to 3 ½ hours. Once we were on the bus, our tour guide, Gulgen, said it would be more like 4 to 4 ½. Since it was already 4:30, we weren’t sure how dinner was supposed to fit into all this.
Off we went – and immediately hit traffic. Istanbul has about 15 million people, with narrow streets and not a whole lot of public transportation. Plus the bridges connecting the Asian and European parts of Istanbul were too small to accommodate the traffic. Our first stop was the Egyptian or Spice Market, and though it wasn’t far distance-wise, it seemed to take forever to get there.
The Spice Market was very crowded. Gulgen walked us into the first shop to explain how it all works. We asked how to say “Hello” and “Thank you” in Turkish and she wrote it on my hand: “Merhaba!” for “hello” and “Tehshekkur Ederim” for “thank you”. The shopkeeper gave us samples of “Turkish delight”, a candy made from honey, nuts and fruits. Gulgen told us it was very easy to find out way back to the meeting spot, and we had about 45 minutes to ourselves.
We wandered around the market, making the mistake of not really paying attention to where we were going. Everything looked the same – jewelry store, spice shop, jewelry store, spice shop – over and over again. We ended up in a store where the shopkeeper’s English was very good (he had lived in California for several years). He kept plying us with samples of different Turkish Delight, and we decided to get some. There was endless confusion about the currency – Turkey still uses its own currency, the lira, but we had euros and dollars. So when he added up the cost of 2 boxes of Turkish delight, a half kilo of pistachio nuts, and a half kilo of apple tea (it’s reaallllly good), we a bit of sticker shock. Oh well, we’re helping out the Turkish economy.
At that point we had to get back to the bus. The problem was, we were now totally disoriented. We started walking - even though everything sorta looks the same, it still didn’t look right, so we turned around and walked the other way. Suddenly we remembered we had passed by a shop with Christian items – the only one we had seen, plus a store with huge hookah pipes on the wall. After that we were able to navigate back to the meeting spot – just as Gulgen was walking away! We raced to catch up with her to get back on the bus.
Turns out we were not the only ones who didn’t find the market so easy to navigate – we were missing two people. Gulgen tried to find them, but was unsuccessful, so we left them behind as we continued onto the ancient underground cisterns. Gulgen was on the phone constantly, arranging for someone else to pick up the two lost people.
Before we descended into the cisterns, I asked Gulgen what the story was with bathroom breaks. She said that the only one would be on the boat for our river cruise. We had been touring for a while already already, and it would be at least another hour before we would arrive at the tour boat. She gathered from my expression that this would not work, and she said she would show us where the “wash rooms” were when we came up from the cisterns.
The cisterns are very old and dark. We were able to see fish living in the water. The cisterns aren’t used any more, since fresh water is now piped into the city. At the far end of the cisterns are two columns, where the ancient builders used random pieces of rock to hold up the columns. The random pieces were Medusa heads that were hundreds of years older than the cisterns and a rare archeological find unto themselves.
At some point, our lost passengers popped up. They had been picked up by another tour company employee, who somehow utilized an ambulance to get them back to our group – sirens blaring, it was the only way to get through the traffic in a reasonable time frame! The lost ladies said that they were waiting at what they thought was the correct spot, but nobody was there.
Before we got back on the bus, Gulgen pointed out the public bathrooms. Which of course required payment of 1 lira (which I didn’t have) or 50 euro cents (which fortunately I did). I had totally forgotten about the concept of “Turkish toilets” (a hole in the floor) – but there they were! Not a whole lot of choice here, and when you gotta go, you gotta go. The last time I saw a Turkish toilet was in Paris in 1977. The knees aren’t so cooperative any more. There was another woman from my tour group in the bathroom, and she kept asking me how it all worked – how do you flush, what was the bucket for, etc. I told her I’d let her know once I figured it out. Which I did of course. And there were no paper towels to dry your hands. Drip dry!
Ok, so now I knew what I would have to deal with for the next day or so.
Once back on the bus, we inched our way along the city streets till we arrived at the ferry dock to pick up our tour boat to cruise the Bosporus Straights. The steps up to the sitting area were very narrow and steep – going up was ok, but I knew going down would be entertaining. Gulgen had told us that the left side of the boat had a better view, so we made sure to secure spots in the right place. We were provided with one free soft drink, but I wasn’t in a hurry to drink a lot of fluids!
The cruise was beautiful – we saw palaces and mosques, the two bridges, many interesting houses and restaurants, including one that was on its own island in the middle of the river. It looked like it had a little floating doghouse attached to it, but we didn’t see the dog.
By the time the cruise was over, it was after 8:00. It was now after dark, and the traffic had improved dramatically. Gulgen had explained that since it was now the month of Ramadan, in the evenings people are at home right at sundown to eat for the first time that day, therefore, the traffic cleared up. It was still close to 30 minutes back to the ship.
It was 9:00 by the time we got back to our room to drop off the items we bought and change to nicer clothes for dinner. Fortunately, the dining room is open till 9:30. We had dinner with two couples from England; they were delightful and we didn’t leave the table till after 10:30.
A great start to our visit to Istanbul, with much more to come!
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