As expected, we were awakened by the call to prayer from our next door neighbor, the Aya Sofia. It was just after 6am. We rested for a little while after that before committing to getting out of bed and getting some of the included breakfast down the street (thanks to Nicole’s Hilton gold status of course). I had menemen, which is essentially just Turkish salsa eggs. If only my mother had known that she’s been making a staple of Turkish breakfast all these years.
After breakfast, we set out to visit our nearby mosques before they got crowded. As it was closer, we went to the Hagia Sofia first. I went to an ATM in the off chance they needed some Turkish Lira to enter, but its status has recently changed from historical site to full-time mosque. As such, there is no longer an entry fee. While this change is a bit controversial, we saved about $20 based on the previous fees listed online. We had to remove our shoes prior to entering. It is quite impressive inside, but also quite dark.
We also had to time our arrival between prayer times so as not to interfere with religious activities. There are five prayers throughout the day, and two had already occurred by the time we entered around 9:15 in the morning. From there, we continued for a brief walk to the blue mosque, or the Sultan Ahmed mosque to be official. We spent very little time there mostly because there was so much construction, you couldn’t even see the dome. You couldn’t really see any of the original architecture. The current temporary structure more closely resembled a Costco than a historic mosque.
From there we continued our stroll throughout the city. Our first stop was the Grand Bazaar. Again, we wanted to see these places before it got crowded. Unfortunately, due to this strategy, we couldn’t hide from the many hawkers and shopkeepers hustling their wares. You could really buy anything in the Grand Bazaar. Turkish rugs, lamps, clothes, designer handbags, luxury watches, fake luxury watches and handbags, electronics, teas, or anything else one might want.
It truly is worthy of the name “Grand” Bazaar because it seems to go on forever. It must be miles of passageways and interconnecting “streets.” We were basically just walking through and we covered a lot of ground.
When we finally reached an exit, we were almost to our next destination — the spice market. Again, this is something that can get very crowded (primarily with tourists), so we tried to see it before the chaos. And again, the hawkers and shopkeepers found us quite easily. When we kept on walking and half ignoring them, they went through a whole rotation of languages in an attempt to communicate with us. Interestingly enough, the one they tried to use the most on us was Spanish. Nicole answered cordially with a “No, Gracias.”
With no merchandise purchased, we exited the spice market near the Bosphorus, the main waterway splitting Europe from Asia. We went across the Galata Bridge, which reminded us a bit of the Redondo Beach pier, where seafood restaurants are abundant and tucked underneath the bridge itself.
From the other side, we were able to get a nice view of the blue mosque with the water. From this angle, you could really appreciate the hills that we would inevitably have to climb to get back to our hotel.
After hitting up all of these Istanbul sights, we arrived back at our hotel before noon. After a busy morning, we elected to spend the afternoon relaxing. Due to Nicole’s special gold status, we were able to reserve a slot in the hotel’s cistern jacuzzi for free. I’m sure it’s been exaggerated a bit, but the concierge seemed to claim that their private cistern converted into a jacuzzi is an extension of the nearby Basilica Cistern from the Justinian era.
It has been very much modernized, assuming it even had some sort of legitimate history, but it was a fun atmosphere nevertheless. We enjoyed our private time slot for an hour and got to rest our legs a bit.
We then went to dinner at a nearby restaurant that had a rooftop terrace. It afforded us excellent views of the surrounding area as well as the Bosphorus. Anything less would be preposterous! Nicole finally found a legitimate pasta after more than a week of searching. I too had a pasta, but with a Turkish twist. It was called manti and was essentially meat-filled ravioli with a topping of yoghurt and spices. It probably sounds disgusting, but was quite tasty.
As seems to be customary for every meal, we get offered something “complimentary” at the end of the meal. For me, it was a tea. In Turkey, it seems there is only one flavor. Bitter and black.
About halfway into our meal, the skies commenced an unscheduled rain shower that put a damper on our fun. We took our plates down to the indoor restaurant and finished our meals there as the rain pounded outside.
After dinner, the rain had stopped, so we took one last look at the mosques from the outside at night before turning in. For a few hours, however, we had to make some decisions on what our next move would be since this is our last night in this hotel. This was made more complicated by the bizarre fact that many booking websites are blocking Turks from booking other hotels in their own country. The reason for this is unknown, so we had to do some creative VPN swapping to get a Japanese IP address just to book our next property. Where will we be tomorrow? Like a bad cliffhanger on a CBS show, you’ll just have to wait and see.
passports & pepto bismol 