Day 18 We were able to sleep in a little on day 18. We packed up our stuff and headed to the airport to fly from Cappadocia back to Istanbul. We arrived Istanbul in the afternoon and headed straight to a Turkish Bath House. We were a little nervous, because of previous of our previous Egyptian massage experience. We walked in and were handed, yes, our own sponges!!! This simple hygenic gesture put us a little more at ease. We walked through the hallway and made it to the women's section and soon realized that yes, this is a Turkish Bath [View Full Entry]

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Day 17 Our day started with a 4:11 am call to prayer. All of our hotels are located near mosques, sometimes we can hear the call, sometimes not. This morning, it was loud and clear. It didn’t really matter too much though, as we had our alarm set for 4:15 am to get ready for a 4:40 departure to our sunrise hot air balloon ride. We arrived way too early at the launch site and just stood around watching all the balloons get filled. The process took at least an hour, but it was really cool watching all the other balloons [View Full Entry]

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End of Day 16 We finally arrived in Kayseri around 4PM and had a 1 hour drive to Cappadocia and our hotel. We were a bit worried when we saw the outside of the hotel, but upon entering the room we were pleasantly surprised. The hotel is built into the side of the hills in caves. The room has arched ceilings of stone and the bathroom is about the size of the bedroom with an open shower. Chester can finally shave her legs without any complaints. As our shuttle pick-up in Izmir was an hour late they tried to make up [View Full Entry]

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Day 15 Our day started with a ridiculous wake up time of 4 am. Our Transport picked us up at 4:40 am and we were off to the airport for a 6:30 flight to Izmir. We were hoping to catch a few zzz's while waiting for our flight, but no so. There were probably about 12 children, various ages, all totally awake and totally running around and screaming. Thanksfully though, they were not on our flight. We arrived in Izmir and our driver whisked us away to meet up with our tour group for some sight seeing in Ephesus. The driver [View Full Entry]

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Day 14 After our arrival to Istanbul yesterday we took a walk around the area of our hotel. Taxim is in the main part of town right near tons of shops and restaurants. Istanbul is full of great areas all over the city and with 10 million residents every where is busy, but it is beautiful to walk around the shopping districts and restaurants and clubs. The hotel recommended a great restaurant where we ate traditional Turkish food. The hotel employee even walked us to the restaurant. What great service! And the food was yummy! Today we did the traditional day [View Full Entry]

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Video of Chester doing her B-day Dance. The Italians were so jealous. [View Full Entry]

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Day 12 This was our last full day in Hurghada so we thought we better get out and not spend the entire time by the pool. We went on a jeep safari. We were piled into land cruisers and off into the desert we drove. This time we were lucky enough to be with a large group from Poland. Again we were the only non Polish people besides the guides in the group. We arrived at a Bedouin village and after some tea in the huts, we were taken around to see how they live. We had another opportunity to ride [View Full Entry]

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Day 13 Day 13 was a day of travel. Starting off with a 6 AM departure from Hurghada and of course of breakfast boxes weren't ready. I mean we made the request and we were on the list, but execution seems to be a bit of a problem in Egypt. We were both ready to leave. 2 weeks in Egypt is plenty. It is a great place to visit but also great place to leave. We had to travel through Cairo to get to Istanbul Turkey and from Cairo to Istanbul we were on different flights. Cairo has a great new [View Full Entry]

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Day 7 Today we woke early as it was a special day. It was Chester’s B-day. And if any of you have spent a B-day with Chester you know she has to have her day. Thankfully it was a fun filled day thanks to our guide Ahmed. We started with a horse drawn carriage ride to the Edfu Temple. This sounds like a nice quiet romantic thing to do but when every person on every cruise in port that day is doing the same thing, as apparently there are not enough vans and buses, it is a bit hectic and smelly. [View Full Entry]

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Day 11 The day started as our first day that we did not have to get up and had no plans. So we slept in, ate a huge breakfast and then proceeded down to the pool and beach to start our day's activities of absolutely nothing. It was great. The weather was perfect, hot but not too hot. We did spend a good part of the day answering questions to the workers of where we were from. Not one guessed we were from America. They all assume Germany, Holland or Italy. And many said we did not have an American accent. [View Full Entry]

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