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We got up and had to rush a bit at breakfast 😞 but it was all for a good reason. We were taking the beggar’s ferry down the Bosporus that morning and had to be there around 9:30 for the 10:15 cruise. We had already walked down to where the ferry boats depart trying to find the entrance to the Tram, so we kind of knew where we were going. . . .kind of (sense of direction still has not improved). We go to buy the tickets for the ferry, and Dad tells me what to say when ordering the tickets (I am pretty sure I butchered the whole thing but the nice Turkish girl understood what I was saying) We got to the entry and two guards were there to look at our ticket and let us through. One guard took one look at Dad and I said with a bit of disgust “Americans”, then Dad says in perfect Turkish “Yes, I am from America” and the guard was shocked, his little friend starts saying “Kapat! Kapat!” “Which means you shut him up!” Dad sure did, the guy didn’t say anything else, it was hilarious and awesome, go Dad!
We
board on the Beggars Ferry, the reason it’s called this is because it is cheap and it makes a lot of stops on its journey up the Bosporus (it takes about 6 hours to reach the end); the people running the ferry started to realize that people were just riding it because it was a nice cheap ride, and not necessarily to go anywhere, so now they make a specific cruise that goes up and down the Bosporus that makes only a few stops and takes a little over 2 hours to get to the end of the line which is Andolu Kanagi where we got off. There is a walk up to Yoros Castle (or what’s left of it) which is on the top of one of the hills and it overlooks the Black Sea. There was some breath taking views which was a good reward for our climb. On the way up I made a dog and 2 kitty friends, usually the street animals are wary of people but these guys loved attention! (don’t worry, wet wipes were on hand) Luckily for us there were restaurants up around the top of the hill to Yoros Castle and on
our way back down we stopped at one for a beautiful lunch overlooking the Black sea.
As we were finishing up lunch Dad noticed that there were these giant tags sewn into the big umbrellas that were all around giving us shade, and on these tags was the name of the manufacturer which was “The Snot Brothers” we thought it was funny for a couple of reasons, besides the obvious, Mom hates the word snot, she doesn’t have any justification to it, she just hates it and we weren’t allowed to say it as kids, but would say it if we wanted to tease Mom (if you didn’t react Mother . . .). So after paying Dad and I get up and each take a picture of the tag inside the umbrella, as I turn around the waiter is looking at us like ‘you guys don’t get out much do you?’. The face he was making at us was hilarious, and if I didn’t know any better I would have thought the same thing.
We walked all the way back down and boarded the ferry to return back, it took most of the day to get out there and
back, but that was fine by me, it was a great change to the go go go we had been doing in order to experience Istanbul. It was very relaxing and I slept most of my way back.
We decided to go to a big outdoor café, Café Mesale. I went to order the Donor Durum but they said that they were out and they would like to recommend a dinner for us, so we said why not! You know you have ordered something special when people around you are taking pictures of it. Our dinner came out flaming. It was a mixture of meat, veggies, and rice, and in the center was a bowl of fire. (Dad and I wondered if we were supposed to heat up our meal again) But it was all for show since underneath the flaming bowl was a bowl of yogurt and the best we can figure is the fire was just an added touch (although Dad did try barbequing his meat over the flame). We then decided to live like kings and order a peach Nargile, we puffed on that for hours just enjoying the atmosphere of Turks playing vicious games of Backgammon,
listening to the live music, and watching the Dervish. We finally left around midnight, and it seemed that Istanbul was just coming alive, everyone was out and about and it was amazing to see the mosques lit up at night. It is so pretty and it’s an added touch that all these birds fly around the mosque. It wasn’t till around 1 am that we finally made it to bed, luckily we weren’t on a time schedule for the next day.
B
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Bill
non-member comment
Excellent
That was a fun day. Started out a little foggy but that burned off and it was beautiful. You had the special yogurt with powdered sugar on the ferry and later an ice cream. We could see schools of fish in the water at Anadolu Kavagi - it was that clean and clear.