Blogs from Canakkale, Marmara, Turkey, Middle East

We had been hoping to do a day trip to Pergamum today but as the peak season is over and there was no-one else wanting to do it it wasn't possible, so we settled for bookıng a bus straight to Çanakkale (vıa İzmır). We packed up (one at a time in our tiny room), ate another good breakfast and then made the short walk to the bus station, where the bus company man was waiting for us with our ticket. The first part of the journey was in a small bus that took us to İzmir to meet up wıth the main bus. Fellow travellers included an Aussie couple who've been living overseas (Hong Kong and then US) for many years and their 12 year old daughter. They are doing a bit of travellıng before relocatıng ... read more

Çanakkale We arrived at Istanbul Airport at around midday and made our way through maze of shops until we found the stall that provided bus trips to Çanakkale. We paid around €20 each for tickets and caught the next bus at 2:30 to our destination. The trip was pretty long and far from enjoyable but when we arrived at nearly 8:30 that night, we were just relieved to be off the bus. We got our bags and headed into the town square and found our hotel very easily. We checked in and were immediately upgraded to the brand new hotel around the corner. This was great as we had a pretty shitty day and this was making it much better. We went to our new hotel and got settled before heading down the road for dinner ... read more

We woke up early in the morning to visit the Museum of Modern Art of Istanbul. We took the tram to get there and admired a representative collection of contemporary Turkish artists. Some of the works were outstanding. Only annoying thing was the security guards that were following us at each step and at every corner. Eagerly to do their job a bit too good. We took our 'horses' to the port and let the ferrie boat lead us for two hours to Bandirma. From there we had a 170 km to go until Canakkale, near Troy. The roads were the worst we had driven so far, the scenery was magnificent though. Long fields followed by mountains and again fields. Yellow for freshly cut weat, bright green for the rice fields, darker green for the trees, ... read more

Day 8: Today we woke up rediculously early, the alarm went off at 515am. It is a good thing too because our little tour guide arrived half an hour early. Five and a half hours later we arrived at our destination. It took us a minute to realize that we had travelled all the way down the Turkish penninsula to where the Darnadelle straight and the Agean sea meet. We then caught a ferry and headed over to Asia minor to visit Troy. There are a few different versions of the legend of the Trojan horse. One of the more popular ones being that the Trojans kidnapped Helena and the Greeks began a campaign against Troy in an effort to get her back. After perilous years of fighting with no success in breaching the Trojan defences ... read more

Pergamum – Troy – Cankkale Another big day of travelling – we have covered a lot of miles in Turkey but the bus stops every hour and a half so there are lots of breaks. One of my favorite places we visited today was a hospital – 4th century BC – so unbelievable they had a hospital then but it was no ordinary hospital, For a start they wouldn’t accept any pregnant women, or anyone who looked like dying or was very ill. It was more like a research centre…. One story Enis told us was that a patient had a dream about two snakes drinking milk and so the doctors got the idea of milking the snakes and that was the beginning of antidotes. The hospital was on a natural thermal spring and they used ... read more

Sunday 31st October and Monday 1st November 2010 It was an early start this morning, 9am departure rather than 10am. This was mainly due to the fact that daylight saving finished here at 4am and we didn't know until just before breakfast! After a final drive past the white travertines we were on our way, stopping briefly just up the road to take photos of the cotton fields there. Cotton is a major industry in Turkey, a fact we only found out about when discussing the country with the other Australians at breakfast this morning. It was a straight through drive to Bergama, over 200kms away, the reason for our visit was to see the ruins of the the ancient city of Pergamum. Not as many tourists come here and it is reputed to be more ... read more

Canakkale: We took a dolmus to the bus station after breakfast but there are no direct buses to Canakkale so we had to change at Edremit. Edremit is not a very prepossessing town and we waited there for an hour and a half before getting the bus out. A pleasant journey with some great scenery then we booked into the Efes where we have stayed before but this time we remembered to get one of the en suite rooms. Friday night in a University town was chaotic but fun. We had sardalya and etmek for very little money - much nicer than a doner kebab and much the same trimmings. Ashley got a shave then we had beer on the front watching the sunset followed by a giant mackerel which we shared. More beer then bed. ... read more

Last night I met my roommate for the next month, and then the rest of the group. They are a lively mixture of mostly Aussies with a Canadian, South African, a Brit, an American and only one Kiwi. Me. Last night was a major football game on TV, for the country’s championship. All the restaurants were full of men watching their local team. The pavement outside our hotel was jammed with locals watching the giant ancient TV set up outside for then diners. It all went quiet later so I assumed they lost. As I left the restaurant last night and fought my back to the hotel through the throngs of footballers the host from the restaurant appears, the one that wanted to take me for coffee at 1am. He produced a bag, a gift for ... read more