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Published: October 8th 2009
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Istanbul was never on our itinerary, but it was AMAZING! We cannot say enough good things about this place. We got here early in the morning after a long bus journey from Skopje, and the bus station was mental. Neither of us has ever seen a chaotic bus station like this so it was a bit overwhelming, especially when you've just woken up, but we found a free bus that brought us into the city centre, and from there we got a tram into the tourist area, called Sultanahmet. When we got off the tram we were lucky enough to meet a guy who runs a hostel right beside the tram stop with a cheap room we could check into straight away. So after a nap, we got up and started exploring.
We realised we were two minutes walk from the Blue Mosque and the Aya Sofia which are such impresive structures both inside and out. The Aya Sofia was built in 532 AD and was the largest cathedral for thousands of years, till the 16th Century. It is huge. It was originally a christian church but was later converted into a mosque by the Ottomans. The Blue Mosque across
the square was built to rival the Aya Sofia so you can just imagine what this is like.
There is a massive park nearby and the Bosphorous river was at the other end. It was crazy to see all the men going for a swim in the river while all the women sat on the side, all covered up, just watching. And the river has such a strong current, when the men jump in they are carried so far along the river in just seconds so they don't seem to stay in for long at all. We actually took a cruise along the Bosphorous river which shows you the bridge joining Asia and Europe. It also allows you to see the Old and New European sides to Istanbul.
In the park itself is Topkapi Palace which is one of the most amazing things we've seen on this trip. It is set on very large grounds and has several buildings. It was where the sultans lived from 15th to 19th century, and honestly, I don't know why you would ever leave it. All the rooms including the harem are beautifully decorated, and they have items on display in the
treasury museum. I nearly died when I saw the 50 carat diamond....then I saw the 82 carat diamond in the display beside it! We took a lot of photos of the palace but unfortunately they just don't do it justice.
We couldn't leave Istanbul without going to the Grand Bazar. It is so easy to spend money here, and the haggling is just so much fun. But we managed to restrain ourselves - there isn't that much room left in our bags!
We were so sad to leave Istanbul as there is just so much to do and see here. And there seems to be a lot of things to see in Turkey itself. We must say it a lot but this one is definitely going on the list of places to come back to.
We had to go back to the massive bus station but we managed to find our bus without too much trouble. And we were off to Burgas, Bulgaria. We thought we would be arriving about 7-8am in the morning. Instead we arrived in at about 2am, such a terrible time to arrive anywhere without a reservation! After a lot of wandering around
the empty streets, we managed to find a room for the night. The next morning we changed to private accommodation - it was so cheap, 5 euro each. We stayed with this lovely old lady who for some reason took a shine to Carol and kept grabbing her cheek, and not her bum cheek for those of you who may have mis read that!
Burgas itself wasn't anything exciting, it was a cute little town, with a large park where all the old pensioners hang out, and a beach with a few bars along it. But we were liking our first taste of Bulgaria and decided we could stay here for a while, heading up the black sea coast.
We took a day trip south to Sozopol which had a quaint little old town area nestled between two beaches. Again, there were the usual bars along the beach front which we've come to enjoy quite a lot.
From here we took the bus to Nesebar/Sunny beach. We actually thought these were two different places, until we got here and realised they just merge into one another. We found a lovely little apartment with a lovely Bulgarian lady
View of some mosques
From the Bosphorous - there are over 2000 mosques in the city (first one who had some english) and it had a great view of Sunny beach from the balcony. Although we were extremely close to Sunny beach, we found that south beach in Nesebar was much nicer so we spent most of our time there. Like a lot of these Bulgarian towns, there was a lovely little old town area to explore as well. As you can imagine, we had quite a busy schedule here on the black sea coast between beaches and old towns, so we decided to take some time out and go to the aqua park for the day. This was one of the best days we've had, but seriously, our muscles were aching after running up and down those stairs all day, it was tough work!
Garry was starting to notice a trend in these Bulgarian beaches, and that was that there are a lot of half naked women around. For those of you who didn't see it on facebook, Garry wants to set up a charity to help these poor women who can't afford bikini tops. How good of him!
After here we headed to another resort town on the black sea coast, Varna.
Topkapi Palace
The Imperial Gate It was a much bigger town than the others and so a little more impersonal. But the city has so many lovely parks, and again, they have a long stretch of beach. One strange and sad thing we noticed here was that there were a lot of old women sitting in these parks with weighing scales and flowers. They charge you to use the scales and sell the flowers as a way of making money instead of begging.
After quite a relaxing time in Bulgaria we decided to see what Romania was all about.
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Drouyn
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Hey Guys Istanbul is still one of the best cities I have visited in the world..its a shame you couldnt get to the other parts because its an amazing country.....IStanbul is just the tip of the ice burg...I am sure you will get back there though some time.... the Aya sofia is still one of the most impressive man made structures I have ever seen..oh and that bus station is crazy isnt it!!! well I am off to Nepal and India in 10 days time....lets try and meet up again somewhere in south asia so keep in touch Enjoy!!