End of Intrepid trip

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4 November

This morning I headed to the Blue Mosque nice and early before coming back and having breakfast. Despite being there quite early there were a lot of people, most of whom looked like they were probably there on an organised bus tour. Everyone as they enter have to go through the ritual of removing shoes before putting them in a plastic bag and carrying them with you. The mosque was quite pretty - blue tiles inside, bright red carpet, a small area for ladies to worship in the corner. You can hear the mosque bells go off at prayer time, from the hostel we could hear them go at 5am for the first prayer, and you can hear them throughout the city.

After a late breakfast and putting in some washing to get done across the road, it was back to the bazaar. Turned out to be an interesting day of negotiating - with one of the girls finding out the way to a good deal was to give the shop keeper a hug when he asked!! We also ran into Ben and Jen at the bazaar and had a chat to them before going off to find lunch. After walking the back streets round the bazaar for some time we stumbled across a few kebab places and ended up having quite a nice kebab.

After that we kept on wandering the bazaar pretty much for the rest of the day. Ended up having turkish tea in a bag stall too.

Anyway we then headed back to the hostel to have an early dinner and say goodbye to Ang who was getting a night train onto Greece that night.

5 November

I had booked myself onto the 1pm shuttle to the airport, knowing that I would have about a four hour wait at the airport but with no choice given they changed the shuttle times. Today was the day that we would all end up going our own way - with everyone pretty much leaving at some point.

I was up early and headed to the Archaeological Museums where I ended up spending a few hours, but could have spent a whole lot more. By the time I got back to the hostel it was time for a few sad goodbyes before my shuttle showed up early and took me to the airport. Ended up talking with some British personal trainer and two ladies from the states for the next few hours while we all waited for the same flight. Time flew.

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