Çanakkale, Eceabat, Kilitbahir and Troy

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2 Pages of photos again! Sorry!!!

Getting out to the Gallipoli peninsula turned out to be more troublesome than anticipated. Having bought tickets on a Metro bus, one of the biggest companies in Turkey, we thought it was going to be easy. Their servis transfer at 0910 took us to the bus station, but not the bus station we expected to go to. There we were put onto another bus which eventually took us to the main bus station. When we presented our ticket for our 1030 departure, it turned out that was the departure time from the Harem bus station on the Asian side of Istanbul. We were not due to leave until 1230! So, we could have had another 2 hours in bed!!!!

When travelling to Gallipoli the buses pass through the town of Gelibolu (Gallipoli in Turkish). DO NOT GET OFF THE BUS THERE! It’s nowhere near where you want to be. Luckily we knew this and safely made our way to Eceabat, a small place from where ferries regularly cross the Dardenelles to Çanakkale. Our home for the next 4 nights was the Eceabat Hotel which forms part of TJ’s Tours empire. TJ’s wife is the cousin of one of our Australian friends, Laura, who we met in Bolivia. It’s a small world!!

Our Gallipoli tour was dealt with in the previous blog entry, but Eceabat is also a great base for exploring the rest of the area. Eceabat itself has little to offer except the small park paying homage to Gallipoli, but the views over the Dardenelles are nice and the seafront restaurants are not bad. It’s just a bit quiet, but you can easily cross over to Çanakkale for a night out if you’re not too tired after a busy day’s sightseeing!

Çanakkale was a much bigger place than we expected. The military museum is well worth a visit and you must allow more than the 45 minutes we had. The Lonely Planet led us to believe that would be enough time but the displays in the old fortress and the visit to the replica mine-layer need twice that amount of time to do it justice. The harbour is quite pretty and it was nice to sit out for a beer or even just a tea in one of the many bars and restaurants lining the waterfront. Also along there is a wooden horse, the very same one which was used by Brad Pitt et al. in the film Troy. On our last visit there a Turkish naval vessel had just docked. We watched the sailors parade off the ship and they looked very smart indeed. It was a surprise to see some women marching alongside the men.

The ancient city of Troy was easy to get to. To the South of Çanakkale’s centre we found the dolmus station where buses leave every hour at half past the hour. It took about 45 minutes to get there and we got a nice close up view of the agricultural activity in the fields. The archaeological site was much bigger than expected and quite interesting. 9 different cities have been found each built on top of its predecessor. It is, of course, most famous for its dramatic siege and the Trojan Horse episode. Homage to this is paid with a huge replica horse which you can climb up inside. Apparently this one is a more accurate representation than the one featured in the film.

A little way down the Gallipoli peninsula is the village of Kilitbahir. We actually took the ferry across to Çanakkale then another ferry across to Kilitbahir! It was easier than trying to find a bus going that way. Getting back to Eceabat was no problem though as the buses meet the boats. The main reason for going to Kilitbahir was to see the fortress and the museum set inside the river fortifications. It was well worth the visit. We sat out for lunch with a wonderful view of the Dardenelles. Whilst we sipped our post-lunch beer, we were treated to a submarine passing by, an unusual sight for us to see!

So that was the Gallipoli peninsula. Next stop Bulgaria. The problem was getting there as we wanted to go to Varna on the Black Sea coast and not inland to Sofia. Eventually we caught an early morning bus (0730 - we saw sunrise!!) to Kirklareli and changed bus to go directly to Varna. TJ’s manager Ramazan sorted this out for us when everyone else seemed to be denying it was possible!

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Photos

Sunrise!
Another rarity for us!

Trojan Horse
Hollywood style!