Blogs from Canakkale, Marmara, Turkey, Middle East - page 3

Left Istanbul early in the morning on a bus for Canakkale. Turkey doesn't have a very well organized train system, but their buses are superb, and really are the only way to get around. Also, you really get to see the countryside, which is absolutely beautiful by the way: a lot of really green rolling hills, small towns, flowers in bloom everywhere, and randomly an evergreen forest as we went over a small mountain pass (it reminded me of home). Then we had to take a ferry over the Dardanelles to get to Canakkale, where I'll be for the next 3 nights. Canakkale is a beautiful town right on the Dardanelles, and really is one of the last Turkish towns before you hit Greece and the Aegean Sea. I love it because it's absolutely surrounded by ... read more

During our third visit to Turkey I made it a point to visit the historic city of Troy, which is an ancient and legendary city that is steeped in Greek mythology. It is the home of Homer’s Iliad and the focal point of the Trojan War, which ultimately resulted in the presenting of the Trojan Horse (beware of Greeks bearing gifts) by Odysseus to the Trojans. The original wooden giant still stands in the heart of Troy and is visited by thousands of tourists each year. Troy is a hop, skip and a jump away from the city of Canakkale where the replica Trojan Horse (from the movie Troy with Brad Pitt) stands in the harbor to greet you. After filming was complete, Hollywood donated the replica horse to this beautiful sea-side town. Being the shutterbug ... read more

Çanakkale was great. It is a town on the southern (Asian) coast of the Dardanelles. There is a lovely seafront walk where you can stop for a meal, beer and/or coffee. This is a great communal area and you can see the Trojan horse which appeared in the Brad Pitt movie. There was a soccer riot near our hotel, with tear gas and everything. It was great to be 3 stories up and just observe. The morning after there were bloodstains on the ground in the town square and some more on the roundabout down the street. It was the final of the Turkish Championship, all I know is the red and yellow guys won and the yellow and black guys were seriously peeved about it. Our tour guide was happy as her team was the ... read more

We packed up, had breakfast, checked out of the Hitit Hotel, and were in the mini bus ready to go at 8 am this morning. We set out on our long drive to Canakkale, making numerous stops along the way. Our first stop was in Izmir, at Nihat's house, so he could switch suitcases. While we were in Izmir waiting for Nihat Susan and I popped into a small shop that had all kinds of natural pharmaceuticals, but the women there didn't speak any English and we don't speak any Turkish, so we were unable to sufficiently communicate to enable Susan to buy what she was looking for. They sure had a lot of interesting things though, and it was too bad we couldn't make ourselves understood. The women were very sweet in trying to understand ... 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