So Long Marmaris and Thanks for the Fish

Doing Ephesus as a quick trip was a really good idea. Selcuk seemed like a really nice town and it would be cool to explore the area, both attractions within the town were closed. Ephesus itself was impressive, but unfortunately the ugly modern footprint of mass tourism has scoured the ruins. The once hella impressive amphitheater is now lined with chain link fences to keep the dumbasses from falling off the edges, and hordes of tour groups in every language shuffle through the pathways. 

My first day in Marmaris and I'm hoping this is not the example of how all Turkish beach towns are like. It's a really nice area, but the town is totally overpriced (food is almost twice the price of Istanbul) and its loaded with vacationers, not really the type of place for a grizzled (not really, i just shaved) veteran backpacker like me. I managed to get a pretty cheap room though. It's a little run down, but $16 for a private room isn't bad. To top off the bad, I had an attempted scam which I thwarted, and the castle is closed.

The positive of this post: I'm leaving this vacationer hole behind tomorrow and heading back into real Turkey. I rented a scooter (sorry, baby) and will be cruising the Datca and Bozburun peninsulas, checking out amazing hidden bays and spectacular countryside for two days. At the end of the Datca peninsula is Knidos, an ancient Roman port city, which is lower key and I'm hoping will have the same feel as Pergamum did. On the way out I'll be swinging by the bus station to plan a quick lightning fast exit out of Marnaris upon my return.

A Glimpse Into Antiquity

I don't know how that hostel clerk in Istanbul thought Bergama was no good; he should be shot for it. I love it here. The ruins are incredible! It's an amazing thing to look at something two thousand years old. Once you're out of sight of the vehicles, people, and modern noise, you step into the reality of a world as it was two millennia ago. The wind still blows, the sun still shines, and the birds still sing. Paradise.

The if the Askepilos of Pergamum was amazing, the Acropolis has no words capable of describing how great it was. The ancient city is fortified on a hilltop above Bergama, specifically placed there to offer protection from the enemies of Greece. This didn't guarantee safety, however, as the city fell to many different conquerors, one of them being Alexander the Great. As I type this I may be sitting on ground where his phalanx formations once marched. Very cool.

The main upper part of the city, such as the temple of Trajan and the amphitheater were really cool and I spent a long time roaming around. I had taken the gondola on the way up so I decided that taking the path back to town via the lower section had to be done. I started walking along the narrow, grass lined path, minding my own business, when I heard a rustle in the grass next to me, and BAM, this giant brown snakes crashes out of the grass about two feet in front of me, darting across the path and down the hill into more grass. After that I took it a little slower. Thankfully I had packed my monopod with me, which I used to beat the grass ahead of me to make noise, as I had seen a guide in Thailand do. It worked, I scared two more out of the grass, then saw two more from a distance further down. In addition to the turtle I saw at the top, I saw a lot of wildlife today! 

It was definitely worth the snakes, however, as there was not a soul on the trail and not a bit of restoration had been done to the ruins in this section, which gave it an authentic feel. I'm torn on whether to leave for Ephesus tomorrow, or stay another day, because I really like this town, but have seen all of its important sights. With hourly buses going to Izmir every day I don't have to stress about it too much.

On the Road

Today was a great day to be on the bus. I awoke to a slow rain and grey skies that persisted all the way out if Istanbul, which is a huge city that seems to go on forever. The bus I took was pretty nice! It had air conditioning, TVs in every seat back, and comfortable seats. For some reason they have a channel that plays a feed from a camera on the front of the bus. I have no idea who would watch that, I forsee it making me sick very quickly.

It's the best being the only white guy on the bus, they never forget about you. You're such a novelty to them that they'll never leave without you when you're taking a shit. For example, the time that almost happened to me in India, I wasn't the only white guy on the bus!

Not a Step Backward

Hostels can be great resources for information about what to do, where to go, and how to get there. But like everything, they're not perfect. Sometimes you need to take the initiative and figure things out for yourself. Such was the case for me today. I had planned on taking a bus to Bergama to see the ancient city of Pergamum as my next destination after Istanbul. The hostel clerk first told me there were no direct buses there, and then that there were no hotels. Wikitravel and my guidebook both said otherwise, so I decided to try for myself. After inquiring at travel agencies the past couple days, I caught the tram to the main bus terminal and ended up booking a ticket, in rudimentary English, to Bergama for tomorrow morning. It remains to be seen if it will actually be worth it, but such is the risk with traveling. I'm still keeping strong the philosophy of not a step backward. Backtracking leads to wasted time, and wasted time is wasted experiences.

After my bus ticket errand I headed to the Grand Bazaar, after downing some delicious falafel. The bazaar was basically like any other large indoor market I've seen in China or Australia, but I did manage to pick up some stuff, including a pretty ballin watch. I'm not really sure if I got a good price; I talked him down to 200 lira from 490, and it was a hard bargain, but something feels like I still paid a little more than I should have. I'm not going to stress about it though, it is a pretty nice watch. 

After that I went to the Blue Mosque, and felt a heavier spiritual influence than I did at Hagia Sofia. Something about seeing people involved in their religion firsthand always makes it more intense than the building itself. I also took a quick walk through the Mosaic Museum, admiring the amazing, and probably tedious work that the ancient artists put into arranging thousands and tiny pieces into a picture that covered an entire floor of a palace.

(note: this post was written yesterday)

Turkish Delight

Istanbul has made a great first impression of Turkey. I flew in yesterday on a quick journey from London. We had a great tail wind that helped us arrive a half hour early. The funniest part of the flight was at Gatwick Airport, where I had to buy a new hair trimmer to shave my head with, since the higher voltage in Europe caused mine to operate so fast it wouldn't cut my hair (don't ask me how that works). I bought a kit in the terminal, after I had passed through airport security. I opened it up later to find a pair of 3" hair scissors. I probably bought them at the airport as people were getting their nail clippers seized at security. Airport security is such a joke.

I departed the airport after a lightning quick walk through customs, grabbing my bag off the carousel in less than a minute. I jumped on the tram and headed into Istanbul. First impression was India lite; it had some smells, like car exhaust and cooking street food, and the sounds of car horns. Thankfully Turkey decided to skip the cow shit.

I arrived at my hostel at 7, tired and hungry. I decided to chill out, and opted for eating and drinking Turkish beer on the hostel rooftop. 

The next day I headed into the Hagia Sofia, a giant mosque turned into museum; one of the prime highlights of Istanbul. The sheer size and magnitude of it was incredible! It dwarfs most other sights I've seen before, including the Taj Mahal. The artwork and detail inside is simply stunning.

Later that day I went on a boat tour of the Bosphorus strait with some people from the hostel. The views of the city were awesome. What wasn't awesome was when the wind blew the tear gas from a protest on the Asian side into the strait, unbeknownst to us until it started burning our eyes. (the protest is about plans to demolish a park in favour of building a shopping mall)

Afterwards we headed out for dinner, which was delicious. If this first day of Turkish food is any indication of the month to come, I'm going to be returning home a fat man! For dessert we went and smoked some flavored sheesha, and were all thoroughly stoned when we left the bar. 

Loving My IPod

As a travel tool, this thing just gets better and better! The new useful discovery: saving maps as pictures!

Blog Posts

I have to apologize if my blog posts are fashioned with different font styles and sizes for no apparent reason. I'm using a blog app on my iPod and it sucks balls.