Asia? I thought this boat was staying in Europe!

Did you know the country of Turkey spans two continents? I didn't, until we got off the boat in Izmir and our tour guide informed us that we were in Asia today, and tomorrow we would be waking up in Europe! Crazy! Anyway, these are my stories from my two days in Turkey.

Our next port (after Katakolon) was Izmir, Turkey. There isn't a whole lot to do in Izmir unless you did one of the city tour excursions, so we decided to do an excursion that took us an hour away from Izmir to Ephesus, another ancient city. It was very similar to Olympia although it was the ruins of a city rather than an Olympic stadium. We were on a bilingual tour this time (the one yesterday was strictly English) and our tour guide laughed at her jokes in both languages. It was kind of awkward. Anyway, Ephesus was really cool. They're a lot more relaxed in Turkey so you could literally run around and jump on top of everything, where as if you even did so much as touch a piece of rock in Olympia the guards would whistle at you. This resulted in some excellent pictures of us posing with ruins and such. We also met up with Bob and Tomoko in Ephesus. They were on the same excursion we were so we exchanged cameras and let them take pictures of the three of us. Good times in Ephesus. We also ran into our first dose of Turkish markets in Ephesus. There was a decent sized market set up right where the tour buses are parked, and obviously the store owners go crazy when cruise ships come in. There were large signs that read "GENUINE FAKE WATCHES" and a man selling Turkish delight who, I kid you not, said things like "You are looking for me! Here I am! I am the Turkish Delight man! My name is Delicious!"

We quickly boarded the bus and waited for the rest of our group to get on before heading back to the boat. Unfortunately, Bob got lost in the ruins of Ephesus.. Tomoko told the tour guide that she felt bad holding everybody else up, so our bus left and we hoped another bus would have found Bob and brought him back. Note to everyone: Do not get lost in Turkey. Your bus driver will leave you there. Bob found his way back somehow because he was at dinner that night! For dinner I had rocket salad, tortellini with bologna, and Paris-styled grilled chicken (aka grilled chicken with french fries). Vanilla gelato for dessert. I should also mention that this was the day my bad luck started. When we were getting dressed, I ripped my favorite pair of pants, and then as I was trying to find my sunglasses for the five minutes of sun we encountered in Ephesus, I pulled them out only to find that they were broken. It was a sad day. On to Istanbul!

Our excursion in Istanbul was called "Istanbul on Two Continents," so at this point we were aware that Turkey was a part of both Asia and Europe. Our tour guide was hysterical. He was basically the Turkish version of Britne doing the Jungle Cruise, except it was more like "Istanbul for Dummies" and it was amazing. We found a few familiar faces as we entered the bus for our tour (the Swedish lady from the show and the old British couple) and we were the last ones on because I may have forgotten my cruise card in our room... oops. Did you know that there were no last names in Turkey until 1934? That was our first fun fact. We took a boat tour around Istanbul on the river that divides the two continents and then headed to the Asian side. Our first stop was at Beylerbei Palace, which was the summer home of the Sultan, and so we took a tour of that. It was straight up gorgeous. There are no other words for it, except maybe exquisite. After the palace we crossed the bridge connecting Asia and Europe and got certificates that say we've been in two continents in one day. Talk about something to hang on the fridge! 

After that excitement, it was time for lunch! We went to this large building that was basically a mall with a restaurant on top of it. For lunch I had salad, chicken kebabs, and some kind of cheese pastry thing. A few of us finished eating early and wandered out the open window onto the roof to take pictures. Continuing with my streak of bad luck, I, of course, dropped my camera while standing on the roof. It still takes pictures, but sometimes the zoom gets stuck and if that happens nothing on the camera works until I un-stick the zoom. So that was cool. Once everyone was done eating, we headed down to a carpet demonstration. The man basically showed us all of his shmancy carpets and explained that they were all hand-stitched. It was really cool to see the designs. They were beautiful. We shopped around for a bit (don't worry mom, I didn't buy any carpets) and then headed off to the Grand Bazaar! 

The Grand Bazaar is exactly what it sounds like - a Grand Bazaar. It has over 2000 shops and it's not laid out very well. They literally sold everything you could ever want in there. We didn't buy much, although Melissa did take a stab at haggling and I bought some Turkish chocolate and one of those eye keychains for good luck. Fortunately, most places tend to take Euros even though their currency is the Lira. Unfortunately, a lot of places don't have change for Euros. So while I paid for my chocolate in Euros, I got change in Turkish Lira. It was very confusing. After the Grand Bazaar, we met up with our tour guide again and headed off to the Basilica Cistern. A cistern is kind of like an underground tunnel, and Istanbul is loaded with them. We went to the most famous one (and probably the safest?) and it was SO COOL. The only complaint I have is that there was stuff dripping on us the whole time and our tour guide said that we were right below restaurant restrooms. I don't entirely believe him, but it was still unsettling. ANYWAY. After leaving the Cistern, we stopped by the Blue Mosque and St Sophia's for ten minutes to take pictures. It had finally gotten nice out and I became the official photographer for our British couple friends and their friends. I didn't take a lot of pictures because, like I said, my camera was busted since I dropped it on the roof... 

in front of the Blue Mosque

Once our short picture-stop ended, we headed back onto the bus and raced back to the ship. We almost missed it, but our tour guide promised that if we did miss it, he would house all 30 or so of us until the boat came back. Once on the boat, we just relaxed and snacked on our newly-purchased Turkish chocolate until dinner! For dinner I had and Italian cold cut platter, stracciatella soup, and grilled chicken with french fries and ketchup. Dessert was my favorite type of gelato, stracciatella! Then we went to the show, which was supposedly a magic show, although there was no magic in it. It was just the same performers as we saw previously doing their tricks again. It was still cool to watch, but somewhat disappointing. Or maybe I was just upset because I had been on a streak of breaking things. 

We spent all day Thursday at sea, which wasn't very exciting. We mostly just relaxed and I sipped on a chocolate milkshake while watching an ice sculpting demonstration. We ran into a lot of our new friends again and talked about how much we loved Istanbul. I think everyone on the ship wished we had more time there. Istanbul was seriously amazing and I definitely want to get back there at some point!

That's all for now.. I'm sure I'll update again later today!! Thanks for reading!