24 hours in Istanbul

Turkish Delights! One of many types of gel, starch, and sugar based desserts.

Welcome all to Anna and Max’s Turkish Delight Blog! This trip started over a classic Anna/Max Skype date back in Summer 2011. One thing led to another (as it often does), and before we knew it we were exchanging emails back and forth and researching possible international destinations for a climbing trip. We chose Turkey because it has fantastic sport climbing and is a part of the world and a culture fairly unknown to either of us. So far, Turkey has certainly lived up to its hype. 

A glimpse of a mosque in the background of a residential street.

After landing in Istanbul, we took the public tramway to our hostel. Bahaus Hostel is quaint, comfy, has a nice view of this section of the city (Sulthanamet), and excellent breakfast consisting of eggs, cereal, coffee, cheese, tomatoes, bread, and dried fruit. This part of the city is filled with hostels and other tourist attractions. In particular we have enjoyed seeing two breathtaking (literally!) buildings – the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sofia (a massive architectural feat of a church built in 547 AD and later converted into a Mosque by the Ottomans). We visited the Blue Mosque on our first evening, but at 5pm were asked to leave so people who were not tourists could pray. Our first night in the city could not have been better. We were met by my childhood friend Anoush and her boyfriend Yousef, and spent hours wandering the city and stuffing our faces with delicious bread, kebabs, mussles, desserts, and fresh-squeezed pomegranate juice (and there is still so much more food to try!). Anoush has been living in Istanbul for two years now and served as a fantastic tour guide. 

One of the many boats that grills fish, which you eat on land.

Panoramic view of the Blue Mosque.

180 degree panoramic of the Hagia Sofia (built in 547 AD).

We had always heard that Istanbul was an incredible city, and everyone falls in love with it. It was hard to fully understand until arrival. It seems that just about anyone could find appeal in this metropolis. The public transit is clean, easy to use, and reliable and the people are genuine and eager to help you. This is not in an aggressive, in your face style. Today wandering around the Grand Bazaar (a roofed in shopping area with 4000 small shops) proved to be a surprisingly low stress, yet grand-scale, international shopping experience (however this may be partially due to the fact that we are not visiting in a high tourist season).

Grand Bazaar, one of the largest and oldest covered markets in the world, with more than 58 covered streets and over 4,000 shops which attract between 250,000 and half a million visitors daily.

A Store in the Grand Bazaar. For Buttons. And only buttons.

We ended our wandering today in a fancy carpet shop where we chatted over tea (another Turkish staple) with the Kurdish owner of the shop, Ismael. I don’t think either of us has ever thought about carpets as much in our entire life as we learned in the time we were in the shop. We learned about the history of weaving carpets, the different styles, what makes a carpet more or less valuable, and the process of buying and selling carpets. Ismael was very friendly and a practiced salesman, which he hardly has to be seeing how beautiful the carpets are. Carpet after carpet was rolled out in front of us. One style, then another, one color, then another. We spent at least an hour in the shop. Definitely another must have Turkish experience. 

Several of the carpets that caught Max's eye.

Traditional Turkish tea, served after every meal and at carpet shops.

We still have quite a bit of exploring of the city to do, and we cannot forget the classic Turkish experience of the Hamams (bathhouses). That will consume the next two days then Friday we take off to Antalya to start climbing! We’re wishing you all much love from Turkey! 

-Anna

Anna and Max enjoying our first Turkish dinner (complete with a salty, yogurt drink - more to Max's delight than Anna's).