life on greek time

today was my lucky day. realised at 10.25 that i was booked on a shuttle to the wrong airport in turkey. sprinted down the street and somehow managed to catch the 10.20 bus! on arrival at the airport could hear that almost every flight was being delayed - by some miracle mine wasn't! 

arriving in greece and making my way to the hostel was far less stressful than in turkey. staying at the student & travellers inn, which has been pretty great so far! the lovely british girl on the desk highlighted all the good attractions on a map, and so spontaneously joined with two other solo travellers to trek up lycabettus hill. the views over athens were fantastic.

somehow we managed to come down the wrong side of the hill, so spent a while lost before managing to find ourselves and wandered through the national gardens on our way back to the hostel and managed to see the changing of the guard too! 

asked the guy on the desk for a recommendation for dinner, and were so glad we did! the place was awesome!! we shared a variety of local foods and listened to live music from next door. the service definitely occurred on greek time, but it was a pretty perfect first night!

watermelon is evil

the water is unsafe to drink in turkey. so when they pump watermelon with water to make it juicier it's not going to be pretty. 

my afternoon yesterday...

not a good idea. spent 2 hours locked in a bathroom last night and still feeling rather average this morning! all part of the experience i guess!!!

a quiet one

last night was definitely an experience. despite being the only english speaking person aboard my bus i had a surprisingly easy trip. sat next to a young turkish woman named zeda... if i'd been sitting next to the pig across from me i would have cried, so was very happy! 

got to my hostel in istanbul at 8.30 this morning and have decided to just take it easy today. went to a hammam this morning - the fat lady scrubbing me thankfully was wearing bathers (even if they were tiny and semi-sheer). i felt so clean after being steamed, scrubbed, foamed, massaged, washed, steamed and washed again!

just had to do some laundry - my clothes stank from the minerals of pamukkale - and now i'm off to the spice market before meeting tim and casey for dinner! 

adventures at the cotton castle

today i went to hierapolis and pamukkale with virtually the same tour group as yesterday, with the addition of yet another aussie - john. after a long bus ride and a rather horrible lunch, we arrived at the site. it was amazing! 

to begin, we wandered through the ancient graeco-roman ruins of hierapolis. this was the site of healing and death in ancient times and a place of pilgrimage for christians due to the presence of the martyrium of st. philip. we hiked the impressive slope up to the amphitheater, against the advice of mehmet, and were very happy we did - it was gorgeous! the stage of the theatre was two tiered and featured intricate columns and statues. 

we decided not to pay $20 to swim in the roman pool. it would have been awesome, were it not for the filth of hundreds of tourists. instead we went straight to the pamukkale terraces - the cotton castle. it was absolutely gorgeous, completely unlike anything i've ever seen before. natural hot springs formed calcified terraces and pools all down the side of a mountain. 

the boys and i had a wonderful time frolicking in the hot spring pools all the way down the mountain. it was utterly spectacular and so much fun!!! 

          casually sitting in the spring

   ken and john exfoliating in the minerals

             amer soaking in the pools

unfortunately have to leave before nightfall, otherwise pamukkale at nighttime would certainly have been a magical experience! about to board an overnight bus back to istanbul and then off to greece on sunday!!

tourist traps and sleazy men

today my tour of turkey took me to the ancient city of ephesus, the house of the virgin mary and the temple of artemis. the day was certainly memorable, two awesome guys acting as my protectors all day from the sleazy tour guide who took a liking to me 😣 according to mehmet, my breasts look like quinces! 

walking through ephesus begun the day in an attempt to escape the heat - it most definitely didn't work! the ancient capital of turkey was absolutely incredible! ephesus was home to an estimated 200,000 people and had an amphitheatre that could seat 25,000!! the ruins were pretty spectacular, especially the library and the roman victory fountain. mehmet made sure to show me 'special' things all the way through.

from ephesus we went to lunch (where i ate an awesome selection of salads, you would have been seriously jealous mum!) and then were treated to an absolutely hilarious experience at a leather shop. pulling up in our bus we knew we were in for a tourist trap, but were totally unprepared for the fashion show of the most hideous leather jackets you have ever seen, accompanied by loud top 40 hits. we were then given half an hour to roam the two storey behemoth of a shop - during which we proceeded to model many of the revolting jackets. on a side note, the sleazy tour guide informed me that i could get a jacket for 10% price because he liked me... i not so politely declined. 

we climbed back aboard our tour bus and went to the house of the virgin mary. the boys and i had a wonderful time marvelling at the hideous and ridiculously expensive memorabilia, but the religious significance of the event was lost on us unfortunately! highlight of seeing meryana evi was definitely getting ice cream at the end! 

from there we made a brief stop at the temple of artemis, one of the ancient wonders of the world. sadly only one pillar remains of the biggest ancient greek temple as the rest is at the british museum. once again mehmet the tour guide was a delight, asking about my virginity since artemis was the goddess of virgins! 

our last stop of the day was another tourist trap - this time a carpet gallery. thankfully it was quite fascinating, as we were showed the process of spinning silk and then watched ladies make various types of carpets, some of which take over 18 months to make!!! quite a few people made purchases, but i refrained from spending a ridiculous amount of money on one of the beautiful carpets.

currently eating dinner by myself, quite contentedly i must add, and you'll be happy to know that i'm trying more local dishes mum! 

... needed to add a note that we had mehmet as our tour guide again for pamukkale today. thankfully we were virtually allowed to roam by ourselves the majority of the day! 

random thoughts from turkey

the world is a seriously small place... in greece or barcelona i wouldn't be surprised to run into people by chance, but somehow within the space of 10 minutes in istanbul i bumped into two people i knew!! 

saw a grave stone at the lone pine cemetery that stated "to live in hearts we leave behind is not do die". really stuck with me, so felt the need to share it. 

selfies suck. 

language barriers can be both frustrating and fun. had an absolutely hilarious time with 3 canadians attempting to order lunch from two turkish women who didn't know a word of english. lots or miming and laughs later i managed to request pilav (rice - much better egyptian rice than you made mum :P) and some chicken and potato dish. certainly an experience, though trying to find the toilet when you really need to go and no one speaks english is far less enjoyable!

australians are great comfort when you're travelling alone. especially in a country where many men seem to love to make inappropriate advances and keep touching my face! 

on my tour of turkey

well, i've officially decided that tours go too fast, involve far too much time on buses, and include sites that you really wouldn't mind if you missed. this morning we went to troia (troy) which to be perfectly honest was quite underwhelming. all that remains lots of limestone and sandstone walls, recreated mudbrick walls, a few scattered columns and some food storage pots. the only cool thing to see was the perfectly preserved amphitheatre, built by the trojans and refurbished by the romans. 

i do admit the history was quite interesting to learn. turns out the city began as a fishing village and was razed and rebuilt 9 times until it was abandoned by the romans in 580AD due to the changing land formation pushing troia inland, eliminating its trade significance. 

the famous trojan war occurred during the 7th period of the city, and whilst helen was the catalyst, the primary objective of the greeks was to gain control over the richest seaport in the aegean. the conflict lasted 10 years before the greek force breached the city walls with the trojan horse. 

anyhow, enough history lessons. i'm now on an 8 hour bus ride which is meant to have wifi and meant to have usb points, but my phone won't connect to either, so i'll have to post this when i arrive in selcuk! sleep time :) 

.... turns out sleep wasn't really on the cards, the aircon conked out while it was 39 degrees outside :/ at least we stopped a lot - turkey has really good tost (cheese and tomato toasties)

being an australian

yesterday i took the journey to gallipoli. after waking at 6am we took a bus to eceabat. 5 very cramped hours later we arrived to be greeted by a very random lunch - meatballs, sweet chilli coated chips, plain noodles and lettuce! definitely not what i think of when i think of turkish food.... on a side note, baclava and turkish delight are amazing here, and yes mum, the locals do eat them! 

as i was on a gallipoli tour i inevitably spent the day once again with aussies, a somber 6 hours of touring the various historic sites on the gallipoli peninsula. the amount of knowledge our turkish tour guide imparted was seriously impressive - i learnt so much about the anzac campaign and the turkish experience of it all. turns out they suffered more deaths and casualties than the allied forces!

i think the most confronting part of the day for me was seeing and hearing about all the young soldiers who lost their lives, the youngest only 14 and 10 months. also a terrible surprise was the overwhelming feeling of shame i felt as an australian when a drunken bus of aussies and kiwis walked around shirtless and mooned the statue of turkey's greatest war hero. 

the day was absolutely sweltering, and swathed as i was in scarves, the only thing i wanted to do was go for a swim and a beer when we got back. so went for a relaxing beer on the beach with the boys - the beer here is great by the way! 

the first hard lesson of my travels

today was a massive one! woke up at 7 and was out exploring istanbul by 8.45. first stop was the blue mosque, where i had a creepy turkish man show me in and then wait for me at the exit! after i shook him i attempted to find the cistern, upon which time i was accosted by a turkish carpet salesman - who i spent an hour drinking apple tea with! 

eventually managed to make my way through the basilica cistern, it was really beautiful and quite awestruck by the ability of men to create such a structure in the 6th century! 

decided to go on a cruise of the bosporus... realised its never a good idea to go on a boat when jet lagged. suffice to say i fell asleep twenty minutes in, and woke up incredibly incredibly sunburnt all over an hour later! lesson learnt the hard way!!

despite that unfortunate turn of events, i met a group of lovely australian girls at our hostel and went to the grand bazaar with them. absolutely hectic but unfortunately not very cheap, so didn't shop at all! met up with the lovely lucy prowse and have had another great evening. time for bed now as i go to gallipoli first thing in the morning!! 

i made it!

had an incredibly eventful trip to istanbul. a 92yo man on the flight had a heart attack, my wonderful seat mate saved his life! so after being diverted to jakarta, we made it to abu dhabi just in time to rush through the airport to catch my connecting flight - thank goodness! 

arriving in istanbul, waited in a 500 person long queue for passport control!! thankfully moved pretty fast and then i was faced with the adventure of getting to the hostel. it was awesome, i think if i can manage catching a train, walking under and over roads, being harassed by taxi drivers and turkish men, catching a tram and finally asking random people how to get to my hostel i can manage anything! finally ready to embrace europe!!

went for a wander after i arrived. this place is stunning, the architecture is incredible - cant wait to properly explore it all today! typically, spent last night drinking beer with a group of aussies, but it was quite nice for the first night to be around the familiar! 

bring on today!

the time has come, i'm off

waiting outside the gate to board my flight to abu dhabi. today has been one of the most stressful and tumultuous days of my life, but now that i'm through and on my way i'm finally starting to get excited for everything to come... bring on europe!!! 

only 4 days to go...

europe is only 4 days away and it's bloody scary... i've still got two exams to go, still have to pack and have no time to say goodbye to all the people i'm leaving behind in my familiar bubble! i'm struggling just a little to fit my life into a box and a backpack :/