View from the Best Western President Hotel in Istanbul looking toward the Sea of Marmara.

Inside the Blue Mosque. The “blue” comes from the predominant color of the tiles throughout.

Just a small piece of one of many wings of the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul. Over 4000 vendors are located here. It is unbelievable. They sell everything from gold to clothes to daggers to pashmina scarves to loukum (Turkish Delight).

My cousin Peter and his wife Meltem. They met in Belgium and when she returned home to Turkey, he followed. They both currently work at a university; she teaches Organizational Behavior, he teaches English.

Another view of Istanbul from the Best Western President Hotel.

Snow near a lunch stop outside of Bolu. We had checked the weather reports and thought we might have a little snow, but we didn’t expect a short snowstorm! (Picture taken from the bus.)

Small village near the highway to Ankara. Mosques are everywhere in Turkey, and each village has one. This one was particularly beautiful, standing out against the less brilliant colors of the hills and the village buildings.

One of 13 sun disks found in a group of tombs dating from the early Bronze Age. Eleven were made of bronze while two were made of silver. They were probably attached to poles for parade use. This is in the Archaeological Museum in Ankara.

Atatürk Mausoleum – Mausoleum of the Father of Turkey. He is the most highly revered person in Turkey because he led the fight for independence and changed/created the country. The museum on the grounds is HUGE and wonderful!

Atatürk Mausoleum – This is basically the ROOF of the museum. Yes, it’s that big. It is a magnificent history of the Turkish people that even includes the roles of women in the battlefield, paintings, dioramas with sound, and more and more. 

Atatürk Mausoleum – In back of the Museum, this is a representation of the flag of Turkey.

This is a view of the Mausoleum at night from our hotel balcony. I didn’t realize that’s what it was at the time. 

I loved the snow patterns on the furrowed ground. This was on the E90 from Ankara south toward the Salt Lake (Tuz Gölü).

The edge of Tuz Gölü. It is a maximum of 2 meters deep and approximately 60 miles long x 30 miles wide, expanding and contracting with the seasons. No life can exist in it, and it is one of the largest salt lakes in the world.

Remember the Santana album “Caravanserai”? This is a real caravanserai. It was a guarded safe haven for travelers on the Silk Road and would accommodate camels and people free for one night with additional nights at a nominal fee.

A view of Kaymaklı from our window in the lovely Hotel Vera. Here is where it really began to dawn on me that the rural Turkish people work very hard and have little to show for it materially. Kaymaklı is a gateway to Kapadokya.

Just a few of the cave homes in and around Göre. It is illegal to live in one now, but years and generations ago, they were inhabited.

More cave homes, this time outside Uçhısar. The rock is the characteristic “tuff” of Kapadokya, the lava that is solid yet malleable enough to be dug out by hand tools. Cave homes abound in this region.

A view of the village of Göreme, situated squarely among the tuff in amazing Kapadokya.

The entrance to the Open Air Museum, where we walked and climbed through actual ancient cave homes and cave churches. Standing there we felt awed and humbled by the former inhabitants’ tenacity to protect their land and beliefs.

The modern staircases made climbing between the rooms easier for us non-cave dwellers. One might be the “kitchen”, one the “living room”, etc.

This is what one of the rooms looked like with passageways to adjoining rooms.

An example of one of the original frescoes in one of the many small churches. Photography was difficult as the rooms are very dark and flash is not allowed.

A rug weaver at her loom. She is working with cotton or wool, so can work for 3-5 hours a day. If she were working with silk, which is very hard on the hands, she can only work a maximum of 2-3 hours per day. This vendor also trains young women and then gives them looms so they can work in their homes, enhancing the local economy.

Making silk threads from the cocoons of silkworms. Fascinating to watch.

For once, Kris looks happy in a picture. Of course, the other guys are happy too, since they’re the ones who sold us the rug! :-)

These are examples of the fairy chimneys. They are natural formations – and the rocks on top were not placed there intentionally.

There are also formations in the shape of animals. This is a camel, for example, and some of the group to the left are penguins.

In nearby Avanos, we visited a ceramic shop that has been in the same place and the same family for 5 generations. They hand produce some of the most beautiful pottery we had ever seen. Here the owner is shown making a teapot on his wheel.

Here one of the artisans is painting a plate. Beautiful work!

Here is an example of a finished piece.

The city of Konya, near the center of the country, is in a high desert reminiscent of the southern part of Interstate Highway 5 in California or Highway 80 in Nevada. It is known as the home of the Whirling Dervishes as well as the most conservative city in the country.

What’s left of the amphitheater at Antioch, just above the modern-day town of Yalvaç. Originally about 100 meters wide, Antioch is now in a state of advanced decay.

Hoyran Gölü between Yalvaç and Pamukkale.

One of many large pieces in the lobby of the Lycus River Hotel in Pamukkale.

One of the larger buildings in the ruins of Hierapolis near Pamukkale. The sign on the front reads “There is danger of collapse do not get in.”:-)

Same building, different view. It was massive in its day.

Another huge one.

The thermal pools at Pamukkale very slowly run toward the right of this picture and over sort of a cliff. As they do so, they deposit bicarbonate that they call travertine, which looks like...

This. It’s spectacular from this angle, but even more so when you drive around a corner on a small hilly road and it fills your entire view to the right.

A pool near the thermal springs in Pamukkale. We were so tempted to just jump in... :-)

A mosque in Pamukkale. I like the blue tower top. It is different than most.

A resident of Pamukkale. What a life. :-)

Ruins of St. John’s Church in Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love. Everyone we encountered was actually friendly, open... more than willing to check us out. 

I thought it fascinating to look through the towers of the Church of Saint John and see a mosque. It points up the 99% Muslim population of Turkey.

Between Philadelphia and Sardis, we stopped for lunch. I couldn’t resist taking a picture of this sign. I think it spells out which is which pretty well. :-)

Looking through the entrance to a synagogue and there is a mosque. This time it is in Sardis. Pretty fascinating.

The Gymnasium at Sardis – or what’s left of it, anyway. The gymnasium is where sports and other activities such as swimming and baths were done in the nude. It was placed next to the synagogue here, a very unusual placement.

A budding vineyard and a bit of landscape on the road between Sardis and Selçuk. Looks a lot like California! :-) It’s a bit fuzzy as it was taken from the bus. 

We arrived in Kuşadası around dinner time. This was the view of the sky from our hotel room balcony. (See also slide 69.)

This is a small chapel dedicated to the Virgin Mary (Meryemana) on the spot where it is believed she lived her last days. No pictures were allowed inside, but I was able to at least get this shot through the entry. We both sensed this was a very sacred place just because of the feeling we got on the grounds and in the chapel.

Ephesus was the high point of the tour for Kris. It was a city of about 250,000 at its zenith, and despite it being one of the best preserved sites of the ancient world and pretty darn spectacular, it is estimated that only 10% of the city has actually been excavated. Wow. Here you are looking down one of the main roads. The large building at the end follows this slide. Also, where you see farmland beyond was, in ancient times, a harbor, since the ocean came inland that far.

This is just the facade of what used to be the library. Thousands of scrolls were kept here. This is currently undergoing restoration. 

Mary Anne “preaching” in the amphitheatre. This was a zoom shot, so she was farther away than she appears. We could hear her talk unamplified with clarity.

The amphitheatre from the front view.

An example of the intricate mosaics throughout the city.

Bizim Ev Hanuueli, the most unusual of the places we stopped for lunch. It is outside of Selçuk on a country road and is a family-run operation. The food was typically good and the WC was free! :-)

The “Guard” at Selçuk’s Ephesus Museum. Cats are everywhere in Turkey. This one happened to be on the top step of the entry to the museum.

Real live storks nesting outside the Ephesus Museum. This shot was taken from the museum’s atrium.

One of many artifacts from Ephesus at the Ephesus Museum. This is one of the more intact sculptures.

Vases and possibly perfume containers from the period.

The armor on this one reminds me of a space suit or scuba gear.

Another Church of Saint John. It was a large and impressive structure in its day. This is what it looks like now, and...

This is what it is believed the building exterior originally looked like.

At the Kercilar Leather Art Factory we were treated to a fashion show – and they even chose two of our group to participate! However, I was more interested in...

The two classic Chevys they had on the grounds. This one’s a 1952. The one in the background is a 1955.

Even Turkish highways are not immune to cow crossings. This was on the highway between Selçuk and Kuşadası.

The Turkish sky from our hotel balcony near sunset. Some of the most beautiful scenery and skies we saw were in and around the west coast resort town of Kuşadası. (See also slide 50.)

And looking down from our balcony produced this view of the ocean below.

A look at the present-day city of Bergama from the ruins of Pergamum. It was unbelievably windy here – we could barely hold our footing long enough to take a picture. Apparently, it is almost always windy on this hilltop.

Just a small corner of the ruins. Pergamum was pretty large in its heyday. I wouldn’t want to walk these amphitheatre steps every day!

Our guide and driver, Meri and Sefer. They were amazing and friendly. Meri was very knowledgeable and spoke excellent English, and Sefer went out of his way to help make every aspect of the trip easier.

This is a replica of the Trojan horse that was built for the movie “Troy”, and is an estimate of what they think the horse must have looked like. Quite an imposing figure!

There have actually been 9 cities on the site of ancient Troy, each built primarily on top of the last. This shows concurring sections of the second, third and fourth cities. These happen to be in order from lowest (oldest) to highest (newest) but it is not necessarily that way throughout the site.

More Troy – every site had an amphitheatre, didn’t it? :-)

A view of Çanakkale from our hotel window.

On a hillside above the Dardanelles is this tribute to Turkish soldiers. It is another indication of the pride in and love for their country that the Turkish people have.

Along the Bosphorus are some of the most expensive homes in Turkey. They can run as much as $40,000,000. Yes, dollars. Here are a few of my favorite shots.

I really like this one. With all the little balconies, just think how many plants I could have. Tomatoes, cucumbers, ivy, geraniums... :-)

The structure above these homes is a suspension bridge that crosses the Bosphorus. I dunno... with all the earthquakes in Turkey, I don’t think I’d want to live in one of these!

Since there’s no ‘x’ in Turkish, this is the spelling of “taxi”.

And last, this is where perhaps the silliest thing happened. Mary Anne and I were looking at this delightful chocolate shop inside here and kept asking the proprietor what was in the chocolates. He came back with the same answer each time – chestnut. We finally looked at the sign above and it said “Chocolate Chestnuts”. Duh. He must have thought we were really stupid. We chuckled over that for a long time. In the end, they were delicious!

We spent 10 full days in this delightful and different country and enjoyed all of it. It was not enough. I personally could have spent a month there, and would like to see more of the eastern half someday. The farther east you go the more it begins to look and feel like Middle Eastern countries, though everywhere we went, there was always at least one Western-style toilet. And all of them were clean! Maybe next time we can stay longer. In the meantime I am using the Rosetta Stone program to for the slow process of learning enough Turkish to communicate with a new friend there. Can’t wait to begin writing.