Istanbul trip

[OilSheikh]

Continuing from my this thread, I have just spent 6 days in Istanbul.

One word to describe Istanbul - Magnificient!

I also got to learn a bit of history about this old city. It was the capital of the East Roman empire - Byzantine empire and the Ottoman empire. From what I recall, the Ottoman empire controlled the lands of northern African Arab countries, Saudi, Iraq and Balkan countries. It had been around for 400 years and had existed up until WW1. Towards WW1, it had weakened due to below-par Sultans and the empire was shrinking. It also had to take financial loans from European empires. In WW1, Ottomans wanted to retake their lost lands and wanted to side with British, French and Russians but were refused. Meanwhile, the British were supplying arms and tacticians ( Lawrence of Arabia ) to some terrorist in the Arabian peninsula to cause trouble for the Ottoman empire with promise of him being the king of all of Arabia. The Ottomans then sided with Germany etc. British empire already had plans of expanding to Africa and Middle East and were delighted when the Germans and Ottomans lost. The Ottoman empire was being chopped up and seeing this, Ataturk spearheaded attacks against foreign armies, overthrew the useless monarchy and managed to save as much as he could of which is now Turkey. French and British foreign ministers then met and divided up Arabia into different countries on their own without any reasoning.

Enough history!

I had decided not to spend much on this holiday and booked a 3* hotel for £300. I recommend booking better hotels for £500. And, avoid weekends as rates are higher. My hotel had free WiFi ( 3.5Mbps ) and cable TV but buffet breakfast was mediocre. My hotel was in the Sultanahmet area and all the tourist attractions are nearby. You can even walk to most of them. From my hotel, I walked up to what looked like a High street and saw Trams. There were plenty of people about and even then, not once did anyone bump into me! Compare that with so many mannerless people in London.

I visited the following places :
Hagia Sophia - 30TL ( Turkish Lira , £1 = 3.5 TL ) entry fee. It has two floors and a few mosaics.


Hippodrome -a wide open area with few columns.


Sultanahmet mosque - FREE


Arasta bazar - next to Sultanahmet mosque

This guy had photographs of him with various celebs. One of them was with Jodie Foster

Topkapi palace - 30TL. The palace is massive and takes 4-5 hours to see all of it. If you want to see the Harem section, it is a extra 15TL


Grand Bazar - a labyrinth of hundreds of shops!


Istanbul Archaeology museum - 15TL

A very nice museum of three buildings with pieces from the times of Mesopotamia, Babylon, pre-Arabia and Greek/Roman times. Best of all you can touch many of the sculptures and photography is also allowed.

Valens Aqueduct - FREE

Near the Aqueduct, there was a park with these Ottoman statues

Next to the aqueduct, I found a fruit seller and helped myself to some fresh fruit


Mosque of Shehzade

This was near to the Valens aqueduct as well.

I wanted to see a few other places but I didn't want to spend any more money and/or they were too far e.g. Basilica cistern, Galata tower, Sulemaniya mosque, Istanbul military museum, Ataturk museum

[OilSheikh]

On the high street, I regularly saw Syrian refugee kids of around 7 years old do the following :
-begging
-sell toys of a swimmer that can swim about in water
-draw interesting Caligraphy like colourful shapes
-play the flute
Apart from this, Syrian and Iraqi men were standing around selling fake watches, bracelets, misc. stuff.
Police officers regularly made them pack up when on their bike patrols.
There were also a few cosplayers, who let you have photos with them for money


And, now the food!
There were endless number of restaurants but I avoided proper restaurants and went for ones that local folks would try. Never have cold drinks at restaurants as they are expensive. You also get a free bread basket with every meal.

I saw a few shops like this. Very tasty food. Each portion costs 10TL and rice is an extra 5TL.
I also had chicken doner kebap and it was only 5TL! And, it was much tastier than anything I have tasted in London.

Turkish Dondurma ice cream was also available for 5TL but I found them to be of a different variety, very rubbery and chewy and no cream. I instead went to Burger King and had a regular cone ice cream for 1TL!



Be sure to also try out watermelon vendors selling chopped watermelons. Very tasty and only 5TL for 5 pieces.


I also took liking to a local yogurt drink called Ayran. It's like Labaan. Only 1TL
Didn't have any stomach bugs at all during my stay, which was another awesome point.

Turkey seems like a very rich country and everything was cheap. Definitely looked richer than poor and miserly London. Transport in Istanbul - Trams are modern and they come every minute and a journey between any two points costs 2TL ~ 57p on the IstanbulKart ( their Oyster card ). On my way back, I took the tram and train and paid only 12TL for the three of us in my group.

You can get your Liras for good exchnage rates at the currency exchanges at Ataturk airport. Post Office gave me terrible rates :@
Even though I said I didn't have any plans to spend money in Turkey, I ended up spending £400 in food and buying this and that.

Long live Turkey. May you never join the EU and become poor!

[OilSheikh]

I have also decided to replay the Assassins Creed Revelations game and explore Istanbul / Constantinople again.

[peterb]

Glad you enjoyed it! It is an amazing city!

[TheAnimus]

You can get your Liras for good exchnage rates at the currency exchanges at Ataturk airport. Post Office gave me terrible rates :@ Even though I said I didn't have any plans to spend money in Turkey, I spent £400

I never, ever understand how the post office and the like are in business.

You go to a forex place, and you can immediately see how much they are screwing you over with by the 'Spread' rate they charge.

Something like the GBPEUR which is incredibly liquid (lots of people buying in both directions) they have staggering spreads on, I think the worst I've ever seen was Marks and Spencer charging 40cents on the pound!

Now if it's something like Turkish Lira then I can sort of understand having a large spread, it's not very liquid (not many people come in every day wanting to buy or sell it) and it's fairly volatile (rate changes a lot, meaning that the company could be left holding a lot of worthless cash). However a quick google online and you can find places that offer great rates. Normally being lazy I have just 100USD, 100EUR, 100GBP which works in almost every country in an pinch, and use the local cash points. But this can land you in a spot of bother if you are unable to use the local cash machines for some reason!

[g8ina]

Great write up.

With me as a wheelchair user, what are the streets like, is it hilly or relatively flat ?

[OilSheikh]

Great write up.

With me as a wheelchair user, what are the streets like, is it hilly or relatively flat ?

Thanks.
Well, the side roads are all hilly and can often involve an uphill struggle. If you book your hotel on the High street, e.g. Pierre Lotti hotel, you should have no problems as the High street is flat. If you decide to go down to the beach, it will be a swift downhill trip and on your way back, it will be an immense struggle. The side roads are also not covered with tarmac and are instead made of grayish bricks (?)

[TheAnimus]

Very hilly with a lot of cobbles in some of the most interesting parts sadly, however with a powered chair I dare say it would be very easy.

[OilSheikh]

Ah, cobbles is the right word. Grayish bricks lol

[OilSheikh]

Some more photographs...


Sea of Marmara from Topkapi Palace


One of the Byzantine style houses still around


I decided to take a boat trip. You can find people advertising them in the Hippodrome area. 30TL per person and it takes 2 1/2 hrs!


Galata Tower




Dolmabache Palace


Bosphorous bridge - connecting Europe and Asia


Rumeli Fortress


Maiden's Tower

If you have time , make sure to go to Princes' Island for a daytrip. Also, be sure to visit the city of Troy - yes, it was in Turkey!

Big Bus Tours have a hop-on and hop off ticket valid for 72 hours but I felt it was a bit expensive.

[OilSheikh]

Turkish Airlines have an amazing offer at the moment.
Fly anywhere with Turkish Airlines and if your transit is at Ataturk airport for more than 6 hours but less than 24 hours, you can tour Istanbul for free in this time instead of sitting at the airport. [ You will need a e-visa beforehand , cost approx. £30 ]

a - For 09:00 /18:00 Tour
Arrival time must be 08:00 or earlier than 08:00
Departure time must be 19:30 or later than 19:30

b - For 09:00/15:00 Tour
Your Arrival time must be 08:00 or earlier than 08:00
Departure time must be 16:30 or later than 16:30

c - For 12:00/18:00 Tour
Your Arrival time must be 11:00 or earlier
Departure time must be 19:30 or later than 19:30

Your arrival time should be enough to be ready at the Hotel Desk half hour before the tour starts. For instance for our 09:00 tour, we kindly ask you to be ready in front of Hotel Desk at 08:30 am. For the 12:00 tour, this is 11:30am.

Secondly, we expect our passengers to be ready for boarding and pass the passport and custom control minimum 1 hour before their scheduled departure time. For instance if we assume that your departure is at 18:30pm, we may only suggest tours ending at 15:00.

You will be taken from the airport on a tour bus, have a tour guide, get free breakfast & lunch and also get free paid-for admission to a number of sites.
You will get to see ( this varies on daay and which one of the 3 daily tours you take):
Serpentine column
Hippodrome
Basilica cistern
Blue mosque
Topkapi palace
Taskim square
Bosphorous tour
Hagia Sophia
Dolmabache palace
Grand bazar

For more info , look at http://www.istanbulinhours.com/