First stop Istanbul

I must confess that Istanbul wasn't in the top ten of my bucket list, in fact it wasn't on my bucket list at all but a five word email from Carol back in February changed all that. The email simply said: "Do you want to come :-) " and there was an e-ticket to Turkey attached for September 2015.

We decided to start off with a week in Istanbul and after a bit of searching on the web found an apartment in the area that James had recommended right alongside the Galata Tower. The downside was that it was up five floors and there was no elevator, but Carol said that she and Stephen had stayed in a similar type of place in New York and that it wouldn't be a problem - that was before the accident!

Galata Tower

Our apartment as seen from the top of the Galata Tower

About 12 weeks before we were due to leave Melbourne Stephen took a tumble down an embankment at his friend Lewis' place in Bendigo, resulting in a broken arm which had to be pinned. When the pain killers from that wore off he realised his foot hurt, turned out he had torn his Achilles tendon in the fall. He was recovering well from all this and had been wearing the moon boot and following doctors orders when the week before we were due to leave he hurt his back. Well my Gran used to say bad luck came in threes, so I am not sure why it was Stephen's bag that didn't make it onto the last leg of the flight from Dubai to Istanbul!

Stephen had to be taken off the plane in a wheelchair after suffering a relapse of his bad back. After Frank had pretended to be Stephen and filled in all the necessary forms at lost luggage, Carol and Frank almost carried him up 5 flights of stairs. 

Sunday was a recovery day from the trip and wehad to leave Stephen home on his own but he was happy watching the motor cycle racing, playing music, watching the pedestrian traffic below etc. Anyway, the three of us just went for a long wander around on foot. Down to the edge of the water, over the Galata bridge on the pedestrian walkway below, not up top where the scores of fishermen line the bridge. Then up and down some of the myriads of cobbled laneways that carry everything from foot traffic to trucks and everything in between including an alarming number of motorcyclists without helmets. Fortunately being Sunday a lot of the shops lining the streets were closed, so that broke us in gently.

The noise in Istanbul is almost constant from the people having a good time in the bars and restaurants below, to the rattling bottles of what I think but be the garbos, to the honking horns which could be anything from a delivery truck to a taxi to just another impatient Turk on his way to or from work, the barking dogs, the twittering swallows (which are huge by the way) and of course the haunting call to prayer which almost became a substitute 5.30am alarm call :-) It took a bit of getting used to after just the sound of the waves crashing on the beach and the occasional passing vehicle! The funny thing was that when we got home Frank and I agreed that we had grown rather fond of the Muezzin’s call five times a day and missed it!

Cobbled streets of Beyoglu

Call to prayer from the Blue Mosque