We left Orhan's wedding early (around 9:30 PM) to drive that night to Istanbul where I had an IEEE Ad Com meeting starting at 8 AM on Sunday morning. The drive was uneventful along the good highway between Ankara and Istanbul and, being Turkey, there was still a fair amount of traffic even at this late night. We stopped once for a bathroom break but otherwise arrived in Istanbul directly.
I had expected a straight shot to our hotel, the
Marmara Pera, in the center city (Beyoglu / Taksim / Pera area across from the famed Pera Palace Hotel). However, in Istanbul on Saturdays, even at 3 AM it was extremely crowded. It took us nearly an hour to get across the Taksim area to the hotel. We checked in and left the car in front (where it was parked during our whole stay) and settled in our room. It was not deluxe but was surprisingly quiet for being in a very active area. It had two single beds and a small bathroom.
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| View in the morning from our room at the Marmara Pera Hotel |
After a few hours of sleep I got up and at the good hotel breakfast then went to work for the day. Randy relaxed and did some sightseeing in the area. We met up around 6 PM when my meeting was over and headed to dinner on the Asia side where we were to meet Yelin Sevgor (a former undergraduate student at Auburn University) and his wife, Burcu (a longtime friend of Ozge Sumer's, coincidentally). We first peeked in the Pera Palace which was impressive to say the least with its grandeur and history. We walked through Beyoglu (seeing the lines of tourists waiting to go up in the Galata Tower) and over the Galata bridge (always fun) to the ferry port on the other side. We took the ferry across to Uskudar - beautiful in the late afternoon.
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| The famed Pera Palace Hotel (where we did not stay - too expensive!) |
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| Randy is a typical European style building of Pera |
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| The Galata Tower built by Genoans which we had visited on an earlier trip to Istanbul |
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| A typical street walking down towards the Bosporus in Beyoglu |
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| The breathtaking Bosporus in the late afternoon |
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| The busy ferry port on the European side |
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| Selfie on the ferry |
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| Leaving Europe for Asia with the Galata Tower watching over |
In Asia, we decided to walk along the main street skirting the Bosporus north to find the restaurant. It was a nice walk and new for us as we do not usually get to the Asian side. We reached the area of the restaurant but could not find it. After asking some guys on the street and calling Yelin we met up (we were very close and had actually passed it). The restaurant,
Ismet Baba, is a well known local fish place right on the water. It was friendly and delicious. We dined well on fresh fish, wine (for me), Efes beer (for Burcu) and raki (for the guys). We caught up - Burcu runs a printing business especially for T shirts while Yelin is active with international consulting. They rent an apartment nearby - this area of Istanbul, Kuzguncuk, known for being more like a small town than one of the world's biggest metropolitan areas.
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| A Greek Church remains in Uskudar - still open occasionally |
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| Our dining spot for the Sunday evening - highly recommended! |
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| Burcu and Yelin Sevgor - our friendly hosts that evening |
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| Glad to meet Burcu and reunion with Yelin (who we met up with at Orhan's wedding several nights earlier and made this date) |
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| Efes beer, Kavaklidere white wine and Efe raki - we hardly needed the food! |
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| Dining along the Bosporus, very literally |
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| Mezes - always welcome |
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| Happy diners and a War Eagle moment |
We took a taxi from the restaurant to the Uskudar ferry port, and then the ferry back to the European side and got a taxi to our hotel. It was a lovely evening - perfect for capping off this quick trip to Istanbul. The next morning, we ate a leisurely breakfast at the hotel then drove to the Asian side (always an adventure getting across one of the Bosporus bridges) to the Sabiha Gokcen Airport. This was our first experience with this airport (serving many domestic flights in and out of Istanbul). We had to call the rental car place to send a guy to get the car when we drove up. This was rather confusing but we eventually made contact and got rid of the car. We checked into our Anadolu Jet Airlines flight to Erzurum and waited with a beer and a snack.
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| View from the ferry on the way back to Europe |
The flight was on time and we landed in the late afternoon to a sunny Erzurum where Mehmet and Alejandro (having taken different overnight buses from Ankara and Cappedocia, respectively) were waiting to commence our road trip of northeastern Turkey!
