Hello Everyone
We made it to Istanbul late on Friday night – flying Lufthansa from Boston to Frankfurt to Istanbul. The flights were uneventful and we slept most of the way. We stayed at the Intercontinental – a fairly standard large hotel in the Taksim district. The driver was very friendly and spent some time explaining the layout of the city and also explaining that although Turkey is 98% muslim, it is not terrorists like you we see on CNN – this was a theme reiterated by every guide we had.. It is Ramadan and Istanbul is full of tourists from other parts of Turkey in addition to the usual international visitors.

We had an opportunity to join an Iftar feast (the meal at the end of the day of fasting during Ramadan) with a colleague from work. A wonderful meal filled with lots and lots of courses – we were a little too jetlagged to capture all the details (I forgot to bring a camera) but it was lots of fun and we got to meet his very large extended family – the children – there were about 12 of them – were very interested in us.

On Saturday we took a boat ride on the Bosphorus and also went to the Grand Bazaar. It was very helpful to see the city from the water to get a better sense of the territory. Both the Navigator and the Voyager were in port on Saturday morning. The Grand Bazaar was a little intimidating – the shopkeepers are very aggressive – I’m not sure I’d want to walk through alone but it’s definitely worth doing. I did some half-hearted haggling but there was nothing I really fell in love with to buy (still tired I think).

We boarded the Voyager on Saturday around 3 – there was no waiting and our luggage was already in our room when we arrived. The Voyager looks to be in great shape. It’s always wonderful to be back on a ship. We had dinner in La Veranda as we were too lazy to get even minimally dressed up. The Mediterranean steak house menu was on offer and the food was excellent.

On Sunday we took the ship’s tour to the Blue Mosque and Topkapi Palace. They get the group very small – there were only 14 people in our group. The Blue Mosque is spectacular – I’ll try to post a picture of the tile work on the ceiling – it doesn’t even begin to do it justice as the building is enormous. Everything was extremely crowded because of Ramadan. Our guide explained that this is the one time of year there are a lot of female tourists – they don’t have to cook during the day because no one can eat so they have the time to go visiting. Once again our guide spent quite a bit of time explaining that terrorists were not good muslims and trying in a few brief hours to communicate something of the glory of Turkish history. A side note to future visitors to Istanbul – bring socks if you plan on visiting the mosques as you have to take off your shoes while you are inside. Also long pants and shirts with sleeves unless you want to wrap some grungy lengths of cloth around your waist and over your shoulders…..

Topkapi Palace has many interesting rooms to see – we focused on the textiles, jewels and kitchens (always important) but that doesn’t begin to cover the vast array of things to see there. It’s located in a beautiful area overlooking the water and the gardens are also magnificent.

Dinner in Compass Rose and then off to see the show – Pete Neighbour – a great clarinet player we saw on the Mariner over New Year’s.

Today we are in Mykonos – it’s a lovely day – sunny but not too hot. We just wandered around the town – up to the windmills, through the winding little streets, visiting a few art galleries – and had lunch at one of the waterfront cafes – yummy seafood. Now back on board and ready to depart.

Although the wireless network is present, the internet speed is S….L….O….W. I tried uploading a few photos and no luck. I’ll try again if we ever get a more reasonable connection.

Mary Ellen