(Daniel) The typical Turkish breakfast consists of Olives, bread, cucumber, tomatoes cheese and a conserve. We ate on the roof terrace today, washing these down with coffee or apple tea. I went for that latter and was most impressed. After breakfast we walked down to the river and bought a ticket for a Bospherous boat trip.
The Bospherous is the Strait separating Europe and Asia, and is a very historic area, due to it’s strategic importance. We and about a hundred Japanese tourists set off, passing many beautiful buildings and houses along the shore. We sailed for an hour or more, before pulling up at a small town where you could apparently get a wonderful lunch. We disembarked the boat at the town, called Anadolu Cavagi. It was a fishing town close to the black sea and we walked through the street of busy fish restaurants to the usual lines of “Hello, what is your name, where are you from?” and inaccurate comparisons to David Beckham. After a look around and snapping some photos, we sat down in a nice looking waterside restaurant to choose our fish. The set menu was only ten Lira and consisted of Starters, salad, fish, and a drink. I went for Dorado, while the others had Mackerel.
After giving our order, I decided to stand up and take a photo of some ugly cats that had appeared, as I did so a huge bird crap fell from high in the sky and hit my plate and chair dead on! Proof that instincts should always be followed. When our food arrived, a whole gang of funky looking cats appeared, obviously drawn to the area by all the fish. Each one had a character, the leader had only one eye, another had a neat moustache, and others had features like fluffy sideburns, scraggy tails, one had bogeys hanging down from it nose. They watched with unnerving intent as we ate. The waiters kept coming over and shooing them away, but I was throwing scraps when they weren’t looking, bloody tourists.
After the meal we walked up the hill to the ruins of a castle, passing a barracks with scary looking warning messages all over it. The children playing inside the fences, reduced the effect of the warning signs considerably. We didn’t quite make it all the way to the top. Weighed down by full bellies, and weary of our boat departing soon, we headed back. Stopping along the way to sample some Baclava, a sweet made from hundreds of layers of pastry with herbs and syrup.
The Boat departed with us back on board, and we slept most of the way, waking to get some sunset photos just before docking in Istanbul. We walked back to the hotel then, and I updated the diary while the others had some sleep.
In the evening, we headed back to the waterside, and the Armada Hotel, where a tasting menu of five courses was said to be an experience, and had caught the ever watching eye of Lonely Planet Larry. As we sat down in the very posh restaurant, we felt out of place, but soon settled in after the first bottle of wine. The food was excellent, and gave us a great starting point for our journey through Turkish cuisine. After eating ourselves sleepy, we trundled back to the hotel with a quick visit to the roof terrace to take in the city views at night.
Distance Driven 0miles