Istanbul, Turkey. "You should go see the beach. It's a long drive to nice beach. Here, take my car! Let me buy you lunch! I have a spare room in my house, you should come back to Istanbul and stay longer. Meet my wife!". A few days prior, we had bought a couple of leather jackets from him. There had been no talk of any leather jackets since. He was genuinely, just a nice guy. Experiences like these can make all the difference to your impression of a city. In any case, within days of arriving, Istanbul joined an exclusive list of cities that I would be happy to spend a longer amount of time in. Good food, incredible historic sites, surrounded by water, and technically, just next door to our home continent. Oh no. Were we really on our way back home?
We now stood where Europe meets Asia. Our European overland journey had taken us from as far North as Oslo, Norway, East through to this spectacular point on the Bosphorus Straight. As I manned a typical Chinese-Knockoff Spirograph Hawker's stall (photo below) on the streets of Istanbul, I paused for thought. Is this what I had become? Career-path of a Chinese knock-off Spirograph saleman? Short path. Very, short, career path. Turkey was the19th country we visited during 2010. We were staying in a quiet part of Sultanahmet, the former Constantinople, an old area of Istanbul, Turkey. Istanbul is one of the worlds largest, oldest, and greatest, cities. Almost fourteen million people live in the metro area. Former capital of the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire, the Latin Empire, and the Ottoman Empire. Recent discoveries date the initial settlement of Istanbul 8000 years ago, making it one of the oldest still inhabited locations on Earth. Speaking of old, yes, this post is about a year old. We're now back at home, and have been for some time. There is another country (at least one) that I have forgotten to write about, but really, at this point the journey was about to pause.
Fortunately, we have booked some more tickets, and will be travelling again in two weeks. This time, we have noplanes companions! Four more countries, one of which has yet to appear on this website, the other three, old favourites. In the meantime, presented to you by the worlds number one resource for information about Balangan Beach, Bali - NoPlanes.com - enjoy the photos, of historical Istanbul.
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