Istanbul Take 2

And here is the rest of the Istanbul trip in condensed, photo format.  This time involving shisha, night walks through the city, street art, Topkapi Palace, and a great vegetarian food find!  Enough said.

Full photography credits for this post go to Chewy.

Istanbul Take 1

I have so many pictures from Istanbul that I have to put them into a couple of posts.  Istanbul is an incredible city, one of my absolute favourites.  And anyone who knows me knows I'm a country gal and hate cities, so that's a big call!  We visited basically every tourist attraction in Istanbul within the week that we spent there, and still easily could have spent more time there.  The following photos were taken at the Blue Mosque, Basilica Cistern, various bazaars, and at Gezi Park.  This is/was the site of the political unrest in Turkey, and we had to visit it to see things for ourselves and experience the atmosphere of thousands upon thousands of people demonstrating for something they believed in.  The atmosphere was very moving, although wholly positive, and not once did I feel in danger or uneasy and I was there the night before it got cleared for the last and final time by the police.  The situation now seems to have quietened down a bit, but I thought I'd still share my pictures with you.  Oh and the last one was the cat that lived in our hostel, such a cuddly little guy!

Vegetarian Goodness in Istanbul

Someone told me that it would be difficult to be vegetarian in Turkey.  They lied.  The vegetarian and vegan fare in Istanbul was stellar, I was constantly spoilt for choice with multitudes of vegetarian choices.  And this applied to Turkey in general.  One of my favourites was Galata Kitchen in the Galata area of Istanbul (surprise surprise), which I loved so much that we went back several times just to try every dish they offered.  I raved about the falafels at Kikero Falafel in a previous post, so I won't repeat myself, but basically every local taverna/restaurant/cafe will provide you with heaps of vegetarian and vegan options (see photos below).  Without further ado, here are some favourites.

Fruit & Beaches in Ölüdeniz

Ölüdeniz won't be the highlight of your holiday in Turkey.  It's package tourism heaven for many a Brit and a German, but despite this we decided to go there on a quick day trip from Fethiye anyway.  After walking through several streets full of restaurants all trying to sell us a full English breakfast, we found a nice, chilled out bar by the beach and had a smoothie before we braved the heat of the rocky beach.  The water was incredibly blue, and we had a great old time splashing around in the waves.  Full of hope we visited the 'Blue Lagoon' and were bitterly disappointed.  It was full of tourists lying like sardines on small patches of sand, the bit you were allowed to swim in was tiny and roped off, and to add insult to injury we had to pay to get in in first place.  Not a recommended destination!  We made the most of it though and stayed there for a nap in a shady corner under a tree.  At night, back in Fethiye, we had an incredible dinner in the midde of a fruit and vegetable market, and I bought a large amount of cherries to devour for dessert (and scored a free apricot from the vendor). Overall, not the best day we've had but hey, you win some and you lose some.

Ruins in Pergamum, Turkey

We had an absolute ball visiting the tiny town of Pergamum in Turkey! There were hardly any other visitors, so we didn't have to put up with any big groups of tourists, which is always nice.  The ruins far surpassed what we expected, and were pretty incredible.  So without further ado, here are the best pictures from the day.

 

I'm not sure why there was a turtle on top of a mountain, but what a little trooper.

Boat Cruises & Pide in Antalya

Antalya is a beautiful city, which we unfortunately only passed through for 8 hours on your way from Olympos to Cappadocia.  But what a jolly good 8 hours they were! We started the day with some delicious pide, and then went about exploring the old town.  We found the marina and were easily talked into doing a boat tour of the harbour area, which provided us with some stunning views.  After getting very very sick of vendors hassling us in the old town (no, I don't want any souvenirs thanks) we went to a gorgeous little cafe and sat amongst trees and potted plants to have some delicious apple tea.  Post-apple tea, I bought some amazing cherries from a man with a cart full of them, some freshly squeezed orange juice, a simit...the list goes on.  We did have a 12 hour bus ride to Cappadocia to look forward to after all, had to stock up on 'some' snacks.  In the evening we quickly dashed to see Hadrian's Gate, which was fairly impressive.  So anyway, without further ado here are some pictures.

 

View of the harbour from the restaurant

 

This little restaurant/sun lounge/beach/bar number looked amazing, unfortunately we didn't have time to go.

 

This little guy was hiding between the plant pots at the cafe!

 

 

Full photography credits on this one go to Chewy.  Pretty awesome decorations we thought.

I wish we'd had some more time in Antalya because it was such a beautiful city, but then moving on to Cappadocia was fairly spectacular too.  Love Turkey!