Lovin' Turkey!

Istanbul
Probably one of the prettiest cities I've seen so far on this trip! The entire city is on three coasts, with the Golden Horn flowing right through it. And its pretty cool because one side is geographically considered Europe while the other side is Asia...so you're literally at a crossroads between the two continents. The history and culture of this city is literally a hodgepodge of eastern and western influences...which I find incredibly fascinating.

Okay on to pictures!

View of the Aya Sofia (right) and the Blue Mosque (right) from a water taxi

The Aya Sofia, which was originally a church, then a mosque, then a church, then a mosque...

Inside the Aya Sofia. When it was built by the Byzantines, it was the largest dome in the world...and I totally believe it, that thing is huge (twss). Anybody read Arabic? I'm curious to know what is written on the signs...i'm guessing something like "no flash photography" or "no shoes, no shirt, no service" ??

The Blue Mosque (Sultanahmet Camii)...such an EPIC mosque, I absolutely fell in love with it.

Inside the Blue Mosque

Really nice evening view of the city

At the Ritz Carlton, drinking a specially imported 2 liter bottle of Tongyi Lucha and watching the Lakers roll over the Jazz in Game 1 of the first round of the playoffs....life could not be better!

Antalya
Took an loooooong 12-hour overnight bus ride from Istanbul to Antalya, which is a very picturesque coastal city along the Mediterranean.

On a boat cruise around the city

Olympos
A little backpacker's haven about two hours away from Antalya. Its right by some really cool ruins and a very nice beach. We also went on this crazy 4 hour night hike to the Chimera, which are like naturally occurring fires on the cliffside of this mountain....and it was funny because the guy from the hostel basically said "oh yeah its not far at all to walk...just four kilometers from here. Alls you gotta do is walk down to the beach, turn left, walk a little bit, turn left at a restaurant, and then keep going and you'll hit it". When in reality it took about half an hour to get to the beach (even more creepy because it was pitch black and there were ruins all around us). It took another half an hour from the beach to the "restaurant", which turned out to be a little town...that had at least 50 restaurants! So by the time we found out where to actually turn left (it wasn't at a restaurant, but like a half hour walk past the last one), we had to eventually hitchhike to finally get to the base of the mountain...which then was a good 30 min climb up. At that point I definitely wanted to kill that guy at the hostel. But it was pretty worth it.

The Mediterranean!! It's an incredibly calm body of water...and also a really cool deep blue color

Yeah even though the water was definitely coooold, I just couldn't resist the urge to go for a swim...it is the Mediterranean after all

Took another long overnight bus to Izmir and then to Selcuk. Off to see Ephesus tomorrow!