Episodes from a day on the Nile

Around 11am
We're drifting down the Nile on a felucca as the last light of the sun starts to disappear into the dessert.  We had the hot western wind from the dessert earlier and we almost got up a bow wave. 

2pm-ish
The day didn't start well as a couple of the group are feeling under the weather so we our departure and hung out in the air conditioned breakfast room to give them a chance to feel better.  We ended up leaving one couple behind, but I think they are planning a nice romantic evening felucca ride by themselves.  So we left about 11am instead of 9am and boarded a sailboat that is about 4 metres wide and 12 metres long. Doesn't seem that long to me but that is what one of the Mohammeds has just told me.  The captain is Mustafah, one of the crew is also Mustafah, the other crew member is Mohammed and so is our tour guide.  You have a fitfy fifty chance of getting the name right.  Mustafah the crew member is the cook and he made us a fabulous lunch of babagnoush, mashed garlic spuds, some onion, tomato and egg thing, the ubiquitous tomato, cucumber and feta with an original touch of coriander, and some egyptian bread.  It was amazing. 

Afternoon
We stopped for at a beach for a swim while some of the locals and their livestock looked on.  The Nile was quite clear and refreshing, not a hint of a crocodile or a piranha that someone had been worried about.  It was also a toilet stop - second bush to the right with a lookout nearby.  Then we went under the bridge.  Problem is the mast is higher than the bridge so the mast in in two parts and the top half swivels down so that you drift under the bridge.

6-7pm
We are now docked against the beach and I have my 'slow' playlist on while we look up at the stars after the hard work of constructing the toilet (I held the torch; I'm exhausted....).  We are sleeping on the deck of the felucca.  About a handspan below the top of the boat, two thirds from the aft is covered with wood and then a mattress where we will be sleeping under a canvas cover.  There is a small cabin in the bow but I think that is where the crew sleep.  There are only four of us so we will have scads of room - not like the 10 people in the other group who are moored near us.  If we were nice, we'd offer to share.  We're not nice though. 

9pm - ish
Dinner was by candlelight and was a pasta soup followed by rice and a spud, tomato and other stuff dish.  It was very nice, but not as nice as lunch.  We're now sitting on the felucca by the light of one candle and are watching the cruise ships go by.  There is a steady stream of them and apparently they keep going till about midnight.  They're quite noisy so I'm glad they don't go all night.  We are waiting for the other group to finish their dinner, then we're going to have a fire and the crew are going to play some drums for us.  I've been for a visit to the tent toilet.  I'm tall enough to see over the tent side when I'm sitting down, so I'm now going to refer to it as the room with a view. 

Morning, early morning
Something is very wrong with this trip.  I've seen two sunrises and woke well before sunrise this morning.  The orange light of dawn breaking over the Nile was worth the lack of sleep.  The bright yellow of sunrise about half and hour later was even better.  Everyone was still sleeping (or pretending to at least) so I went for a quick refreshing dip and then waited for everyone else to get up and cook us some breakfast.  We cast off and then a lovely spread of pancakes with bananas and honey as we again drifted.  There s a small bit of wind now so we're semi drifting and semi sailing.

Temples, Mickey Mouse and pipes

At 3.15am when the alarm went off, I was wondering whose stupid idea this was.  But I trudged like a zombie out to meet the group and we all hopped into a van.  It is a three hour drive through the dessert to see Abu Simbel and it is done in convoy with an escort from the police.  This conjured up images in my mind of a line of vehicles moving in an orderly line through the dessert with an armoured car (perhaps a tank?) at each end and dust flying as we drove past dangers unknown.   In reality, a policeman gets in to the first and last vehicle and off everyone goes on the nicely tarsealed road, overtaking at will, driving on the wrong side of road as it takes their fancy.  There are no dangers unknown, the convoy is in case someone breaks down so that help can be provided immediately and passengers off loaded to one of the bigger buses.  With seven of us in the van, we were able to spread out a bit and I dozed for much of the trip occasionally surfacing to look at the dessert and catch the sunrise.

We arrived at Abu Simbel at 7am and it was already quite hot as we sat outside the main temple while Mohammed gave us an explanation of the temples (he's not allowed to do that inside).  The detailed carving of the four huge statues perched on thrones outside the temple is amazing and the inside is covered in carved pictures of various scenes, many of which relate to making offerings and mythological stories. 

The temple was constructed by Ramsses II and the second for his beloved wife Nefertari who died at a young age just when the temple was completed.  Old Ramsses II continued to the ripe old age of 92 and had about 50 wives and nearly 200 children.  These were up there with some of the best temples I've seen on this trip - especially as they are not in their original site.  The damming of the Nile meant that these and about 20 other archaeological sites were in danger of being drowned.  In the 1960s they were moved to protect them in a complex operation.  Abu Simbel and the Philae temple (which I will get to later) were the biggest ones that were moved.

It was then back in the van by 10am for the convoy back to Aswan.  The Philae temple is just out of Aswan so we stopped there on the way back.  Entrance is 12 Egyptian pounds but the funny thing is that it is on an island  and the price of the boat is not included in the ticket.  The Philae temple was moved from another island and took 10 years.  The temple of for Isis so that she could visit her dead husband Osiris as his mother had taken his body on the back of a crocodile to a nearby island so that he could have some peace and quiet.

There was time for a swim and a greek salad by the pool at the hotel before we were back in the boat to find our camel ride.  Cathy and I had a camel ride in Morocco and it was not that pleasant (especially as Cathy's camel had a mind of it's own and kept taking off).  The ride in Giza was mostly just hot.  So goodness knows why I was doing this again.  But it was quite nice.  It was a slow walk through the dessert in the early evening to see the sunset.  The others were on camels called Ramsess, and Moon and the like.  I was on Mickey Mouse.

We then had a nice dinner at a restaurant on the Nile followed by a sheesha pipe (we tried mint - yuck, apple - nice, pmiceach - nice, and cherry - ho hum).

Sleepless in Aswan

Leaving Cairo on a midnight train.  Ok, so the train left at about 9pm and it was all fairly mild and undramatic.  But this is what I wrote at about 9am:

"The train, it seems, needed a new engine sometime in the night. Hence we are running 4 hours behind schedule.  But it does mean that we get to see quite a bit of scenery - and it's much nicer than dusty, dirty Cairo. There seem to be a lot of corn fields. And donkeys. There are cars and bikes on the road, but also a lot of donkeys pulling carts.  Despite oil being one of Egypt's major industries, there is apparently a shortage of fuel so for those farmers with donkeys, this is not a worry.  I get the feeling it is not the the fuel shortage that determines their mode of transport The scenery seems to be crops (mostly corn or something similar) or sand. It has something to do with where the flood plains begin and end."

Then I got distracted and didn't write anymore.  We had whiled away the evening playing Shithead (quite good card game despite the name) and, sadly, I ended the game with the toilet paper crown.  I had slept the night much better than I'd expected, still I was quite tired so we lazed about on the bunks until the last possible moment. 

We are staying in a quite nice hotel right next to the Nile.  It has a pool which I tried out today before the camel ride.  But I'm skipping ahead.  After we'd settled into the hotel we were picked up in a motorboat from in front of the hotel and Achmed told us some history of the Nubian people and Elphantine Island.  Some of it was quite interesting, but I didn't really take much in.  Then we went to a 'beach' on the Nile for a paddle, some Nubian coffee and a walk up some sand dunes.
me
We had dinner in JJ's home and we wandered the aromatic (i.e. smelled like farm animals) streets of his village and arrived at his house.  We were then invited to walk around his house and take pictures.  Never mind the younger sister asleep in one of the beds.  We were combined with another group for dinner, which was a very very nice lentil soup (hard to believe, I know), followed by a vegetable tagen, rice, fish, chicken and salad.  Also homemade mango juice and lemonade.  The after dinner entertainment was JJ's description of Nubian courtship and marriage.  He is a bit of a story teller so it was quite entertaining.

When we returned to the hotel, there was a wedding in progress.  Weddings include lots and lots of drums, which is not good when you have to get up at 3.30am.  Surprisingly, I slept quite well until I woke up some time in the night worried about not waking up on time. 

I still haven't told you about the camels, but I'll leave that for the next post as I'm a wee bit sleepy.

Cairo

It's been a long day - and we've yet to catch the night train to Luxor.  I met the tour group this morning - two british sisters, a couple from Seattle, and of course Anita my roommate who I'd already met and who talked me out of my pjs and into a drink on the roof last night.  Our guide is Mohammed.

I'm sure there are lots of things to see in Cairo, but I'm only here for a day so it was all about ancient Egypt.  First stop was the Pyramids and we went inside the grand pyramid.  It starts off well, then gets lower and stepper before opening up to a very high corridor and a bit of a climb.  It wouldnt't have been so bad, but it was also quite hot so I was definitely 'glowing' when we came out.  There are three big pyramids - Khufu, his son and someone's grandson.  There are 6 other much smaller pyramids for the womenfolk.   We took lots of photos, checked out the spots where the pharoah's boats were and then rode camels.  I wasn't overly fond of camels when we rode them in Morocco and my opinion remains unchanged.  Give me  a horse any day.  But we were led about, had our photos taken and they were all amazed that my legs were long enough to easily get on to the camel.  Final stop for that area was the Sphinx for a look through the temple and photos of the Sphinx.  We stopped for falafel and then onto the museum. There were lots of cool stuff there and Mohammed told us lots of information about it all.  The highlights were all the Tutankhamen stuff.

Right next to the museum is a quite big high rise building that has been burned and gutted.  This used to be the headquarters of the previous government party. 

I feel like I should have lots of stuff to say, but I'm mostly just hot and tired.  Perhaps I might have another go tonight on the train.

Ugh, I hate the first day in a new country

New country, new language, new alphabet.  Next holiday I'm gonna limit the number of languages I need to grapple with.  The flight out of Istanbul was delayed as we hung out on the tarmac for an hour waiting for the traffic jam to clear.  I was just thankful that I was on the plane because when I checked in they told me that I didn't have a booking.  It was only when I produced the paperwork that they found me a seat - a nice aisle seat in the exit row so I guess I can't complain.

As I was making my way towards the baggage claim, a man asked me if I needed a taxi and said he was authorised by the government to help me.  That sounded like a load of bollocks to me, but I did need a taxi and the price he quoted sounded about right.  Unfortunately, it wasn't a real taxi - just some guy with a car who took me to the wrong hotel and then spent the next half hour asking someone every 100 metres where my hotel was.  But who knows if a 'real' taxi would have been any better.

Between the late flight and the trouble getting to the hotel, I missed the welcome meeting and they've all gone out without me.  Probably just as well as I'm grumpy and sitting here sipping my wine and looking at the night view of Cairo from the top of the hotel is exactly what I feel like doing.  I'll be up for cheerfully meeting new people and making small talk tomorrow.  My roommate for this trip is someone called Anita.  She went out and took the key to the room out with her so is not doing well in the the best roommate stakes so far. 

I've seen very little of Cairo so far.  The somewhat convoluted trip from the airport and the view from the hotel.  Living in NZ, you forget that much of the world lives in apartment blocks - and not the kind with a killer view.  I found myself thinking of the wise man who built his house upon the rock in the taxi.  It's funny how you don't question the ridiculous ideas you form in childhood until fully confronted with evidence to the the contrary.  I'd always figured that any fool would know not to build his house on the beach where all the sand is and that the wise man wasn't really all that wise.  But we're a long way from the beach in Cairo and there's still a shitload of sand about.  Not many rocks thought so I'm guessing the wiseman was also quite rich.

There's been a bit of unrest here recently - something about a film - so I'm quite pleased that I arrived on a Saturday.  Apparently, Friday is the day when most protest and riots happen as this is the muslim equivalent of Sunday.  I'm getting used to seeing men with big guns just standing around.  Anyway, I think the taxis are a bigger risk.  Last time I was in a beeping country, the taxi driver had an accident.  This is worse.  In South America they beeped before running a stop sign or going round a corner.  Here, it's pretty much constant.  I take from this that no-one uses rear vision or checks their blindspot before moving.  It's a bit disconcerting, but for the most part, the traffic is going to slow for any major damage.

Dinner eaten - check (vegetable lasagne, but I couldn't see anything egyptian on the menu)
Wine drunk - check
View admired - check.
Eavesdropped on neighbouring table talking about Peter Jackson's accent -check.

Must be bedtime.  Now I just have to find someone to open my room.  Sigh.

(PS - on the plus side, I just had very nice meal and a very average glass of wine for the equivalent of NZD10 - including tip.)

"I'm sexy and I know it"

Ok, so it's an odd title for a post about Istanbul, but the taxi driver decided to play this on the way to the airport - just after he offered me a cigarette.  He didn't speak any English so I'm not sure if he understood the words of the song.  We did have an interesting conversation in which I tried to interpret what he was asking.  I ended up telling him that I was Australian, because he just looked confused when I said I was from New Zealand.  Harry Killim (or something) was his grinning response.  Thanks to my evening playing backgammon with a Turkish man the night before, I knew that ol' Harry is an Aussie who plays soccer for one of the best local teams.

I'm eating an outrageously expensive burger king sundae so that I have a place to sit while I wait for check in to open.  The nice coffee place didn't have any seats left and the restaurant looked way too posh for my backpack.  I'm quite sad to leave Turkey - there is so much that I haven't seen, especially in Istanbul. 

I should have seem more.  I had time to see more, but I just wanted to chill out and relax in my last couple of days in Istanbul.  I did go to Topkapi Palace on Thursday morning with Jennifer once the rest of the tour had arrived back from their bus trip and we'd all said our goodbyes.  Topkapi Palace is huge and there is lots to see.  It is, however, overrun with tourists to the point that I was feeling very closed in (Frances would have hated it).   We paid the extra 15 lira and saw the Harem.  The heirarchy amongst a group of women who were essentially slaves is interesting  - all determined by whether the Sultan wants to have sex with you and whether you get pregnant with a son.  Still, I think the eunuchs had it worse.

Part of the display is the holy relics including Moses' cane, David's sword, John the Baptist's arm (in gold/brass/?? casing).  All of the prophets down to Mohammed.  Then there is the treasury full of lots and lots of bling and quite a few thrones.  The mass of people was really starting to get to me by then so I did a very quick circuit peeking over people's shoulders and not really reading what anything was.  Wandering around the gardens and the tile and fresco filled rooms was nice, but I could easily have given the whole palace a miss.  There was way too many people and I have enjoyed some of the other museums and sights I've seem on my trip far more.

Jennifer and Edwin were also staying an extra night so I caught up with them at the Mikla bar which has a fantastic view across the city (thanks to the recommendation from the Aussie lawyers) and very expensive drinks.  We then had dinner at a very nice restaurant right beside the Galata tower and I finally go to try the turkish ravioli.

I had planned a cruise on the Bosphorous the next day but I just couldn't find any enthusiasm so I browsed through the shops near where I'm staying and then toddled off to see the Istanbul Modern art gallery.  After spending weeks seeing old stuff, the gallery was a refreshing change.  A couple of the works stood out:
- the gallery has a library and books speared with wire form a fake ceiling - I'm gonna steal that one I think.
- as you enter, there are five tv screens showing some green variously shaped widgets moving to a repeating descending tonal beeping.  As you walk through the rest of the gallery, you can still hear the beeping
- there are a lot of video arts.  One that is most impressive is a picture of a building with while curtains blowing out the windows all the way along.  With the accompanying music it is quite peaceful and restful - until the very end when it goes dark and you hear explosions and see their flash.  The description (which I read after) tells that it was secretly filmed by the artist in 2005 when her Beirut hotel was under UN protection due to the fighting. 
- they had a temporary exhibition about urban walls in which artists have replicated/ taken inspiration from graffiti and other things that appear on the walls of city streets.  The pieces are collected from around the world and were done at different times.

I managed to squeeze in a shopping trip at the Grand Bazaar before my final evening in Istanbul, which was a dinner tour that I had been given free when I booked the Turkey tour.  I arrived at Intrepid office and discovered I was the only one doing the tour.  Salih, a 23 your old just recently graduated from his tour guide degree, was my guide for the evening and we headed off to have dinner with a family.  The family are kurdish from eastern turkey and there had just recently been some terrorism activity there.  Talking to Salih, who has just had a friend killed in an attack, it seems an impossibly complicated situation where one brother will 'go into the mountains' and join the terrorists while another brother will be in the army.  Many of the kurdish people know some of the terrorists as well as some of the people they are killing. The dinner itself and the family were very nice, but it is an odd situation when you don't speak the same language and Salih translated everything and you have very little in common to talk about.  I enjoyed the second part of the evening much more when we went to a cafe, drank tea and played backgammon.  A hookah pipe was included, but I declined and stuck with tea.

Flying with the birds and down to 42 below

I've been having way too much fun so haven't posted in a few days but the end of the tour is near and I'm relaxing under the verandah in the hotel waiting for my transfer to the airport to arrive.  The rest of the people are taking a 12 hour bus trip but I decided that was a bit of a nightmare and managed to find a cheap flight.

I think my last post was after Kas and we spend a night in Konya after that.  There's not much to say about Konya apart from the felt making demonstration we went to - way more complicated and time consuming than you would think - and the museum.  Whirling dervishes are big in Konya and there is the tomb of Mevlana who is big in dervish circles.  I have seen his tomb so this means I will have a long and happy life.  Combined with Cleopatra's pool of youth in Pamukkale, I'm pretty much set.

The highlight of Goreme has been the hot air balloon ride.  We were up before dawn yesterday morning and then sat around in a room waiting for nearly an hour (what a waste of sleeping time!) before heading out in the van.  We were with Graham, and englishman with 30 odd years ballooning experience.  We were up in the air just in time to see the sunrise and then floated for about an hour looking at the rock formations, grape vines, pumpkin fields and drying grapes below.  Some of the best photos are of the other 80 balloons that were up at the same time - about 1500 people in the air.  Graham thought that it was too congested and stayed away from the other balloons as much as possible.  On landing, four men grabbed onto the side of the basket and stopped it from turning over.  I  thought they were a bit skinny for the job.  Cherry juice and cheap bubbles finished the trip.

On the way from Konya, we stopped in an old caravan shelter on the trip to Goreme, and that was interesting for a short stop.  The shelter's were so important for trade that everything in them was provided free by the  Sultan.  This one is on the silk road.

Goreme is a nice little tourist town full of cafes (including one that makes a decent flat white!), restaurants and tourist shops.  This seems to be very much a backpacker destination rather than a British tourist enclave like some of other destinations.   We went out to dinner last night and had pottery kebap which was quite interesting.  Then we went to Fatboys bar for a few drinks and trying the hookah pipe (we had apple flavoured).  It was quite nice and I felt very chilled out but not sure if that was the wine or the hookah.

Cappodocia is full of interesting rock formations - those of you who have seen my facebook pictures will know that some of these formations are a wee bit phallic.  People made their homes in these and you can stay in cave hotels still today.  The open air museum we visited is full of churches some of which have fantastic frescos on their walls.  Apparently they had to keep the churches secret because of the frescoes as icons - even in paintings - were considered to be sinful.  The churches were quite small and there were lots of people so we started taking turns peeking inside to see if it was worth the others making the effort.  They are quite interesting but they start to look a bit same-ish after a while.  We did a bit of a hike to one of the valleys with rock formations yesterday and went quad biking to a few other locations today, including one which dominates the skyline at Cavisun (or something like that).  I accidently went off-roading on the bike for a wee bit, but it was a quite fun, if dusty, way to spend the morning.

Yesterday we also went on a trip to Derinkuyu which is this big underground city.  It is from a something or a rather century BC and was build by the Hittites who were clearly quite short.  It was only used for protection during times of war but it is quite a large city. They have excavated 8 floors and there are apparently 13 into total (or was it 14?).  It was really interesting but very low ceilings in places.  Ozan told us that if went round this one semi-circular tunnel three times we'd be lucky in love and then once we'd all done it told us he'd made the whole thing up!  We went down to the 7th floor which is about 42 metres down.  If I'd planned ahead we could have drunk some 42 below vodka.

Pink couches and logic puzzles

I think I finished my last post while sipping coffee and sitting in the sunshine on the back of the boat.  Things only got better from there.  Breakfast was delicious especially this nice poached eggs and yoghurt thing (much better than it sounds).  The rest of the day was much of the same.  Lots of swimming and eating and lying in the sun.  We saw the sunken city but the water wasn't really smooth so you couldn't see very much.  You aren't allowed to swim or dive in the city because they want to preserve it.  But it seems that a steady stream of boats motoring past a hair's breath from the ruins is perfectly ok.

The area is all part of the old Lycian area and there was an old cemetery and castle thing so we wondered around there for a while.  I climbed a rock and made the mistake of putting my hand on a plant and then spent the next half hour pulling out prickles from my palms.  The cemetery is quite impressive.  It's a couple of thousand years old and a number of the graves are still mostly in tact.  They have upside down boat hulls on them to signify the person inside was a sailor.  The only disappointment was that we didn't really sail.  The skipper did put up the main sail and the gib on the trip home but he still had the motor going and he was really a bit crap at the whole sailing business.  The gib was flapping around all of the place and would occasionally collapse all together.

We spent our evening in Kas and just had dinner, a wander through the town and then a few of us had cocktails on a big pink couch.  I still felt like I was rocking slightly when we went to bed - and not just from the rather strong cocktail I had consumed.

Yesterday (Sunday) it was nightmare travel day.  We were picked up from the hotel in a largest van and spent nearly 4 hours in it to Antalya.  It was quite a nice drive along the coast where you would come across little beaches and inlets along the way.  I really wanted to stop and go for a swim.  The bus from Antalya to Konya was  a bigger bus and more comfortable but it was more than 5 hours which was  a bit hideous.  The scenery was quite nice - but not really enough to keep you occupied for 5 hours. 

Our achievements for the day were solving several logic puzzles that Charlie set for us, naming all 50 states of America and most of the African countries, and teaching several of the group to play yuka.  We could have done NZ provinces, but I don't think even I could name all of them so that seemed a bit too challenging.

One of Charlie's logic puzzles to keep you thinking:

A prison guard decides to give his inmates an opportunity to be set free.  He has a room with a switch that has two settings: on and off.  He will randomly select the prisoners to visit the room and it is possible that one prisoner could visit the room more than once before some prisoners have visited at all.  He will set the prisoners free when one person comes and tells him that all the prisoners have visited the room but if they are wrong, the game ends and they must all stay in prison.  The only communication the prisoners have is the on/off switch and they have no other way of finding out information.  All the prisoners are allowed to meet beforehand to discuss their strategy.  What should their strategy be to ensure that they go free?

Livin' it up on the Med

The start to the day was not particularly exciting - a van to the bus station and then a two hour public ride to Kas.  The countryside we  drove through looked quite like home with pine forests, poplar and gum trees, and the odd cow scattered about.  There was also a large number of glass (plastic) houses and when you looked out across the plains from the hill, the glass houses covered most of the available area.  But we left the plains behind, crested a hill and there was the sea looking lovely and blue and inviting. 

After lunch and a brief wander through the shops in Kas, it was all aboard and off to sea we went. The Selin-3, from the aft of which I am writing at the moment, is a cross between a yacht and a launch.  There are two short masts and they have sails on them all ready to go, but I have yet to see them up.  It's very wide practically from the bow to the stern.  We motored for about an hour or so and then stopped for a swim and a snorkel.  The water is so warm and quite salty so I just float with very little effort.  There weren't many interesting fish, but it was still nice.  We then motored for another couple of hours into a nice sheltered inlet. 
Along the way, Jennifer caught four fish, I caught one tiny wee one, and one of the crew caught one. 

Apart from that we just lazed about and saved our energy for another swim when we arrived.  Lisa dived in and forgot that she had her sunglasses on so the skipper, Osmon, donned flippers and mask and after several attempts surfaced with them on his face (to much applause).  After a very long swim, it was a busy evening of playing cards, learning backgammon (or relearning, I think Grandpa taught us when we were kids), eating a fabulous meal including the fish we had caught, and generally chilling out.  The highlight was a trip in the dingy (inflatable) to a big cave where the phosphorescence was fantastic.

Our sleeping quarters were on deck and four of us were on top of the cabin on little mattresses.  I was a little worried that I was going to roll off on to the deck and into the water and wake up with the fishes in the morning but someone swapped with me so I wasn't on the edge.  We looked up at the stars (the rest had a cover over them) and I saw about 6 or 7 falling stars before I went to sleep.  And then woke and turned.  And then woke and turned....  At about 6.30am Justin suggested a swim and we slipped into the mirror flat water.  It was still warm (with the occasional cold spot to keep you awake).

I'm now sipping coffee (instant but beggars can't be choosers), sitting in the sun and listening to the sounds of breakfast being prepared.  It doesn't get much better than this.

Ghost towns and falling skies

We left Pamukkale yesterday on an early bus.  Luckily we were first on as we all got seats on this public bus that took 5 hours.  An older woman got on later and decided that she wanted my seat so she sat on me and poked her stick into me.  I was about to slightly ungraciously offer her my seat but the tour guide offered her his.  It wasn't the most pleasant bus journey I've ever taken but it was bearable - especially as I had my trusty tablet and watched a movie after whiling away an hour or so playing cards with Mary.

We are staying in Kayakoy and we could have grabbed a taxi to the beach, but decided to chill out a bit at the hotel and then spend an hour floating in a nearby pool instead.  Dinner was a whole sea bass (or sea bream, I'm not quite sure) grilled on the barbeque followed by baklava and ice-cream.

This morning we set out at 8am to walk 6km of the 500km Lycian Way.  The first part of the walk was through a ghost town.  After the war of independence in 1922, there was a population exchange where Greek Muslims moved to Turkey and Christian Greeks living in Turkey moved back to Greece.  Many had lived here for generations and didn't really speak the same language as mainland Greeks so it all sounds a bit horrible.  The town of Kayakoy used to be a Greek village and when the Greek muslims came here they didn't like it and so built their houses on the below.  The village has been left to slowly decay.  The village was located on a hillside and not one house obscured the view of the other.  We then had a nice walk through pine forest and ended at the blue lagoon and at small village that is kind of part of Oludeniz where we spent the rest of the day.

The beach is one of those ones where you pay for a lounge chair and an umbrella, so we sat on the beach for our first swim.  The water was lovely but the stoney beach was a bit sore on the feet - especially as it was also hot.  After a walk through the town we decided to check out the blue lagoon.  It cost to get in but I really wanted to go for a swim there.  Sadly, when we got there, it looked awful.  Very crowded, full of and a bit dirty.  We swam on the ocean side instead and that was great.  I swam out to a small island and sat on the rocks for a bit looking at the yachts moored on the other side.  Then it was a beer on the beach as we watched the paragliders falling one after the other - the sky is full of them and they land right in the town so you have to keep your eye out when you're walking along the boulevard.  If we'd had longer, I would have been tempted to give the paraglider a go.  Ellie has just told me it's the second best place in the world to go paragliding after Rio.

On our way back to our hotel, we came across a small procession with a little boy all dressed up in white finery and riding a horse.  Boys in these outfits are quite common - they are on their way to get circumcised so their fathers look happy and proud and the poor kids look terrified.

White terraces

We've just arrived in Kayakoy and we have a lovely lightfilled (but fairly basic) room in one of the small family run hotels in this ghost town.  It's been a long morning travelling on a public bus - at one point another passenger was practically sitting on my lap. 

I had expected to see amazing sights on this tour; I hadn't expected Pamukkale to be one of them.  It looks like a couple of pools and a great big tourist trap in the pictures.  It is full of tourists, even at 4pm when we headed out.  It is basically a huge mountain of limestone in which pools have formed at various intervals.  Ozan says that they have formed naturally, but they look very man made to me.  You have to take off your shoes and then it's a gentle walk up the hill with a stream of water flowing down the rocks.  People in their swimming costumes are littered about the place as they let the water run over them or wade through the pools.  I set off to explore and was promptly told off by the guard for going off the path.  Back to the straight and narrow for me.  We spent quite a bit of time taking pictures and taking in the scenery.  It's like nothing I've seen before.

At the top of the hill, a sprawling Roman city once looked out over the pools and plains.  Bits of it still remain - the largest theatre in Asia Minor (very impressive), a graveyard (I didn't venture there) and the tomb of Philip the Apostle has recently been found there.  I instead decided to take the waters in a pool.  It is rumoured that Cleopatra bathed here and the wrinkles on her face just disappeared.  I can confirm that the story is true as I look at least 10 years younger ;)

Unfortunately, I took too long in the pool and missed the sunset, but it was a nice walk down in the light of dusk and then dinner by the pool at the hotel.

John's (the apostle's) tomb and more piles of old rocks (Ephesus)

I'm mid train ride to Pamukkale (the first half of which I spend reading a gossip mag that someone lent me - sad to say but the rumours that Dannii and Kris are getting back together are unfounded) where we will stay in a crappy hotel, but it has a pool.

Selcuk was a nice town but we only had time for a wander including a nice mosque with a garden courtyard, dinner and a drink after the long bus ride and all the exploring was for the next day.  St John's Basilica, or what's left of it, is in the town itself.  When Jesus was crucified, he committed his mother Mary into John's care and apparently they ran away to Ephesus.  John's tomb is there and some nice ruins including a baptismal and the ever present columns with a great view out across the valley.  Mary's house, the location of which was revealed by some Nun in Belgium (well, one of those European countries anyway.   Bulgaria maybe?), is a 7 km walk so we skipped that.  The museum is small and full of statues.  I might have been more impressed if I hadn't just been to Greece.  It does however have a couple of statues of Artemis covered in either breasts, eggs or fruit.  They symbolise fertility and that depiction of her is unique to this area.  Artemis is a key deity of this region and the Temple of Artemis in the town is one of the seven wonders of the ancient world.  All that is left is one column (and that's been rebuilt).  According to Lisa (our resident classicist) some guy wanted  to be famous, so he burnt the temple down to gain infamy.

We had lunch at a pancake house and watched them being made - a couple of the group had a go at making them as well.  I was just doing my best to avoid looking at all the flies.  It was one of those sit on the floor on cushions kind of table which is quite comfortable but hopeless for eating.  The pancake is slightly out of town and is right next to the site of the seven sleepers - seven guys running from people persecuting Christians slept there for three hundred years (lazy bastards).

Next was the highlight of Selcuk, Ephesus.  The ruins are quite large and are from Roman times.  The usual suspects are there: baths, agoras, temples, fountains, theatres.  It was quite a hot day and I was glad that we had waited till late afternoon to visit.  The highlights for me were:
- the latrines.  Yes, you can giggle.  I laughed and gave some fake enthusiasm when Ozan told us our next site.  I was very sternly informed that they were a vital part of the Roman life and pooing together was an important ritual - this sent me into gales of laughter (and earned me more stern looks).
- the road (Ceretes St I think) which is nothing special but looks very cool - as does the road to the harbour (unfortunately the ocean is now 3 km away so it is a road to nowhere at the moment)
- the frescos and tiles in the terrace houses.  You have to pay extra to see these, but it was well worth it.  Houses with delicate frescos in place of wallpaper and tiles mosaics in place of carpets.  This is also the site of the world's largest jigsaw puzzle and I was itching to have a go but I think you have to be an archaeologist to participate.  One of the other kiwis suggested scanning all the pieces and getting a computer to do it might be quicker (but less fun)
- the library - the facade is about all you can see and it has been reconstructed, but it looked like an ideal location to kick back and read a book (well, a scroll back then)
- the theatre was the biggest I have seen yet, but it has largely been reconstructed with concrete and much of it is inaccessible due to further work.

Dinner was in a small,very tourist but very pretty, village near Selcuk.  We stopped to taste some fruit wine first - I thought that the apple wine was very nice and sampled a full glass.  Dinner was unremarkable except for its very nice location and the moon rise over the hill.  We did learn from Charlie that a moon rise soon after sunset is always going to be a full moon (or near to it).

The train is quite comfortable with plenty of leg room and reclining seats (if I could just figure out how to make my seat go back).  The scenery is very agricultural - olive trees is all I can identify but there are paddocks full of other trees and crops. 

Food, hamam and dancing

I'm sitting on a bus on the way to Selcuk.  We've been on it already for five hours already with a half hour stop for lunch - a 'famous' cheese toastie which was ok but as much of a let down as welsh rarebit, and this funny foamy yoghurt drink which was quite sour but strangely good. We still have about two more hours to go in the bus.  Next time, I'm gonna travel in a really small country that doesn't take all day to get anywhere.

Friday night in Istanbul, we headed out to a nice fish restaurant and I have no idea where we were.  We were picked up by a van and he drove us on a zig zag through the back streets (from what I've seen so far, they are all back streets in Istanbul).  At the restaurant, there were people playing and singing and occasionally dancing.  A couple of them were across the street in another restaurant but I think they were playing the same tune.  It was  a very enjoyable meal and the waiter refused to let us leave until we had drunken our tea.

We spent the next morning travelling on a ferry to Mudanya and then a bus to Bursa.  I was a bit disappointed that we weren't allowed out on deck while the ferry was underway but we did get a nice view of Tokapi Palace.  Bursa was the capital at one time and is the centre of silk so we say window displays full of wedding dresses on our way in.  It also has sugared chestnuts (we tried some chocolate covered ones) and a hamam that used to be frequented by emperors.  Most of the group decided this was an experience not to be missed.  For 55 TL (about NZD 40), you get entry to the hamam, a scrub and a massage. 

I think hamams are all different but I will describe the one that we went to.  There are separate hamams for men and women.  You are given a room to change into your swimsuit (or not if you wish to, go au natural) and something the size of a tea towel to wrap yourself in.  You then enter a marble clad room about 6 x 4 metres with a low bench with sinks at regular intervals. You bath by using a small bowl to scoop water over yourself from one of the sinks, before entering the large very hot pool in the centre - there is an even hotter pool at one end of the room but I didn't venture here.  At one end, there are two low marble coffee tables.  Well, that's what they look like.  You climb onto one of these (in full view of everyone else) and the attendant (also clad in her bikini) removes your bikini top and then scrubs you down with an abrasive oven mitt - back and front - I was a little worried she was going to scrub my nipples off.  You're allowed to keep your bikini bottom on but she exposes your bum to everyone and then gives you a wedgie when she is doing your legs.  You then sit up on the side of the coffee table and she does your arms.  It's then back down again and she covers you in soap and give you a massage - front and back again before sitting you up and using bowl fulls of water to wash you off.  It was very nice but I had a challenge to not giggle in parts (I'm sure you can guess which).  Apparently the men's hamam was quite different - and they had male attendants.

We were picked up in the evening by a local gentleman who took us to his regular tea shop where he and his friends were having  a bit of a jam session in  a back room (it seems that this is a regular pastime after work for the men) and then back to his place where his wife had cooked a very nice meal.  It was great to have a vegetarian meal for a change.  Next we walked down to the dervish house and sat around in a room full of genie lamps listening to a sermon projected on the screen outside.  It was in Turkish of course.  Then it was time for the show.  The men sit downstairs and the women upstairs and then men in long dresses (I'm sure they're called something else) whirl - for ages.  They just keep going round and round and round without getting dizzy.  Each time they turn they are saying the name of Allah and it is apparently a form of prayer.  It also looks really cool with their skirts whirling round.  It finished with a prayer - again I have no idea what the prayer said, but it was very reminiscent of being in a Christian church.  There were very few tourists there other than ourselves and the women who we were crammed into the upstairs with were all very welcoming and nice despite that language barrier.  It was an enjoyable evening.

Let lose in Istanbul

The tour has begun and they look like  a good crowd.  Three lawyers from Perth, a British journalist (who I'm sharing  a room with), an older couple from Canberra (occupation unknown), an academic from Canada, a Pharmacist from Chicago, a student from Holland, and a couple of vets from New Zealand who are currently living in the UK.  Most of us went out to dinner last night at a restaurant looking over the Hagia Sophia and then for a drink at a place looking over the Hagia Sophia (it's a popular selling point).  Oh and Ozan, our guide, who studied for 5 years to become a guide - I'm hoping that this means he really knows his stuff.

Today we spend the morning with a walking tour of the highlights, including, some 18th century Ottoman houses, an alley way full of second hand book shops (mostly in Turkish), the Grand Bazaar, the Spice Bazaar, a visit into a couple of mosques including the Suleyman which was built to 'last forever' sometime in the 6th century I think and it has survived over a hundred earthquakes since with nary a crack,  and some history and then a few of us had freshly caught fish grilled and put in a sandwich (with too much onion).  It was delicious and only 5 TL (about NZD 3.50).  Then it was time for some serious sightseeing.  The Aya Sofya was originally a cathedral built under Constantine (360 AD).  The structure that is there today was constructed 200 years later and was then converted to a mosque in 1453 by Mehmet the Conqueror.  Ozan tells us that Islam is a very tolerant religion and christians are allowed to prayer in the mosques.  The Aya Sofya is now a museum.  The Blue Mosque, our next stop, is free entry and was therefore every full.  Before entering a mosque, you must remove your shoes and women must have their head covered.  The architecture and history of the mosque is interesting; the second class treatment of women inherent in the religion is not.

Lisa, the dutch student, is studying classics and on her urging we navigated out way to the "most important artefact in Western history".  It was a fairly short column on two entwined snakes that was constructed at Delphi to celebrate the Athenian and Spartan defeat of the Persians.  According to Lisa, if the Persians had won, all of Europe would look very different today.  The sculpture was later looted from Delphi and taken to Istanbul.

We stopped for a drink in a nice little courtyard place and rested our feet before tackling the archaeological museum.  It's quite a big place with exhibits in three different buildings.  The highlights are the sarcophagus of Alexander the Great and a collection of 'interested documents' that were c.2000 BC including the oldest love poem, a page from Proverbs, and some law code thing.

Gallipoli - mixed emotions

None of my family fought in Gallipoli, I have no reason to take it personally, but I have been surprised by my reaction to the history of the WWI battles. Turkey has also experienced a revival in interest in this region and the events of WWI so the area is well taken care of and there are regular reminders of their triumph and their heroes. They are rightly proud - and gracious in their victory - but I had forgotten that winners write history. When I visited Normandy, the stories were all told from the perspective on the Allies Here it is the Turks who talk of their matyrs and heroes and celebrate how they outwitted the Allies - quite spectacularly during the first offensive on Anzac Day when the Anzac troops could have taken Chunuk Bair if they had known that the 100 Turks they could see ready to fight were all of there was between them and their goal. But they didn't and months of fighting and thousands of deaths ensued and very little was achieved.

The problem is that Turkey's great victory was our great defeat.  I don't mean 'our' as in the Allies, but our as in the Anzacs. However it was viewed at the time, many New Zealanders today view Gallipoli as a pivotal point in our identity. We remember our brave soldiers, we slate the Brits and blame them for our defeat, and we have an odd respect for the Turks who, as as kiwi I met on a plane described it, whipped our ass.

In the morning before the tour, I hopped in the car and set off to see Kalitbahir Castle.  It was closed for renovations but I found a nice old Turkish battlements and little museum. This reminded me that the Dardenelles were a significant defence point for a long time before WWI and was held at various times by the Venetians, Romans, Iranians and Byzantines until the fourteenth century before it settled into Turkish (under various names) hands. It's importance as a defence point for Istanbul, and the rest of the Ottoman empire down to the Middle East was precisely the reason the Allies sought to take it in WW1. The way the Turks tell it they joined the war on the German side because the British refused to deliver two warships they had promised and for which payment had already been made because they now needed them for the war. I think there was probably more to it than that.

The bus tour was for about five hours and visited the main sites for the Anzac troops - Brighton Beach (where they were supposed to land ), Anzac Cove (where they did land), Lone Pine (where 3000 Aussies died), Johnsons' Jolly, Chunuk Bair (the major site for kiwis) as well as one Turkish site. You can still see where the trenches were in some places and they were so close to the enemy. The small space in between, no man's land, is the gravesite for most of those who died - Turks and Allies. There was no way to retrieve the bodies so the number of graves does not represent the thousands who died - and the whole peninsular is littered with cemeteries.

Those that did get a grave were given a wood cross and in the 1950s these were replaced with proper gravestones.  Families were asked if they would like an inscription added.  Some of these are heartbreaking.  I started tearing up when I read them - not cool in front of a group of people so I stopped reading them and went back to Anzac Cove the next day where I could read them and let my eyes water without feeling like an idiot.   Some inscriptions seek solace in religion and commit the fallen into God's hands, others are very poetic, many speak of their sons having served their duty, died for their friends or are standard war memorial phrases. "Their name shall not be blotted out" was common.  There were moving especially when you saw how young these men were.  Some were spoke of pain still felt - 30 years on: " My only son", "we loved him then, we love him still".

The Allies eventually won the war and took the Dardenelles and sailed the fleet up Istanbul.  But just like Chunuk Bair which the kiwis took at huge loss of life only to have it recaptured two days later when they have been relieved by the British, Musafah "I'm not ordering you to attack, I'm ordering you to die" Kamel Ataturk led the Turks on a war of independence which they won in 1922 on this very day and returned the area to Turkish rule.

Turkey - first impressions

Two days in Turkey and I've really only seen the road to Gallipoli, Gallipoli, and the road back to Istanbul.  I'll do a separate post on Gallipoli but here are a few impressions so far. 

Perhaps I should have done some research on the driving rules before I arrived at Istanbul and picked up the rental car.  No matter, I've picked up the rules along the way:

- speed limits only  apply in the slow lane which is as rough a groom after a three day stag do in Vegas
- lane markings should be treated as more of a guideline than a rule
- oncoming traffic has the right to pass at any time and you should move as far as possible to the side of the road in case they choose to do so
- I never have the right of way and should let those crazy nutters go first
- they tell you when you have to slow down but they assume that you are smart enough to know when you can speed up again (which I did, immediately, almost)

The weather has been a bit cooler here so my toes no longer look like little sausages.  It's still nice and warm and there was a nice breeze on much of the Pennisula.  The food however is very similar - I was given a Greek salad with my Kebap last night (which looked nothing like a Kebap that I know, but was very tasty).  They also gave me a plate of what looked like green chillis.  I warily ate the end of one and yip, there were chillis.  The waiter looked quite offended when I didn't eat them but my mouth was on fire after that one little bite.

It's Victory Day in Turkey today to celebrate their independence in 1922 (I think).  There was a short ceremony not far from my hotel room this morning with all the military brass out on display. I think they started with the national anthem as everyone in the street stopped while it played then carried on about their business when it finished.  Kind of like a flash mob - but without the dancing.

Have arrived at my hotel in Istanbul and I'm sharing with Mary from the UK.  She gets an extra 4 weeks holiday every four years and is quite well travelled.  Hopefully she'll be a good roommate.

Reflections, credits and bits I missed on Greece

I've said goodbye to Greece and I'm on my way to Turkey.  Greece is a lovely country and I am particularly enamoured with Athens - perhaps because of my three Greek friends - Marcella, Despoina and Kostantinos - all of whom helped plan my trip and made Athens special.  Marcella met me at the airport and spent the best part of three days showing me the sights, adding colour to them with her own stories and knowledge, and put up with my jetlagged state.  Despoina made me feel like a VIP with a special bottle of wine delivered to my room on my first day.  And Kostantinos had dinner with me in Plaka on my last night.  I particularly liked his description that Greek laws last about two months before people start to ignore them and go back to the way they did things before.  Both he and Yannis described the Greeks in a similar way - the 20 euro they have in their pocket may be all the money they have, but they will spend it to buy you a drink.

I had planned to spend my last day in Greece on Hydra but I was quite tired from all the travelling a couple of late nights so I decided to have quiet morning  in the studio apartment I was sharing with 4 strangers, a slow afternoon walk from near the Acropolis to Syntagma via some of the sights I had already seen and a nice evening walk with Kostantinos around the acropolis to Plaka seeing all the old stuff lit up at nice (and we ran into Yannis and a couple of people from my tour),  We have a fabulous dinner with a  mixed plate of meats - even Maurice would have been impressed by the size of the meal!  They refused to give me the bill until I had eaten the on the house nutcake (it's a tough life when you're forced to eat dessert).  In an aside, the in flight meal includes a quite nice applecake but I had a bit of a laugh to myself to see the label that describes it as homemade.  I have visions of some poor turkish grandma beavering away in a hot kitchen day and night to feed thousands of passengers daily.

There were a couple of stories that I forgot to include along the way so I might mention them now. 
- The Greek resistance during WWII was inspired by a couple of university students who snuck up to the Acropolis and raised the Greek flag in an act of defiance.   - The autonomy of their universities was so highly valued that the revolt against Turk rule was initiated as a result of their contravention of this autonomy.
- Greek figs are delicious when liberated straight from the tree by Yannis, not as nice (but still good) when bought from a street stall.
- There is an olive tree in Crete that is 2-3000 years old - and that's not even the oldest in the world.
- someone way back when, invented a cup to prevent his workers from demanding more grog.  If you fill it to the line, all good and you can drink away.  Fill above the line and the whole lot empties out the bottom.  The moral of the story: don't be greedy or you'll lose everything.
- Delphi is the centre of the world (aka the navel) and has a giant belly button sculpture to prove it - must have been an outie though.

Places of worship - the very old and the quite old

I've left the tour behind and am relaxing in a cafe waiting for my greek salad before I catch my train back to Athens later today.  The waiter has just have  me a nice jug of ice cold water and I am in heaven.  Needless to say it is hot today, again.  The main sights for the past two days have been Delphi and Meteora with a brief stop in the place where 300 Spartans (and 700 other fellas) held of tens of thousands of Persians for several days until they were betrayed.  The most interesting part of that brief stop was the bus driver getting told off by the policeman for doing a u-turn in the middle of the main road.

Delphi, the archaeological site is spread over three sites, two of which used to have the village of Delphi above them but the French government (or possibly the German) paid for the village to be moved so they could excavate.  The main attraction is the Temple of Apollo where the high priestess used to provide omens.  She had to be 50 years old with no remaining ties to her family and this was such a rarity, the women of the area were fed all the best food and treated with cotton will so as to ensure continuation of the priestesshood.  I think she was basic ally stoned when she gave omens.  Yanni describes the people who ran the temple as better than any intelligence agency today.  They would collect information so as to use it when people came to find out the answer to their question.  Answers were given in riddles and recorded so as to avoid any dispute if the prophecy was wrong.  People of all over Greece (from Marseilles to Turkey) would come to give offerings and seek to find answers to the future.  The site is rich in historical sources including a wall which was the gossip magazine of the day with events and news inscribed on it and some of the tablets with the prophecy riddles on  them have been found.  The museum was also interesting but mainly because of the stories that Yanni told about the scenes depicted on the statues.  There's a really old pottery thing which is supposed to be impressive but it was a bit like the Mona Lisa (I thought it would be bigger and more impressive).

* several hours later on the train back to Athens *

It's quite nice travelling solo although I do miss the nice comfortable bus.  Meteora is very picturesque and we visited an icon making shop before heading up to the nunnery (St Stephens) and then Varlaam monastary.  Then I hopped  of the bus and did a short but very hot walk up to the Grand Meteoro - the biggest of the six remaining.  The inside of each of the churches are very colourful with painted top to bottom walls and ceilings and painting of saints adorning the walls.  There are rules about who gets top billing and what scenes get depicted where.  Many of the paintings were done by Creteans.  Apparently the monasteries were very active in the resistance during WWII and so one was bombed by the Germans and has been restored by the Greek government.  The Ministry of Culture has three committees which distribute money for upkeep of the prehistoric, the classical greek, and the byzantine era historical sites. 

I had missed the 1.20pm bus and the next one wasn't until 5pm which would have meant that I'd miss the train, so I hitched a lift with a couple of nice Romanian couples back to Kalambaka and had a nice lunch before catching the train.  Despite emailing beforehand and being told that I didn't need to prebook, all the seats were gone so I'm sitting in the eating train.  Not terribly comfortable but I have a table so I've watched a movie and done a bit of reading.

The only thing so far to really annoy me on this trip has been a 69 year old man on the tour with us.  He was very touchy but at dinner on the second night he had his hand on my arm, my leg, my back, my shoulder all bloody night while he told a story about a time he was backpacking in Scotland and ended with him embracing me (the story was clearly complete bullshit).  It's just as well he is old else I would have been extremely unpleasant.  As it was I had a very brief and to the point conversation with him the next day when he was alone.  What annoys me is that I felt bad about telling the bastard that he was out of line.

It's dark on the train now and we still have a couple of hours to go so I think I'll watch another movie.

More old rocks and Hermes' nice arse

Day two of the tour was a lot more relaxed.  We arrived at Olimpia not long before the cruise ship tours arrived so the site was very busy.  The gym, the temples of Zeus (where one of the seven wonders of the ancient world, the 36 foot high statue of Zeus used to be), the temple of Hera in front of which the olympic flame is lit before each of the four olympics is held, and the memorial are the most impressive part of the site.  The stadium itself is just a long stretch of dirt and not much else.  I knew that the ancient olympics were males only.  I hadn't realised that there were also olympic games for women held in a different year than the men's games.  The women were clothed in their games, but the guys all competed in the all together.  After a women snuck into the games one year in 300 something BC, all 40,000 spectators also had to enter the arena naked to prove their manhood.  Only one woman was allowed into the arena - the high priestess of Dimitrius (I've spelt that wrong too) who was one of the few who had a chair provided.  The  judges had seats but the rest of the audience just had grassy slopes.

The museum at Olimpia has some very nice sculptures and artifacts including the winged statue of Nike (well, her wings have broken off), Apollo looking serene at the battle of the Lapiths and Centaurs, and Hermes who is looking very fine.  Apparently he would look even better with sunlight streaming down on his marble glory so you should all write to the museum and ask for him to be moved.

The drive to Delphi was broken with several stops, most of which were just for coffee.  We crossed the new bridge joining the mainland and the Pelonponese and stopped to watch a short video about the construction and to take a few photos.

This hotel is a bit nicer than the previous one, but the bed still looks a bit rock like.  But I had a nice swim before dinner which had some interesting conversation with the others on the tour.

On tour with grey power and a couple of Aussies

Thursday morning I said goodbye to Athens and hopped on a bus for a quick tour of the Pelonponese, Delphi and Meteora.  As I type, I am sitting on the bus outside a souvenir shop just out of Olimpia where we have tasted wine, olive oil and smoothed my hands with olive butter.  There are an interesting assortment of people on the bus which is fortunately half empty.  There's an Aussie couple from Brisbane who are about my age.  The other 10 are pushing 70.  There is a small spanish speaking contingent, a couple of Canadians one half of whom is a physicist from some facility at UBC, a couple of American guys one is an english professor and the other a psychairatrist, and a couple who I have not yet ascertained where they are from.

Grandma told me that the Corinth canal looked like a drain.  She was right.  However, Nero started its construction in 1 AD and then, according to Yannis our guide, gave up and went home and burned Rome.  We stopped for a few photos before heading to Epidaurus theatre.  It is still largely in tact and is one of the few that didn't have the circle of the dancers destroyed by the Romans.  The acoustics are amazing from the circle.  Napflion was a bit of a drive by to get a photo of the three castles.  There is one that covers most of a wee island out in the harbour.  A chain from that fortress to the mainland prevented enemy ships from entering and made it one of the safe havens for ship owners to harbour their fleet over the winter.

I have always thought that Greek culture started with the Ancient greeks that you hear all of the myths and legends about.  But the area has a very lively pre-history and Mycenae which is 34 centuries old is a fine example of this.  It was vaguely reminscent of the ruins in South America.  I had the obligatory photo at the Lion's gate and then we went exploring down to the spring that Yannis had specifically told us not to try and see.  The aussies had a torch on their iPhone and about five of us ventured down by this one tiny light. Ashley made it all the way to the bottom but wasn't impressed with the muddy pool so the rest of us just looked from above.  A nice surprise was the very intact tomb of Agamemnon (or whatever his name is) which is just below Mycenae. 

We then embarked on a very long drive to Olimpia where was stayed in a 'first class' hotel.  I don't think it has been refurbished since 1983 and the beds were as hard as a slab of rocks.  The food and service were great though.

Thursday: Athens - Corinth canal - Epidaurous - Napflio - Mycenae - Olimpia
Friday: Olimpia

Highlights of Athens - Scene II

I've seen a fair few theatres over the past few days and the Greeks are famous fo r their plays.  The theatre used to be attended all day over several days.  You  would see several tragedies and a comedy for each of several playwrights and  at the end the winner was proclaimed based on the loudest applause.  For my 'theatre' experience, I went to an open air theatre and saw Expendables II - so bad it was good.

But I was going to tell you about the food.  I am a big fan of souvlaki, our first night's dinner, and we had a great tasting plate for lunch at a taverna right next to the Roman Agora on Monday.  The courgette balls, grilled capisicum tomato balls were divine and the cheese balls,  lamb balls, dolmades, little sausages and cheese were also very nice.  The tomatoes stuffed with rice I had for dinner on Tuesday night were a little bland, but very nice with the feta that Marcella recommended I have with them.  Greek salad is everywhere and is just like the kind Mum and Frances make (except the greeks add capsicum which is a nice addition).

The churches have been a nice surprise.  Little byzantine ones dotted over the place, the white church on Lykavittos hill, even the newer churches look interesting (no glass clad monstronsities for the Greeks).  The metropolis cathedral was beautiful with it's blue and green marble from brazil and white pentali marble.  They are going to remove the blue and green marble as it has only been there 20 years and they are restoring it to the original.  There are paintings of saints in all of the churches and when people make requests of the saints they make an offering of a gold or silver addition to the painting - the Madonna get a halo, some are 'dressed' almost entirely in silver, the poorer people have a small card size offering which is tied to the painting. 

The sauna, I mean Metro, in Athens is fantastic.  Not only are the trains on time and frequent, but the stations themselves are quite nice - artwork is in most of them, some have excavations as integral parts of their strutures, and Monstraki station itself is quite nice.  I have had to learn to be rude though in order to get on and off the trains.

Wednesday was for trips out of Athens central.  Marcella and  I caught the Metro out to Faliro (?) one stop before Pireaus where we passed the peace and friendship stadium and then had lunch by the sea  - right be the sea, it was one foot away from our table and people in the neighbouring table were feeding the fish.  I had cod and ouzo (which is apparently a traditional combination).  I liked the ouzo, the fish was a bit dry and the potato garlic that came with it was awful (very strong garlic).  The mountain herbs were very nice - Marcella described it as herbs with olive oil and lemon juice - it tasted like spinach.

Later that day we caught the bus out to Cape Sounio.  The coastal route is nearly two hours long and it wends its way past beaches full of umbrellas and bobbing heads in the water, and people scatter on the rocks by the water.  Houses and hotels line the shores just about all the way to Sounio.  We, with about 100 other people, watched the sun go down from the Temple of Posidon.  It was very peaceful with a gentle warm wind and the strangers from all over the world around.  One brave chick was doing yoga to the sunset on a precarious looking rock, there was a romantic looking greek couple next to us, and one family taking 1500 photos of themselves with the sunset behind them.

* Lowlights *

There are signs of the financial crisis if you are looking for them but they are not obvious.  Empty shop fronts where buildings have closed, the national gallery which I visited on Wednesday morning is closed except for one floor.  I was talking to a greek woman while browsing in the shop and she explained that they can't afford the staff to open the other floors - which is a shame as I didn't get to see the more modern art, but I did see some very nice late 19th/early 20th century paintings. 

Jetlag blows.  I thought I was doing so well on Monday.  We saw a lot of the archaeological sites and then caught the funicular (cable car) up to the top of Lykavittos hill to see the sunset.  We escaped the crowd and had the steps mostly to ourselves and then made our way back to the top again in time to see the flag being lowered for the day.  We walked from the bottom of the funicular through Kolonaki (where the rich people live) and were going to get dinner.  But I was so tired I almost burst into tears trying to decide what to eat so I went straight back to the hotel instead.

Wednesday: sleep in :) national gallery, pireaus, cape sounio

Athens - Piles of old rocks

I had read somewhere that you could see Athens in a day.  You might be able to visit the most important sites, but you would see very little.  After two very full days - one with Marcella and one by myself - I have seen most of what I wanted to see.

The highlight for me was the Ancient Agora and the other buildings on this site.  Sure, the Acropolis is majestic as it looks out across the city demanding attention, but it's a look but don't touch site and there are always, quite rightly, scads of people.  Ancient Agora is a tree filled site with wandering pathways,  one of the most intact temples in Athens, and Stoa - long thin multistoried building - in which you can wander around .  It houses a museum with the ubiquitious statues and busts.  As I looked out from the second floor, I pretended I was Caesar's wife until I remembered she was Roman not Greek.  Besides which, Caesar had her killed. 

The museums in Athens are magnificent.  I saw the new Acropolis, National Archaeological, Keremeikos (cemetery) and the Ancient Agora museums.  You'd think, having a history degree, that I would love museums, but rows and rows of ancient vases and statues are kinda dull.  What I did like was the way that the artefacts are presented.  Restoration is part of the display - including on the sites, most of which had people working on restoration and excavation.  In the Stoa there is the occasional clear pane in a line of frosted glass that allowed you to peek into the areas where people were working.  The new Acropolis museum is built on an achaeological site and you walk over glass panes with the excavation below you.  This them of light and 'peeking' is continued in the rest of the building (don't wear a skirt!!)  Some of the statues are quite beautiful such as the Caryatids which you can watch being restored in situe.  There is an interesting video about the Parthenon and then, of course the replica of the Parthenon and the magnificent views up to the real thing.

Most of the women statues in the sites and museums are clothed and most of the men are in thier full, willie snapped off glory.  The few that still have their willies makes me very sorry for Greek women (-waggles little finger-).  Greek men have a hobby of 'harpooning' women tourists and comparing notes afterwards.  I wonder if they realise that the women also discuss their conquests and giggle at Greek men's lack of um....

Anyway, I have strayed from the highlights of Athens.  The food has to be right up there, but I have a date with an Art museum, Pireaus and Sounio so I'll have to tell you about that next time.  In the meantime, this is what I've seen:

Monday: Syntagma Square - National Gardens and zoo - Zappeio gardens and palace - Panathiniac (olympic stadium) - Temple of Zeus - Hadrian's Arch - Theatre of Dionysos - Herodes Odeum - Acropolis - old area?? - Monastraki -hotel - lycabettes hill - kolonaki - hotel
Tuesday: New Acropolis Museum - Monastraki - Roman Agora and Temple of the Winds - Ancient Agora - Keramikos museum and cemetery - National Archaeological Museum - hotel - traditional greek restaurant - open air movie.

Jetlagged in Athens

Cat Stevens is playing as I sip my cappaccino (looks like a flat white to me) on the top floor of Public (like Whitcoulls Queens St) and look out over Syntagma square.  So far I've seen Elvis standing on a guitar and Spiderman sitting on a stack of books - and that was just the first floor....

My hotel room is very nice and clean but a bit noisy.  I slept like the dead last night so it didn't really matter. 

Marcella and I went for a wee wander yesterday afternoon/evening.  I really just wanted to crawl into bed and sleep for a week, but I've made that mistake before.  Omonia square is where the rich people used to live but it is now the hang out for drug addicts and illegal immigrants.  It was deserted when we walked through it.  You can see signs of the protests and riots in the graffitti everywhere - some of it very violent and huge anti-police sentiments.

We say the National Library, the University of Athens headquarters and the Academy of Athens all in a row.  The graduation ceremonies are held at the headquarters.  There are statues everywhere.  Athena, goddess of wisdom, and Apollo, god of music and arts, sit atop the Academy which is undergoing some restoration work (like many of the buildings in Athens).  One of the statues in front of the University is Kapodistrias.  He was the first prime minister after they achieved independence from Turkey.  He tried to introduce potatoes to relieve the starvation of the greek people, but no-one was having a bar of it.  So he planted some in his own garden and stationed guards around it saying that they were exStremely rare.  As expected, people stole his spuds and started planting their own.

The old parliament buildings were next complete with a statute out the front of someone famous.  I can't remember his name but he is pointing to Lykavittos hill and apparently this is important.

Old stuff is all over the place.  We came across an byzantine church in the corner of a square.  It has a bell with a chain hanging down.  Naturally, I rang it.  (I'm  a bell ringer now too, Abi!)

By then we were a bit thirsty and peckish so we stopped at Everest (chain fast food) for a cheese pie before tackling the main shopping street.  It's sale season (so many shoes...) so lucky it was Sunday and everything was closed).  The sweet shop, however, was open and we bought some loukoumi (turkish delight) and the saleswoman explained about various sweets.  Mastich is very greek.  It comes from the sap of Mastich trees which grow on Chios Island (there have been bush fires there in the last few days and most of the trees have been burnt). 

Souvlaki was for dinner.  A very nice outdoor meal of mini kebab (domer souvlaki) and some greek salad.  The meal was marred a little by a very insistent beggar.  I was feeling dreadfully guilty but the restaurant owner told us that he was a drug addict and had refused food when he had offered it to him.

I was so tired that we caught the Metro back to the hotel and was in bed by 9pm.

Mum, it's been clear blue skies and a 'mild' 30 degrees  :)

In Transit

Flying half way round the world is kinda dull.  But I do have a wee bit of free time so a blog post seems in order.  I'm writing this from Dubai airport where I am waiting for my hot stone massage.  I am very pleased that I booked ahead as there are quite a few people being turned away as I sit here typing.  Some of them are none too pleased.  It's a little extravagant but after sitting in cattle class for the best part of a day I need a little spoiling.

I arrived at Auckland airport nice and early (thanks Mum and Maurice for dropping me off) and the departures board status told me to 'Relax'.  Ever obedient, I kicked up my feet in the gate lounge and rested my eyes for a few hours.  Plus points to Auckland airport for surprisingly comfortable seats to lie down on, minus points for no free wifi.

The flight was delayed due to a problem with the seats (one of the air stewards later told us that the plane was four years old and clearly in need of replacement - don't we live in a disposable world??).  My lovely seat with no one next to me was a casualty of the reshuffle and I had instead I had an indian chappy with a pointy elbow and a pertpetual need to go to the toilet.  Oh well, it was only a three hour flight and there was quite a bit of legroom.

Sydney airport transit was quite short but they still made me go through border control again and they made me skull all my water.  Free wifi was nice.

Marcus and his nephew Rodney were my new companions for the 13 hour (!!!) flight to Dubai.  They were on their way to the Ukraine to check out farming techniques (and here I thought men went to the Ukraine to find a wife).  Apparently they have tractors with GPS so that they can plant seeds in between the rows of the previous year's crop.  Marcus was very chatty, but I had to joking threaten to punch him in the face when he started rubbing my shoulder.

* a day later from my hotel room in Athens*

The massage was a good idea, but not as fabulous as I had hoped.  The room was a bit chilly.  But if was nice to be spoilt for an hour and I was able to have a shower afterwards.   Dubai airport is madness.  Crazy full of people and I was glad to leave.  I had a very nice kiwi girl next to me on the the flight to Athens.  Seats were hideously uncomfortable, movies were very difficult to watch but we did have the exit row seats so plenty of leg room.

I have been amazed at how relaxed the customs process is after Australia.  It's a bit of a push to get people to even look at my passport.  Greek customs consisted on the woman stamping my passport and that was it.  No baggage scanning, no questions, no 'where is your return ticket.  Just straight out the door where thankfully Marcella found me straight away and took charge of finding me a coffee (a frappe, served by a woman who was a bit surly until I asked Marcella how to ponounce thank you - Ef - ha - rist-o - and then she came up all smiles.   We caught the blue line of the metro in and changed at Syntagma to the red line to get to the hotel.