Istanbul, Turkey Day 1

Istanbul, Turkey -- March 2, 2015

Our itinerary was calling for Istanbul at 1:00PM today. After breakfast, I went to the Spinnakers and participated at their Sudoku Challenge and won second place. Lunch was at Cagney's where I tried their burger for the first time. Not as good as I liked it to be, the bun was too dry. While we were having lunch, the ship entered the Golden Horn and we had a table on the wrong side so we did not get a good view of the Blue Mosque and the Higia Sophia.

Istanbul is one of our favorite cities and we looked forward to be back at this amazing city. We were here on a land tour in 2013 which gave us a good idea of where everything is and planned on what we want to do on this trip. Our goal for this cruise was to cover the places that we missed when we were here last.

Musicians welcoming guests at the port of Istanbul.

Looking out from our balcony.

Important information to have when in port. A contact person just in case.

We left the ship at around 2:00. This was the only port that we scanned our sea passes to get in and out of the terminal.

As we walked out from the terminal, we made a right turn and found the tram station in the middle of the street. I was planning on getting the "Istanbulkart" but did not see a machine around. Later we were told that the card should be available at the newspaper stand on the other side of the street.

After waiting in line for a while, we finally got some tokens from this machine. The machine is only on one side of the station.

We were at the Findikli Station and we wanted to get to Sultanahmet. When exiting the cruise terminal, make a right turn and you will be going to the Findikli Station. If you turn left, it will be the Tophane Station. We were thinking that it would be better to get on the tram before everybody else who would be waiting at the Tophane station. The terminal is actually closer to the Findikli station than the Tophane station. We found that out later that evening when we came back to port.

It was quite crowded on the tram and we had to stand the whole time we were on it.

After getting off the tram at the Sultanahmet station we crossed the street to Hagia Sophia and walked around toward the back to Topkapi Palace. Topkapi Palace is closed on Tuesdays, so we had to go there that afternoon. (Hagia Sophia is closed on Monday.) Last time when we were here on the tour, we did not get to go to the Harem, so Harem was what we aimed for this time.

A quick photo of the Blue Mosque which we will skip on this trip.

Around the back of Hagia Sophia to the Palace entrance.

We tried to purchase our tickets using the machines outside so we wouldn't have to get in the long line at the ticket counter but the machines only took certain type of money without giving change. The guard even took out his own wallet to see if he can make changes for us but he did not have enough. After fumbling through our wallets we finally figure out that we had enough TL for the three tickets needed (30TL each). The guard told us to hurry in and go to the Harem first before they close.

Entrance to the palace

Entrance and ticket booth to the Harem on the left. Tickets to Harem is 15TL each.

Entering Harem

The Passage

Inside the Court of the Concubines

Prince's apartment

Beautiful tiles everywhere

We could see the Jade through one of the windows.

Courtyard of the Favorites

An excellent view of the Golden Horn from the parlor.

A good day with sunshine.

Baghdad Pavilion

We also went into some of the Halls of Treasury before exiting the ground at 5:00, closing time.

An armed guard near the gate.

Many vendors trying to get visitors to their carpet shops from outside the gate.

ChC wanted to sit around and wait for the sunset and that was what we did between Higia Sophia and Blue Mosque.

Then we walked up to the Grand Bazaar. Many interesting shops along this street.

Cemberlitas, Burnt Column

The Nuruosmaniye Mosque right next to the Grand Bazaar.

Inside Grand Bazaar

We stayed at the Grand Bazaar until almost closing time.

Then we took the tram back to port. Traffic was quite heavy even for the tram. We were stuck for a long time. Some passengers got off the tram and walked. Probably because of the delay, the stops posted on the tram was off which caused us to get off one stop too early. We just picked up the next tram back to Tophane.

The ticket machine

The Tophane station was a much longer walk back to the port terminal. As we were walking back in the dark, we saw two men having a heated argument and they ended up having a fist fight. Not something we expected so we hurriedly walked by with the other cruisers back to port.

Safely back to our 'home' and we had dinner at the Garden Buffet where they were serving prime rib that evening.