Wednesday 4 September 2013
Istanbul - Day 2
With my last grains of energy I'm writing this post :)
As Istanbul is so huge with about 16 million people, traveling always takes alot of time, with in between a lot of walking. To get to the European side we took the Vapur (after the metro) which is the local name for the ferry. I always find it quiet a luxery how you go for such little money on a little boat trip, it is also very relaxing.
We first went to Taksim, the name now will most likely be familiar to everyone, as this is the square where the Gezi parki is and where 2 months ago the protests started in Turkey. Things are calmer now, but people are still not happy.
This is the park that so many people protected, a little green place in a huge city where green is becoming a rare thing.
After that we walked the famous İstiklal Avenue which is directly connected to Taksim square and all buildings are old and have beautiful details.
After walking the İstiklal avenue we got in to the world's second oldest metro, the Tünel, which entered service in 1875. It is the world's second-oldest subterranean urban rail line after the London Underground (1863).
After more walking, and walking and walking we arrived at the Grand Bazaar, as you can not visit İstanbul without going there :)
On our walk back we went by an old cemetery with mostly graves of Pasha's, the headstones had amazing details and they were all lying in a lovely peaceful garden, such a garden in Istanbul is very luxurious even for the living :)
We went past Hagia Sophia (see an old blogpost about there) to a beautiful street called SoğukÇeşme street. All houses were old and made of wood, with still the old street stones it was like a time travel.
The houses were all hidden between trees, I loved the atmosphere.
In between I did also some supply shopping of course, so you can only imagine the state of my feet :) Tomorrow more!
Labels:
architecture,
city,
culture,
direngeziparki,
gezi parki,
grand bazaar,
history,
istanbul
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Beautiful city!
ReplyDeleteThanks for this lovely walk in Istanbul!It brings back so many memories!AriadnefromGreece!
ReplyDeleteThank you for the great tour! What an amazing city, I'd love to visit! I especially loved the wooden houses, the atmosphere is magical!
ReplyDeleteHugs!