Day One Hundred - April 15 Good Friday

Having sailed through the Aegean Sea overnight we woke to a glorious sunrise in the Dardanelles Straights. With the sun rising it was then into the Sea of Marmara before we reached our destination of Istanbul on the Bosporus Straights.

The Borporus Straights is the link to the Black Sea and separates Istanbul between Europe and Asia. For you trivia buff,s I was surprised to learn that only 3 percent of the city is located in Europe. If I ever return to this part of the world it might be necessary to explore the Asian part of the city.

The bright sunshine allowed us to see the many mosques and minarets that adorned the city. With a population of 15.4 million people we could see many mosques from our ship.

The ship's arrival time was 13:00 with an overnight before we leaving Istanbul at 16:00 the following day.

"Important port information was provided in the Currents the previous night advising us that due to the the Turkish President visiting Istanbul and St. Sophia on Friday, heavy security as well as large local crowds were expected in the Old City. "

We docked at the new Galataport Istanbul cruise ship port that is the first of its kind in the world. Here passenger and luggage facilities have been moved underground as well as passport control and customs. Taxis, mini bus and ship tour buses have access to the terminal as well. The only drawback was the length of time it takes once you leave the ship to make your way to the outside. Defintely a state of the art cruise ship port that looked more like an airport than a ship terminal.

We had decided on a dinner and night tour of Istanbul with friends from the ship, Joan and Dick. Leaving the ship with them we wanted to find the ticket office for these tours. The outside information desk employees had difficulty with English and told us to walk basically in the wrong direction in search of tour tickets. We found a taxi service on our way and explained the situation to him and he said he would take us to the place to buy tickets. His car would not start initially so this did not look this a good omen.

Janice and I had already purchased tickets for the Topkapi Palace for 15:00 entrance so we needed to buy the tour tickets and then immediately proceed to the Palace. Janice and Joan left the taxi with the driver when we reached the location and the driver needed to leave the car running because he was not sure what would happen if the car was turned off.

Finally the tickets we purchased and we dropped Joan and d*** at the Grand Bazaar and the driver took us to Topkapi Palace. Here the security was at a premium as the Palace is on the same grounds as St. Sophia.

Unfortunately the tickets that were purchased diid not work so we are trying to resolve the matter with Visa.

We were blocked leaving the site as President Erdogan's motorcade drove directly passed us. I was surprised to see him waving to the crowd through an open car window.

We just wanted to get out of the Palace and find a place to eat.

A trip to Istanbul is not complete unless you visit the Grand Bazaar. A check of the internet reveals it covers 61 streets and over 4,000 shops. It is just a massive complex. You may may go into an entrance might and all of sudden you'r turned around and find yourself at another exit which happened to us.

Anything you want to buy you can find it at the Grand Bazaar.

A return to the ship was in order as we needed to get ready for the night tour.

Now what are the odds that the same taxi driver we had this afternoon was in front of the taxi stand when we left the terminal. Maybe he did not like the tip we gave him.

Not wanting to miss the boat and having waited fifteen minutes for a confirmed pickup that had not arrived we decided to walk to the pier associated with the night tours.

We actually walked onto the wrong ship but were helped by the crew to get us to the correct one. Dinner was held on the main deck with long tables on each side of the deck - at least twenty tables and forteen guests per table. They nearly had as many people on this small ship as was on our ship. A super Covid spreader if there ever was one as we were crammed in like sardines. The upper deck was for those smokers and anyone wanting to take pictures of the night surroundings. It was a lounge setting with couches and high tables so very cosy. On a positive note, we were tested the next day for Covid and our ship is still Covid free.

The serving staff came around to take our drink orders as well as dinner orders but when they started to deliver the food our table in the back corner did not receive any. It was nearly 22:00 so I decided to go upstairs and forget about dinner. The view and lights were stunning and we are glad that we got to see Istanbul by night. Janice and Joan also tried the local strong drink called raki Iit tastes like black licorice - -like ouzo but stronger.

A very strange day all round.