Heading back to the hotel to avoid the midday heat I wanted to pass thru Aristotle Square first. This is a large plaza on the sea with a long boulevard cutting northward thru the city centre back to the park with the Roman Forum and Rotunda.

The boulevard is pedestrian only though motorbikes will still pass thru. It had upscale shops, trendy cafes, and tourist shops.

At the north end back by the park was a truck full of police officers. I ignored them and went about my way looking around at the bakeries and tourist shops. Then a couple of young officers standing beside me while I was looking at tourist magnets asked me for my ID

This turned comedic as I gave the male officer my UK Passport, told him I was a British tourist and not from Syria!. He spoke some English and checked my passport.

Then his female partner had to write my name and passport number it her tiny notepad. He had to respell my name in Greek so she could write it by pen in her tiny notebook. Very efficient. They also needed my father's name, so I tried to spell it to her but she didnt understand the english letters so he had to translate it to her.

If I was an actual illegal migrant I was hardly going to walk up to a truck full of police and start browsing tourist shops in midday. Use common sense!. Rather than be offended I found it all quite amusing. I guess they needed a quota of foreigners on their notepad so went to the most touristic part of town to find them!!

Back in the hotel I rested for a bit before heading back out toward the Haga Sophia which was due to reopen at 6pm. On the way back in the evening I stumbled across one of the Turkish Hammams (bath house) not indicated on google maps.

I'm not sure what the use is now but by early evening all the entrances were closed except for a plant store on the exterior.

Nearby the Haga Sophia Church was now open for the evening. The inside had impressive domed Byzantine architecture reminiscent of its parent namesake in Istanbul.

The artwork was faded and not as elaborate as some other Orthodox churches I had been to in the Balkans and Russia.

On my way back I stopped for some baklava. I had been thrown off earlier by the police check but now all the shops were closing so I had a hard time finding one.

After a long day exploring the many layers of Roman, Byzantine, Greek, and Turkish history, finally back to my hotel to rest before my bus tip to Macedonia tomorrow, on the refugee route, wondering if I will even make it with all the refugee border problems.