While Greg worked on the blog and relaxed in the cool interior of our hotel, Kerrie wandered off (she never can sit still for long) to explore the Topkapi Palace as she had been told it was one of the must do sites of Istanbul. Even though it was very hot the walk down to the Palace only took about 10 minutes and if you stayed in the shade it was fine. The Topkapı Palace was the official residence in the city of the Sultans for approximately 400 ye...

Monday to Friday 4 July to 8 July 2011. We arrived in Istanbul at the Hotel Nena around 8 pm and checked in. Fortunately Kerrie chose a hotel close to the centre of the old city with most tourist attractions within walking distance. Before we dumped our stuff and went for a walk to get the lay of the land and have a meal. It was 11.30 pm before we crashed, very tired after a full day of travel. Istanbul has also been fascinating to us. We both studied Ancient ...

Sat 02.04.2011 - The big day in the lives of many Australians and New Zealanders had arrived - a visit to the Gallipoli battlefields to pay your respects to our fallen fore fathers. We booked a tour of the Gallipoli battlefields with arrangements made through the hotel. It turned out our guide, "Bill", is mentioned in the Lonely Planet version of Turkey as one of the best guides of the battlefields. Bill speaks fluent English, but has never been outside of Turkey...

Tuesday 29.03.11 - No luck with the bikes. We were all called dutifully to Dave MILLIGAN's (owner of Get Routed) hotel at 10.00 am where we were to be told the next step.No news yet - come back at 1.00 pm for the next update - no news yet, Come back at 3.00 pm for the next update - no news yet come back at 5.00 pm. Is there a pattern emerging here? Waiting, waiting, waiting! Dave has two contacts in Turkey, another Dave who is an Aussie who is married to a Turkis...

Mon 28.03.11 - today is bike collection day. Wrong. A quick change of plans and we drove 85 km south to visit the ancient site of Efes which is supposed to be one of the best preserved Greek/Roman sites in the eastern Mediterranean. So with fellow travellers Darren and Phill, we headed off and checked it out. On arrival we parted with 7.5 Turkish lire (about $4 AUS) to park then another 20 lire to get in and then another 15 lire to see some terrace houses. Like...