Farewell Asia and Europe! Goodbye Istanbul. It's 2am, and we're getting ready to head home.

It's our last day in Istanbul, so we've been cramming in the activities. First off, we visited the Chora church, which had been turned into a museum. The small building has preserved Byzantine mosaics.

It was a busy Thursday evening in the pedestrian street of Istiklal in Istanbul.

We were so close. We wanted to go to Greece for the day. We bought ferry tickets at 8am for the Greek island of Samos, which is just a short trip away from Kusadasi, where we are staying. By 8:15, we were next in line for Turkish passport control when we were told that the ferry had engine problems and the day's trip was cancelled. We spent the day in Kusadasi; at the market, relaxing around town, and walking to a quiet beach outside of town. This is a pictur...

This afternoon, we flew from Izmir (Ephesus/Kusadasi area) back to Istanbul. Here we are crossing a bridge over the Bosphorus from Asia (left) to Europe (right). Our flight was filled with some kind of school group from Kazakstan and fans of the Istanbul football club, Fenerbahce. Fenerbahce is playing in the Europa Cup semifinals tonight against a Portuguese team, starting at 10pm on the Asian side of town. Two more nights in Istanbul before our long journe...