Greek Cruise Day 9...

Day 9 – Thursday

It was very stormy during the night, and even though our tour wasn’t going out until 1:30 in the afternoon, I had talked to Chris last night and wanted to get together and talk, and he suggested 7:30 so I sat my alarm for 7 and got up then… When I woke up, it was raining outside (the first time during the trip…) and it was very rocky on the boat… so much that the shower door kept sliding open and shut and the water was sloshing all over the place on the floor…

Anyway, got dressed and met Chris in La Veranda for breakfast, which actually turned out to be only coffee and juice for the next two hours… Great talk, and after I went down to the room where Ann had her breakfast that she had ordered through room service (which is what I should have done…) so I threw a load of laundry in and went up to get some actual food… Then after I got back to the cabin, we just sat around for the next few hours and relaxed, watched a movie and some shows, and then around 1 started to get ready to go on the trip to Istanbul…

The day started out by going to the Blue Mosque… When we got down to the meeting area for the trip, some friends mentioned that Ann had on shorts above the knee and that I had on shorts… We forgot to read everything, and the rules of the mosque were that women have to have shoulders covered, a skirt to the ankles, and men can’t wear shorts… So we ran back up to the cabin, and Ann put on the longest skirt she had (without going to a dinner dress…) and got a rain jacket to take along (since it was a rainy day…) and I changed into khakis and a better shirt for the day… which didn’t bother me since it was actually a bit cool out with the overcast day and the rain… We got on the bus, and took a short (distance) but long (time) ride through Istanbul to the mosque… Traffic in Istanbul is as bad as anything I have seen… Like Greece, traffic lights seem to be totally optional, and I couldn’t believe some of the places that the driver got the bus into and through… Finally got to the mosque, and even though Ann had a skirt below the knees, they gave all of the women coverings to act like a skirt to go to the ground… Everyone had to take off their shoes and put them into a bag, and then we entered… The mosque was beautiful inside… I got quite a few pictures and it was one of the few places on the trip that I wished I had my Nikon along with some good lenses for pictures… the iPhone takes nice pictures, and I’m pretty sure that they will come out well, but getting closeup shots of the art on the walls would have been nice… then we went outside, put on our shoes and the women took off the skirt things, and we went to the Topaki Palace…

The palace tour was nice, and there were four rooms with all kinds of artifacts from the Sultan’s era, and a room with the Sultan’s clothing… Ann liked it more than I did, mostly since a) she likes things like that more than me… and b) there were huge diamonds, emeralds, and rubies there… Actually one of the things that surprised me quite a bit was the lack of faces on the gems, even the large ones… most looked more like they were tumble polished, and quite a few of the large ones were very uneven… And all of the vases, bowls, and other stuff that were covered with rubies and emeralds looked like they were covered by red and green glass blobs, instead of what I would have thought for jewels… But 80+ carat diamonds and emeralds are still impressive…

After about an hour and a half in the palace, we made a long walk back to the bus and then a bus ride to the Grand Bazaar… The traffic was horrendous this time (about 4:30 in the afternoon…) and we ate quite a bit of time up that we were supposed to have in the Grand Bazaar… finally got there and the guide gave us 1 hour until we had to meet for the drive back to the ship… It was about a 10 minute walk to the bazaar, so that left us only about a half hour to see 4000 shops and give us a buffer to get to the bus… First thing that you figured out is that if there were actually 4000 shops, there would have been hundreds that had the same exact stuff in them… Ann wanted to get a few scarves for friends, and there must have been 10 shops in a few hundred feet that looked like they had 90% the same merchandise… Which immediately make one suspicious of the “made in Turkey” claims and I’m figuring that they are more than likely made in China or some other Asian sweatshop like everything else and shipped in… Also the jewelry shops, all of which claim to have 18/20/24 carat gold, have to be in question since if that was actually true, and the value of gold being over $1700 an ounce, there would have been hundreds of millions in gold at the bazaar… and some of the shop owners really didn’t look like they could have backed a few million in gold… It was an experience that I’m glad we had, although I would seriously question anyone going there expecting to get anything of substantial value for a great price… I had one of the shop owners get downright pissed at me while Ann was looking for scarves… I was looking for a small travel bag (shaving bag…) and thought if I could find a leather one I might get it… found one that was pretty much exactly what I wanted, and very similar to one that I saw in Lancaster for $60… Asked what he wanted for it… 170 euro, which is over $250… I sort of laughed, and said not a chance… he then dropped immediately to 120 euro, and I said maybe half that… then he dropped to 85 euro, telling me he hadn’t sold anything so far today and I had the special half price first sale deal… I told him I understood why he hadn’t sold anything so far, and then he picked it up, started putting it in a bag, and putting it in my hand for 80 euro… when I told him $80, not 80 euro ($130) he got really mad, threw it down, and started spouting in Turkish… and nothing nice from the tone… I left and went over and found Ann and got 3 scarves for a few euro less than the guy wanted originally, but I really didn’t feel like pissing off another vendor…

Trying to get out we sort of got turned around and lost for a few minutes until we asked a guy where the main area was so we could get back… It was nice to know though that almost every leather coat dealer we walked by told us that they were they only store at the bazaar that had jackets for “a very large man like you (me)…” Good to know if I ever go back there…

Finally found our way out and down the street to the bus… The intersection is apparently one that all of the cruise busses pull up to to pick up shoppers, and the street vendors descend on you like flies… Scarves for 1 euro (best in town…), all kinds of perfumes, top brands, for a euro or two a bottle, all kinds of other crap, and my favorite, the “Genuine Fake” watches… After what seemed like forever, the bus finally got there, and I had a guy come up with a pair of watches (Gucci I think…)
for the low price of 30 euro… two steps toward the bus later the price was 15 euro, two more steps down to 10 euro (all the time telling him no…) and finally when on the steps of the bus (he was coming on with me…) the price hit 9 euro for the pair… I definitely have not seen anything like it before, and it was entertaining if nothing else…

Then a long (traffic was still bad…) ride to the ship, and we decided to not change and just go to dinner… Had yet another nice dinner, just Ann and I, and talked a bit before going back to the cabin and packing everything up for tomorrow… got everything packed up, (large bags were getting picked up around 11…) set a wake up call for 4 (bus leaves at 4:45 am) with a backup on the phone, and then just watched tv for until around 11 before going to bed… Ann had the door open around 10 or so and we got to hear all of the calls to prayer from the mosques… Got to give them credit… they are a religious bunch, and very devout… Tomorrow is all travel… about 20 hours of it… :)