Due to the time change, I had a hard time waking up on our first morning in Istanbul, but managed to get up, get showered and get packed. Once all five of us were “up and at ’em”, we headed up to the terrace floor of the hotel for breakfast. Thankfully, “Terrace” at this hotel (top floor) means something altogether different from what Terrace meant at Rob’s DC apartment. The view from the breakfast room was amazing and would have canceled out a terrible breakfast. Happily enough, the breakfast buffet was amazing even without the view.
After breakfast, we headed off down Istiklal Caddesi, a long pedestrian shopping street, looking in all the windows as we went. The girls preferred to spot the stray cats that were everywhere that we went in Istanbul — everywhere! We turned down a side street full of shops selling musical instruments, then finally spotted the Galata Tower. We went in and, surprisingly, took the elevator to the top, where we could go out on the 360 balcony for great views of the city.
From the tower, we walked over the Galata Bridge and then through the spice market. The girls were starting to run low on energy, so Rob bought them a box of Turkish delight. After a little sugar infusion we continued on up to Topkapi Palace…no lines at all! Our first stop was the Harem. The tilework and architectural details in the private quarters of the palace were just amazing! Even the girls were entranced by room after room!
Once we left the Harem, our energy was drooping again, so we had a snack at the cafe before proceeding on to the Treasury and the Sacred Safekeeping Rooms, where we saw such things as Moses’s rod and David’s sword and Mohammed’s beard. As we headed out of the palace, we all stopped to look at a cistern, but Chloe kept walking along with the Japanese tour group that had overtaken us. She was pretty shaken by the time Camille found her and rescued her. She wouldn’t talk to me, Rob or Phil for twenty minutes — only to Camille.
We headed out of the palace, and the girls got ice cream from a guy who had a whole funny act of serving ice cream; the ice cream itself had a different texture, almost like taffy! By this time, we were mostly ready to call it a day, and Barbara had landed at the airport, so we walked by the Aya Sofia and the Blue Mosque and got on the very crowded tram back to the funicular and then the hotel to pick up our bags.
