on april 21 we spent our morning at the beautiful calcium terraces in pammukale (where my camera sadly died; RIP) and paddled in the hot springs which was an amazing experience. the cliffs gave a really beautiful view of the turkish countryside and the surrounding towns; to sit on the terraces with our feet in hot running water and look out was...wow, amazing.
after pammukale we went to the ancient city of aphrodisias which was beautiful and we took loads of photos including one in a huge ampitheatre. typically, georgie and i got jumping photos and then went on to the beautiful seaside town of kusadasi. my reaction to kusadasi was almost ridiculous; on seeing the beach and the sea my heart skipped a beat, i was so excited. we dropped our bags off at the hotel and then spent an evening on the beach, eating magnums and relaxing before going out for a night with our tour bus, plus two other topdeck buses which were staying at the same hotel.
the next day we went to the ancient city of ephesus (yes, another ancient city - there are two more to come!) which was stunning, one of the highlights of the trip for me. the city has been really well preserved so we could really get a feel of what the city would have been like, including a walk through the "public toilets" where slaves used to have to sit in the winter to warm up the seats before their masters came in to use the loo! we were given free time to explore the ampitheatre in ephesus, and we saw a performance being put on for a norweigan tour group; and took some potentially-disrespectful-to-ancient-monuments photos with "skippy", the inflatable kangaroo we had somehow inherited while out the previous night. we all wound up soaking up the sun in the giant ampitheatre and were then whisked off to lunch where we could pay 15 lira for a buffet or bring our own food. we had decided that morning to bring our own food; so we settled down to a picnic of bread, banana and nutella; and crisp sandwiches washed down with water and juice boxes. after lunch to everyones surprise; the bus took us to a leather warehouse where the owner and his staff then put on a fashion show for us; showcasing the apparently "underappreciated" turkish leather industry. i found it a really uncomfortable experience as we had clearly been brought along as a western tour group expected to spend a lot....but i don't think anyone travelling with topdeck could afford to be spending $300 on a leather jacket that day!
that night we went out again although the night ended pretty early as we were all tired.
on april 23 we started off our day at pergamon; another ancient city which we had to ride a cable car to access. the city was really poorly preserved as the ottoman empire had made a deal with germany in the early 20th/late 19th century and they had thus claimed a large portion of the artefacts found in pergamon. it was very pretty and windy, apparently people used to come to pergamon to be "healed" by the wind. after pergamon we went to the island of junda, slightly off the coast of turkey and so pretty! yve, caitlin, rose, janet and i explored the markets on the seafront and then we were called back to our bus where we carried on to the delightful hotel where we spent the night. after taking a (cold) shower, we went to dinner which was, surprisingly, really nice, and then planned for an early night which didn't really work out too well as our rooms were draughty and even though turkey is warm during the day...it gets down to around 3 degrees at night!
we all rose bright and early on april 24, excited to be heading to gallipoli. on the bus we listened as our beloved tourguide tolga talked (and talked and talked) about the turkish perspective of WW1, which i think we all agreed was important but unfortunately tolga managed to make us all hate the very mention of turkey in WW1 by the end of our tour! before going to gallipoli we first stopped in troy where we took the obligatory photo with a replica of the trojan horse before we carried on to a giant supermarket to stock up on food for the next 24 hours. and stock up we did! georgie and i did well between us, meeting the guy who actually OWNED skippy the kangaroo and was looking desparately for him, and buying enough food to feed a small army. our bus pulled up to the gates of the gallipoli site around 3 in the afternoon and we began to crowd around but the gates themselves didn't open until almost 6pm. getting in to the actual site took a while, there were a couple of security checks that we had to pass through and then we had to collect a "welcome" bag and wristband before finding a place to set up camp. we got really lucky that georgie and kate had pushed way in front of us so they got a good spot which was probably too small for 7 people but we made do. when the sun started to go down it got cold quite quickly and everyone started layering up.
janet and i lay next to each other listening to music for a while before we decided to try and sleep...
the night was passed eating at regular intervals to pass the time and attempting to sleep but as there were performances and presentations every 20-30 minutes which were blasted through the speakers; sleep was hard to come by. at 3am a video presentation of the ANZAC dawn service in many cities around australia was broadcasted, (including townsville but not melbourne) and then at close to 5am; janet, georgie and i descended to closer to the barrier to try and get a good spot for the service itself.
the dawn service was....i can't even express the effect it had on me. everyone was in tears, it was a really powerful, beautiful thing to witness. the only slight irritation were the turkish site staff who had no respect at all for the occasion, talking and laughing loudly throughout the 2 minutes silence. i was blown away by the tragedy and scale of war; especially being on the beach where the ANZACS landed 96 years ago. boys as young as 14 and 15 were displayed on the screen as being killed on april 25, 1915.
after the service ended we began our walk up to lone pine for the australian service. georgie had bailed already, and the others fallen behind so kate and i took our time walking up the (steep) hill to lone pine; calling in at some of the cemetaries along the way and arriving at lone pine just after 9am. as far as i know, it was chosen as the site for the australian service as it was the location of one of the most gruesome battles seen in the entire gallipoli campaign; with 7000 people killed in a space the size of maybe...one and a bit tennis courts.
when the australian service ended georgie, kate and i continued another 3.5km uphill steeply to the new zealand service, but by the time we arrived we decided instead to set up camp on the grass and wait for the rest of our bus to arrive. when we had all gathered we had to wait for our bus number to be called and then it was back on the bus to istanbul! on the ride back we watched eurotrip, took bets on what time we would pull in to our hotel and i think EVERYONE slept for a couple of hours. literally a minute after we had walked in to the hotel we decided to go to bed and took turns showering before getting a good oh...13 hours?
the next day we visited the grand bazaar again and did some more site seeing; kate eventually took off for her flight back to england and we took it pretty easy for the evening; attempting to go out for a final nights drinks with the other members of our tour, but ended up returning to our hotel pretty early.
rose, georgie and i had one more day in istanbul which we spent really bonding and drinking A LOT of apple tea and eating baklava. our taxi ride out to the airport took a turn for the terrifying when our driver decided to race the other taxis on the road and we could see the speedometer inching over 130km...
still we made it home safely and spent a couple of days together in peace before the other girls got back.
amazing holiday. life changing experience. just wow. just...wow.
Thursday 19 May 2011
Tuesday 3 May 2011
may 3
wow it's hard to believe we're in to our 5th month here already...high wycombe looks incredibly different to when we first arrived...crazy.
today was the first day of summer term and all the kids came back looking tall and sun tanned and absolutely adorable in their summer uniform (dresses and boater hats for the girls, the usual shorts and tshirts for boys).
i'm really excited for this term - we have 18 more days of work before half term when i go to scotland and back to dublin for 3 days; all the sports days and exciting things happen now and we finish up for the summer in just over 2 months which is insane! georgie and i are in deep discussions about where we want to go and what we want to do.
for now though; i should catch up on the easter break.
after the last blogpost, georgie, rose and i watched (and sobbed over) romeo and juliet and we then enjoyed a lazy saturday which involved me buying a sleeping bag, mascara and toothpaste; and an early night as we had to be standing outside of godstowe at 6.30am for our taxi. we may have been a little paranoid with getting to the airport on time as we were ready and waiting when the bagdrop opened at 7.30 am and then had a nice 90 minute wait before boarding the plane to istanbul.
during the flight i watched a narnia movie and started my new book - which i am still yet to finish. when we were coming close to landing, georgie got a little nervous as it looked like we were about to land on the sea. istanbul from the air was beautiful and i was suddenly very excited about our trip...
my excitement dispersed somewhat when we realised that getting a visa to enter the country would require queuing for close to 45 minutes but like the good english girls we are becoming, we found the queue not too stressful or long in the end. georgie and i got our visas easily, but rose had some currency trouble. eventually we found ourselves in the line for passport control (yes, another line...well done istanbul airport) and waited. and waited. and waited. we ultimately realised that the reason the passport control queue was going at snailpace was that there were roughly 300 people queuing to get through; and only one booth open. a second booth did open - but of course the line we chose to stay in was controlled by a man in a booth who clearly hated his job, and was stopping every passenger for a 10 minute chat on the way through.
by the time we finally all got through passport control, my backpack had been taken off the carousel and was about to be whisked away to "unclaimed baggage", and we had missed our meet 'n' greet at the airport. luckily georgie had come prepared with the name of our hotel so we made separate arrangements to take a shuttle bus taxi thing to the hotel and with minimum hassle we sped through istanbul to the akgun hotel. sped being the operative word. turkish drivers are definitely up there with vietnamese drivers in terms of disregard for speed limits and all other motorists.
when we walked into the hotel we discovered that the group was halfway through their briefing. luckily, this group was on a 10 day tour and so our briefing wasn't until the next night .we still went out for "welcome" drinks and dinner and got to know them a bit before heading back up to our beautiful triple room for a blissful sleep.
on the morning of the 18th of april, we had been invited to join the 10 day tour on their walking tour of istanbul however after sleeping in we decided to take our time enjoying the delicious buffet breakfast and do some exploring of our own. turns out this was the right decision as literally 30 seconds after leaving the hotel it began to pour with rain so georgie and i ran to the corner store, bought toothpaste and ran back to our hotel room. we spent the day reading, sleeping, "dubbing" turkish soap operas and reading texts-from-last-night. we went down to the lobby in the evening for our tour briefing and then to our second round of welcome-dinner-and-drinks. we met another tour group called "fanatics" and joined them for some karaoke and drinks and then headed back to our hotel.
april 19 began with another buffet breakfast and then a walking tour of istanbul. our turkish tourguide tolga (turkish law says all tour groups must have a native guide) rubbed me up the wrong way immediately and i was proven right! by the end of the tour our entire bus - 45 people plus the topdeck guide - all hated him too. on this first tour he showed us around the blue mosque which was incredibly beautiful; the nearby hippodrome which is thousands of years old and pointed us in the direction of the grand bazaar which i loved. we spent a good 90 minutes wandering through it, admiring the jewellery and i bought a beautiful leather bound notebook. we quickly learned how to haggle and smiled politely at the verbal appreciation we recieved from every single man in the city. " hey spice girls" "australian? aussie aussie oi oi yeah?"
in the afternoon we took a river cruise and then wandered back to our hotel. some of the others took part in a traditional turkish meal with entertainment but georgie, janet and i decided to go the cheap route and scoped out a kebab shop and then bought mcflurrys and chips to smuggle up to our hotel room and eat in bed. georgie and i had planned on going to sleep pretty early but at midnight when kate returned to our room we were still wide awake.
by the morning we regretted this late night as we left the hotel at 6.30am and drove for roughly 10 hours with a few stops for toilet breaks, lunch, to buy snacks etc.
this day was pretty uneventful; we didn't reach our hotel in pammukale until after 8pm and then went straight to dinner and after taking photos with the calcium terraces which were all lit up in the darkness, we went straight to bed.
today was the first day of summer term and all the kids came back looking tall and sun tanned and absolutely adorable in their summer uniform (dresses and boater hats for the girls, the usual shorts and tshirts for boys).
i'm really excited for this term - we have 18 more days of work before half term when i go to scotland and back to dublin for 3 days; all the sports days and exciting things happen now and we finish up for the summer in just over 2 months which is insane! georgie and i are in deep discussions about where we want to go and what we want to do.
for now though; i should catch up on the easter break.
after the last blogpost, georgie, rose and i watched (and sobbed over) romeo and juliet and we then enjoyed a lazy saturday which involved me buying a sleeping bag, mascara and toothpaste; and an early night as we had to be standing outside of godstowe at 6.30am for our taxi. we may have been a little paranoid with getting to the airport on time as we were ready and waiting when the bagdrop opened at 7.30 am and then had a nice 90 minute wait before boarding the plane to istanbul.
during the flight i watched a narnia movie and started my new book - which i am still yet to finish. when we were coming close to landing, georgie got a little nervous as it looked like we were about to land on the sea. istanbul from the air was beautiful and i was suddenly very excited about our trip...
my excitement dispersed somewhat when we realised that getting a visa to enter the country would require queuing for close to 45 minutes but like the good english girls we are becoming, we found the queue not too stressful or long in the end. georgie and i got our visas easily, but rose had some currency trouble. eventually we found ourselves in the line for passport control (yes, another line...well done istanbul airport) and waited. and waited. and waited. we ultimately realised that the reason the passport control queue was going at snailpace was that there were roughly 300 people queuing to get through; and only one booth open. a second booth did open - but of course the line we chose to stay in was controlled by a man in a booth who clearly hated his job, and was stopping every passenger for a 10 minute chat on the way through.
by the time we finally all got through passport control, my backpack had been taken off the carousel and was about to be whisked away to "unclaimed baggage", and we had missed our meet 'n' greet at the airport. luckily georgie had come prepared with the name of our hotel so we made separate arrangements to take a shuttle bus taxi thing to the hotel and with minimum hassle we sped through istanbul to the akgun hotel. sped being the operative word. turkish drivers are definitely up there with vietnamese drivers in terms of disregard for speed limits and all other motorists.
when we walked into the hotel we discovered that the group was halfway through their briefing. luckily, this group was on a 10 day tour and so our briefing wasn't until the next night .we still went out for "welcome" drinks and dinner and got to know them a bit before heading back up to our beautiful triple room for a blissful sleep.
on the morning of the 18th of april, we had been invited to join the 10 day tour on their walking tour of istanbul however after sleeping in we decided to take our time enjoying the delicious buffet breakfast and do some exploring of our own. turns out this was the right decision as literally 30 seconds after leaving the hotel it began to pour with rain so georgie and i ran to the corner store, bought toothpaste and ran back to our hotel room. we spent the day reading, sleeping, "dubbing" turkish soap operas and reading texts-from-last-night. we went down to the lobby in the evening for our tour briefing and then to our second round of welcome-dinner-and-drinks. we met another tour group called "fanatics" and joined them for some karaoke and drinks and then headed back to our hotel.
april 19 began with another buffet breakfast and then a walking tour of istanbul. our turkish tourguide tolga (turkish law says all tour groups must have a native guide) rubbed me up the wrong way immediately and i was proven right! by the end of the tour our entire bus - 45 people plus the topdeck guide - all hated him too. on this first tour he showed us around the blue mosque which was incredibly beautiful; the nearby hippodrome which is thousands of years old and pointed us in the direction of the grand bazaar which i loved. we spent a good 90 minutes wandering through it, admiring the jewellery and i bought a beautiful leather bound notebook. we quickly learned how to haggle and smiled politely at the verbal appreciation we recieved from every single man in the city. " hey spice girls" "australian? aussie aussie oi oi yeah?"
in the afternoon we took a river cruise and then wandered back to our hotel. some of the others took part in a traditional turkish meal with entertainment but georgie, janet and i decided to go the cheap route and scoped out a kebab shop and then bought mcflurrys and chips to smuggle up to our hotel room and eat in bed. georgie and i had planned on going to sleep pretty early but at midnight when kate returned to our room we were still wide awake.
by the morning we regretted this late night as we left the hotel at 6.30am and drove for roughly 10 hours with a few stops for toilet breaks, lunch, to buy snacks etc.
this day was pretty uneventful; we didn't reach our hotel in pammukale until after 8pm and then went straight to dinner and after taking photos with the calcium terraces which were all lit up in the darkness, we went straight to bed.
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