Final days in Istanbul

Our final days in Istanbul were a bit of a fog because we'd both picked up a cold (we blame the Paris Metro and Versaille). To be fair, we'd had a good run, it's just a shame that cough medicine wasn't in my pack of just-in-case pharmaceuticals. We did manage to get some Turkish cough medicine which helped a bit. After a sleepless night, the best we could manage on day 2 was me going to the Hagia Sophia museum, which had a good audio visual tour of the history of the Hagia Sophia and how it related to national and global events through its 1000 year history.

It was raining on our last day but we still hadn't been inside the Blue Mosque. So we got the rain gear out for the first time since the UK and queued for around 20 minutes in the rain. Completed in 1617, the Blue Mosque is stunning inside, tastefully adorned with soft blue mosaics. It was worth getting a bit wet for. On the way back, we did a bit of souvenir shopping at a shop near our hotel that sold teas and Turkish delight.

Later in the morning, we went to Topkapi Palace (the last thing we hadn't seen). If it hadn't been raining, cold, and crowded and we felt well, we would have appreciated it more. As it was, we just had a fairly disinterested look around and headed back to the hotel to sleep for a few hours, which was probably what we needed.

On our last night in Europe, we went to a nearby Turkish restaurant (or restaurant) for some final pillowy bread, cheese pastry and kebabs. We filled up pretty quickly and so told them not to bring the complimentary baklava and ice cream with tea (there is always complimentary baklava and ice cream with tea).

And so we head to Singapore next for a few days with our dear friends Jacqui and Martin. It's a shame we aren't more on our game, but we've still had a nice stay in Istanbul.Read more