Selçuk

We started our morning early with breakfast and then a visit to the ancient city of Ephesus, believed to be home to approximately 250,000 people around the time of 1st Century AD. It was a harbour city with hills (which meant it was good for farming, defence and water supply). During the Roman period (between 1 and 4 AD), it was the capital city of Asia Minor. We understand that people left this town in around 6AD because the river moved and because diseases from mosquitos plagued the area.

In the 150 years in which excavations have taken place, only 15% of the large site has been excavated and archaeologists continue to work at the site.

We entered near one of the original open air ‘agoras’, or main shopping areas where markets used to be. Hazal explained the various sites to us as we walked around. We also learnt that the word agoraphobia (fear of open spaces) originated from this type of market. We then continued into the Odeon, which was location of the first parliament but the word is commonly used in modern society for a place which plays movies. The citizens had the right to elect the members of parliament.

It was interesting seeing the various statues to gods and goddesses including Hermes (God of travellers and thiefs), Nike (the goddess of victory) and Hercules. There was a lot of trade with Egyptians in this town so they also set up their own Egyptian temples in the town. We also saw an ancient form of Badgammon marked on rocks displayed in one of the streets.

We continued exploring through one of the main baths with many beautiful large rooms, the bathrooms, a brothel and down one of the main streets towards the beautiful library. The library was been restored so that its standing up so we can appreciate its size and beauty. Hazal explained that the image of the library is used in a lot of tourism in Turkey. It is the third largest library in ancient times and housed around 30,000 scripts. The library was only used for around 100 years and in 2AD there was an earthquake and it couldn't be restored. We enjoyed exploring this area and walking into the library area. We also explored the Commerical Agora right next to the library.

We then proceeded to take in the vastness of the 25,000 person capacity theatre. Back in the day, this would have had a beautiful harbour as its backdrop but nowadays the coastline is approximately 9km away.

We made one final stop at the Virgin Mary Church. This church was dedicated to Mary and it is believed by many Christians that Mary and St John came to Ephesus to spend the last years of their lives. As such, many Christians make the pilgrimage to see the ruins of this church.

We left Ephesus with the group in our mini bus. We really enjoyed exploring this ancient city over a few hours.

Our driver, Mehmet, also made a quick stop at the ruins of The Temple of Artemis in the town. It was considered one of the 7 Ancient Wonders of the World on the original list.

We had a choice what to do for the afternoon and most of the group decided to go to the small mountain village of Sirince. This is a very cool cobblestone lined village in the mountains which is famous for its fruit wine, with many sellers offering a tasting to tourists. We had a nice lunch overlooking the valley of soup (we hVe had a lot of lentil soup in Turkey!) and some stuffed pumpkin flowers. We went for a fruit wine tasting with Tommy, Babs, Amy and Marissa. The wines were delicious (particularly the cherry fruit wine) and we decided to buy some white and red wine to use later on the trip! We also enjoyed some nice mulberry and honey ice cream before returning back to the town.

We went back to the hotel to chill out for a few hours and then went out for dinner before going to the main square to watch the women’s European volleyball final which happened to be between Turkey and Serbia. Thankfully for everyone, Turkey won which was really important for Turkish women who are usually not appreciated and under celebrated for sport in Turkey.Read more