Istanbul: Asia side

Hopped a ferry over to the Asian side today, the route: Eminonu to Kadikoy. I'd read about the neighborhood Moda on a blog as was hoping to check it out. In the end, I think I walked the edge of it and spend the majority of my time in Kadikoy. There's a tram just outside the ferry terminal I recommend catching for a quick loop around before wandering the streets to shop and eat.

It wasn't supposed to rain today but it did, so I ended up ducking into shops here and there, and picking up a few little things. There was lots of snow globes and couples figurines, I'm curious what the story is. Thought about picking one up, but at the same time it would be heavy and bulky.

Later on, I stumbled across the fish market, vegetables and fruit stands and restaurants. As the hours passed, the streets became livelier. I also found a place that sold kumpir, a massive Turkish baked potato. Probably not the best but it did the job as it ended up being lunch and dinner. I also had lokma for dessert, deep fried though. Cheap and yummy, I walked around the market and two of the fish vendors each took one off my container, which was weird. But since I were taking their photos, I figured it was just part of it.

To get back to the hotel, I decided to walk to the next metro station and catch the Marmaray metro back as it had a stop at Sirkeci which was closer to the hotel. The trick though was getting to Uskudar for the stop. It would've been a really long walk, hence the metro. The Marmaray was out of service though so I was directed to a shuttle which dropped us free of charge.

Great views of the Bosphorus looking back at the European side, I even saw the Maiden Tower in the middle of the water. Didn't see much in Uskudar, but that might be me not going far enough. Back to the hotel for an early night as we start our group tour tomorrowRead more