Konya, Turkey Travel Journals & Blogs

JuJo Tours Let's go east
Day83
Konya and a more traditional Turkey
October 22, 2019 in Turkey ⋅ ⛅ 14 °C
We'd been told not to go to Konya. Sometimes people said that we would be robbed, that people there have an obsession with money; that Konya is full of Syrian refugees (many Turkish people don't see with good eyes that their country is asylum for around 3M Syrians). Others said that there is nothing to see.

To make our own experience we ignored all kinds of 'stupid' recommendations and discovered a very traditional city full of people wearing less modern and more modest clothes. Their traditional dishes were all cooked with meat, so we kept it also traditional with our favourite vegetarian combination: lentils soup + rice + white beans. Konya isn't used to see the amount of foreign tourists that other cities receive, so the locals were very interested on us and treated us like their guests meaning also that they didn't try to rip us off.
Besides discovering who was Mevlana and the dervish tradition, we also discovered that Konya university has many students from abroad. We got to enjoy an entire evening with two of them, Ahmad (Jordan) and Emi (Algeria), and shared some different points of view about life, politics and religion. Thank you for your kindness guys! Shukran!Read more
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Herrliche Bilder, faszinierende Berichte. Habe mir jetzt endlich die Zeit genommen eure JuJo zuverfolgen. Da bekomme ich wieder richtig Fernweh. Euch weiterhin glückliche Reise. Pa
11/3/19Reply
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Oct 22, 2019 · ⛅ 14 °C · Altitude: 1,033 m · 37°52'30" N 32°29'33" E
Turkey Konya
Türkeirundreise
Day26
Konya
April 22, 2019 in Turkey ⋅ 🌬 4 °C
Der Weg nach Konya war recht abenteuerlich. Schon beim Kloster fing es an zu schneien. Dann gings weiter bergauf. Ein Schneegestöber, die Straße wurde immer schneebedeckter. Zuletzt blieben wir sogar hängen. Nach einigem vor und zurück ging es dann doch weiter. Auf der anderen Seite hinunter im Schritttempo. Die Hochebene vor Konya dann eben, soweit das Auge reicht. Endlich dann Konya. Hotel, Essen, Bett.
Am nächsten Morgen Konya, eine überraschend interessante Stadt mit toller Markthalle und schönen Moscheen, bekannt durch die Mevlana Derwische.Read more
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Apr 22, 2019, 9:59am · 🌬 4 °C · Altitude: 1,022 m · 37°52'12" N 32°30'16" E
Turkey Konya
Rita Yee Into Ancient History
Day44
Konya, home of Rumi
February 21, 2019 in Turkey ⋅ ☀️ 3 °C
Back on the road, we stop by a 700 year old caravanserai. This old hotel used to host merchant traders and their horses. Today, it's currently under restoration. We tried to imagine what it must have been like staying here and mused how fun it would be if we could stay at a working caravanserai for the night.

Moving on to Konya, home of Rumi or Mevlana. We had another chance to try pide before having a few hours to explore the centre of town. I think it would've been nice to stay here overnight, but otherwise we had fun exploring the markets and the museum of Rumi. It's a great spot if you want to buy anything with dervishes, prices are great. We also tried Konya candy, which is like a sweet piece of chalk. It wasn't to our liking though so it was nice of the shopkeeper to give us a sample.

Konya is a much bigger city than I imagined as we left it. Neighborhoods just stretched out before our eyes. Perhaps my mind was still on the Konya described in "The 40 Rules of Love" that I'd read, about Rumi, Shams and a host of other characters.Read more
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Feb 21, 2019, 9:00am · ☀️ 3 °C · Altitude: 1,033 m · 37°52'29" N 32°29'35" E
Turkey Konya
Anthony and Katey Curnow A&K Adventure 2019
Day56
D56 Turkey - Antalya to Konya
August 29, 2019 in Turkey ⋅ ☀️ 26 °C
A Snapshot of Our Day

Photo 1 - Anthony was clearly heartbroken at the fact that we were leaving our last sea side town.

Photo 2 - Welcome to Konya! We were told that it wasn’t an overly touristy city and that now we were heading towards the east, the locals were a lot more conservative. Our first impressions are that all good; it’s really clean and tidy, with lots of open public spaces including the main plaza with a huge mosque and park.

Photo 3 - The entrance to the main mosque and Dervish museum. The top of the main entrance has a chain hanging across so when you enter you are forced to bow your head; a small nod in respect to God.

Photo 4 - Despite being squished like sardines by a swelling number of Asian tour groups, we were able to admire the beautiful interior of yet another mosque. There are 7 principles of Mevlana, one of the reasons for the mosque generating interest:
1. In generosity and helping others, be like a river.
2. In compassion and grace, be like the sun.
3. In concealing others’ faults, be like the night.
4. In angry and fury, be like the dead.
5. In modesty and humility, be like the earth.
6. In tolerance, be like the sea.
7. Either exist as you are, or be as you look.

Photo 5 - A member of the Dervish sect that had the role of getting the milk, bread and Mars Bars from the shops.

Photo 6 - A scene set out of how the Dervish men would have sat around to eat a meal. They had a particular way of sitting while they ate, with one knee underneath them and the other propped up; the theory being that the gently pressure on the stomach would prevent any potential gluttonous thoughts. Not convinced this would be an effective portion control method for me!

Photo 7 - The beautiful back streets of Konya led us to many a clothing, jewellery and knick knacks store.

Photo 8 - The show of the Whirling Dervishes is now free every Thursday evening and was entrancing; the meditative and controlled spinning is an act to help these men feel closer to God. I’m still amazing that no one was sick after you to 8 minutes of spinning around and around!

Video 1 - Amazing.Read more
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Aug 29, 2019 · ☀️ 26 °C · Altitude: 1,032 m · 37°52'19" N 32°29'56" E
Turkey Konya

You might also know this place by the following names:

Konya, قونية, قونیه, Горад Конья, Кония, Iconium, Конья, Qonya, Ικόνιο, Konjao, קוניה, कोन्या, Կոնիա, KYA, Iconio, コンヤ, კონია, 코니아, Qonye, Къонья, Konija, Konja, Конија, കോന്യ, قونیہ, Koʻniya, 科尼亞

Konya

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Konya and a more traditional Turkey

Konya

Konya, home of Rumi

D56 Turkey - Antalya to Konya

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