Friday, June 13, 2014
Hello!
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| Over 5,000 miles! |
Well, we are now in our “going home” mode.
But first, dinner last night!
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| Nice starter! |
We decided to see what was available in the
restaurant at the Hampton, and we were very agreeable surprised!
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| R's lentil soup |
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| My rocket parmesan salad |
I had a wonderful rocket and parmesan salad
to start, with a “Hilton” burger and chips to follow.
The burger was (yet again!) overcooked, but
everything else was fine.
Robert ordered
lentil soup to start, which he said was great, and then followed it with penne
with a spicy arrabiata sauce.
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| My "Hilton" burger with chips |
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| R's penne |
For
dessert, R had a peach tarte with ice cream with peaches on top, and I had
their ice cream “sandwich.”
My ice cream came between two HUGE vanilla
waifers with strawberries on top of the ice cream, and a strawberry sauce
besides.
It was WONDERFUL!
Back upstairs and to bed about 9:30 p.m.
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| My dessert to dream about! |
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| R's peach tart and ice cream |
We passed a very nice and quiet night in Bursa, and were up
about 5 this morning. Down for breakfast
about 7, and out the door somewhere about 7:45 – 8 a.m. and heading to Istanbul
to turn our wonderful little car in! We
ran into some nasty traffic working our way into Istanbul, but overall, it was
a very easy drive until we were about 2 km away – then it really got crazy with
grid lock! We made it to our rental car
place about 10:30 a.m. – 42 days! In
all, we picked up the car and it had about 19,000 km on it – not sure of the
precise number – and returned it today at 28,000+ which equates to something
like 5,592 miles+! We certainly have
covered a lot of ground!
The nice young
man at the office drove us over to the ferry and dropped us off, which made
things very convenient. We just needed to get the 3 TL Jetons (tokens) for the trip and get aboard the 11
a.m. ferry over to the Sultanamet side. From there, we got a taxi to bring us to our
last hotel – the Doubletree Old Town, which is actually very close to the Grand
Bazaar. Checked in, and our room is
(fortunately!) ready! Lovely hotel; we’re
in room 329, which also has a nice terrace and chairs outside.
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| Wonderful artifacts on the Istanbul street! |
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| Lunch time! |
As it was now definitely lunch time, we headed out to find
something to eat. Chose SEOS restaurant
which is right at the entrance of the Grand Bazaar. R ordered a vegetable pide, and I had pide
with cheese and mushrooms – excellent, although a tad more expensive than lunch
in Selcuk the other day! We strolled
through a few blocks of the Bazaar, but honestly, we don’t need to buy anything
more at this point! They also do a lot
of leather work here – handmade shoes, jackets, etc. – as well as FUR! Somehow, when it’s almost 80 degrees out, who
is in the mood for that?? Decided enough
was enough so returned to the hotel for naps.
I’d like to go out again when it gets a little cooler; right now, it
feels great in our cool hotel room watching EuroSport on TV! (My idea of a good time!)
Our plan for tomorrow is to get up, have breakfast and head
to the airport. As it was SO chaotic
getting into Turkey (getting through Ataturk Airport) we want to make sure that
we have plenty of lee-way on our way out.We are scheduled non-stop from Istanbul to Houston, and from there to
Phoenix, and we’ll pick up a rental car.
A VERY long day, to be sure, but after these past six weeks, I’m
thinking that we’re about due for a sitdown!!
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| R's vegetable pide |
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| My cheese and mushroom pide |
Lots of love!
m
xxx
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| Strolling through the Grand Bazaar |
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| Me and thousands of "friends!" |
that burger does sort of look like the Uniroyal tire that sits out on I-94!
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