River, Palace and Market Day

Today was a long day! We went on a two-hour cruise on the Bosphorous. Istanbul is enormous. We've heard reports of anywhere from 16 to 25 million people. We cruised for an hour in each direction and saw no end to the sprawl. The houses along the river are fabulous and very colorful. Susan Kutty -- I had a great time because a Spaniard was on board with a tour guide. So I heard all the history in Spanish. Very fun!

Then we went to the Dolmabahçe Palace which served as the main administrative center of the Ottoman Empire for most of the period from 1853 to 1922. It is also where the beloved Ataturk died.

It was designed to shine with Europeans and contains the world's largest Bohemian crystal chandelier with 750 lamps and a weight of 4.5 tons. At the front gate there is a guard who does not move no matter what you do. I saw him blink once -- but did not let him know that I saw. Poor guy!

On the way back, we wandered until we found a local lunch stop. The owner treated us wonderfully, including giving us tea and pastries made by his grandmother with our bill.

Then we caught a train back to the Grand Bazaar. Each of us bought something, except for Pat. She has in her head that she wants to buy a nargile (water pipe). Who knows why. But Pat looked at them and then never made an offer, much to the vendors' dismay. Rick Vanderwall -- we did see ouds. And once we asked what an oud is -- we had to convince the shop owner that we didn't need to bring you one. Sorry -- it doesn't fit in my bag.

We walked a long way through local shopping areas and on into the spice market. Weird to see lingerie shops amid the many women in head scarves there. (Though most women are not in head scarves. Where we are staying we see mostly young men).

Just imagine kilos of spices in shops upon shops. Saffron by the kilo. And dried figs and nuts and all kinds of things dried and honeyed. And Turkish Delight everywhere you go. Turkish delight really is a delight. I thought it would be some awful sickly sweet thing. But the good stuff is mildly sweet candy filled with sesame and pistachios. Really wonderful. And the shopkeepers give you tastes. lots of tastes. We bought snacks to last us throught the rest of our trip and decided not to eat dinner tonight.

Next door to the spice market is an open air garden and pet market. Tubs of bulk cat food next to rare herbs and bunnies and puppies. And again -- cats. Alot of them.

At the end of the 10 hour odyssey we heard muezzims from 4 separate mosques sing the call to prayer at sunset. Amazing!

Our friend Husnu made it his personal mission to help Pat buy a nargile tomorrow. We'll see what happens. I'm not sure she can pull the trigger. But we are having a wonderful time!

[caption id="attachment_47" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Pat, Jim and the man who doesn't move"][/caption]