28 April, 2024

I was woken up at 4.56am to the chant through speakers from a mosque down the street, that happens 5 times per day, although the times seem a little out from the Turkish app I looked at relative to sunrise.

Today we had a walking tour within the Sultanahmet district of Istanbul. We took a taxi driven by a different driver from yesterday and he stuck to the main roads. After an hour and twenty minutes, and after ten minutes in the one place, we got out of the taxi and walked the last 2.5 kilometres so we didn’t miss our tour.

It happened to be half-marathon (cycling) day with the finish being close to the central area, so lots of polis and officials, roads blocked off.

The tour was very interesting – learnt about a period where part of the Eastern Roman Empire was situated, including archaeological and other sites. We luckily got to walk through the Cistern of Theodoius that was rediscovered in 1985. Lucky as it was closing the next day for some repairs.

There are a number of mosques in the area that we walked around, including the Hagia Sophia Grand Mosque and the Blue Mosque. Unfortunately the Great Palace Mosaics museum is closed so didn’t get to see the amazing Byzantine-period artefacts. But there were so many other sites to see. We also went through a couple of gift shops and I saw a really nice plate which came from Nicaea (now named “Iznik”), the site of the First and Second Councils (of Christian bishops) meetings to develop the structures around Christendom.

We went through a bazaar – there were spices, sweets (especially turkish delights and baklava), coffee pots etc. I really enjoyed the range of spices available including some red saffron. The photo of the pole with what look like eyes is commemorated to all the workers who lost their lives during the construction of the cistern. The open area with scaffolding is another archaeology site being developed.