We now have had a chance to reflect on our Turkish travel. Things here are familiar and with few surprises, except for street work upon which we'll reflect in our next blog.
Ouches:
Another "ouch" was the price of things in the Sabiha Gokchen airport, which is named after the world's first female fighter pilot! Waiting for our flight out on Friday evening I scoped out the prices in the various restaurants and Duty Free shop. The prices in the Duty Free, which one anticipates to be lower than on the street (assumes) was found to be rediculously high. Here's an example, a bar of olive oil soup (same as I purchased in the city for 3 Turkish Lira) for 4 Euros! Basically everything was double in price from what you'd see the tourist areas of Istanbul! And in some cases, triple the price.
Travel by bus:
After the rental car fell through and we resigned ourselves to bus travel our mindset changed. We first adjusted our thinking from being able to see so many things, stop at will along the way or take side trips to sticking with what we could walk to within a city or take a mini bus to reach. We were out of luck lining up a tour guide because we depend on tourist offices to connect with the guides, and the offices don't work on weekends. Rule to remember, if you think you want to do a guided trip, line it up well in advance because you might not be able to pull if off on the fly. Well, you probably could, but we didn't try. Buses run on schedules (somewhat), and sometimes a particular bus you want to take is sold out. In fact, there might be two or three buses sold out forcing you into a much later departure than you wanted. The flip side of the buses is that they are generally comfortable, large, air-conditioned Mercedes vehicles which get washed at a mid point in your travel. They have conductors or attendants and usually you get at least water and sometimes coffee, juice, or soda and a snack. They are CLEAN!
So your mentality changes when you are locked into the bus. You begin to look for hotels, motels, or pensions that are close the the otogar in your destination to avoid paying for taxis. You check for mini buses to transport you to historic sites and you look more closely at the things that are within a town or city that you might want to see. Cities and towns take on a different significance. You change where you'll stop for the night based on what you might be able to see versus the convenience of the place.
Otels, Hotels, Motels, Pensions and People:
Being somewhat anal, but not totally, we created a spreadsheet of our cities and hotels using various criteria to evaluate each place we stayed. Our criteria included such things as: value, bathroom/shower, food, reception, beds and pillows, food, noise, location, etc. It is interesting, as always, when you do such an evaluation to see how the places you really liked stacked up. It isn't always a given because sometimes just one or two of your criteria will put a place right up at the top even though there are some other very weak areas. We certainly know where we'd probably stay again just based on "gut" feelings and often these feelings are spot on. What did we learn…well, hot water in showers isn't a given as we probably only took two or three hot showers out of seven or eight nights. Beds were, except for maybe one, very HARD. Pillows were cloth covered bricks. Blankets only cover the top of the bed and not two people on a bed. Showers might have doors or might just be in the bathroom area! Breakfast always had: tomatoes, cucumbers, feta cheese, olives, coffee (nescafe instant) or tea and bread. A good breakfast also had eggs or omelets.
We encountered some really wonderful people along the way. Our first super person was Ahmet in Anemur. We were the only two people in his hotel right next to a mosque and the otogar! He fixed us an amazing dinner of fish and then the next day as we were waiting for the dolmus (mini bus) he came out and said he was sorry, but he didn't think they worked on Saturday. So we asked about renting a motorbike or motor scooter. He had his and he was willing to let us use it providing that David knew how to drive it! So off we went to see Annamurium only because of the kindness of Ahmet! We will always be grateful to him for his generous offer (yes we paid him, but it was worth every lira!). Other otel staff were helpful, but Ahmet too the cake hands down. We also met people on the street who helped us and people on the buses too. So, it comes down to one's openness to accept the opportunity for these interchanges with locals and embracing it.
Food:
We have always enjoyed Turkish food. Or maybe we should say food from this part of the world as much of it is similar, just different names and slightly different forms. Eggplant lovers should come here! Spicy and hot food lovers will find a home here as well. Do you like barbecued food (shish)? Wonderful yogurt too and olives cured locally. Thin breads cooked on bricks. It is all here and we've enjoyed the trip even if just for the food. And there was good fish too! Not to mention amazing peaches, pomegranates, bananas and other citrus fruits. Honey soaked cakes and donut like goodies also soaked in honey and Turkish delight. Ah, we didn't suffer when it came to the food.
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