Sunday 22th – Day 9: Cappadocia – Ankara
We were allowed a sleep in this morning as we were not leaving the hotel until 9.30. We stopped off to view Uchisar castle which is what we got hailed away from on Friday. Uchisar means highest area around and there was a castle carved into the top of it. We didn’t go in, it was just a chance to get photos of it as it was the most dominant point around. We stopped at a couple of more photo opportunities and then were off to Ankara about a three hours plus drive away plus lunch. It is colder today and now raining.
We got into Ankara about three and headed straight to the Museum. Although small it had a good collection of items from right through the ages. Ankara is the capital city. Because it was in land and most threats came from the sea..
We were then off to the mausoleum of Ataturk. As I mentioned before this is the guy that fought at Gallipoli and for the Turks independence who was a super hero. Even although he didn’t want any thing they built this super impressive mausoleum for him. It was on the highest hill and is guarded 24/7 by the forces. Huge.
We then booked into our hotel, The Barcelo in Ankara. Gocke pointes us all to the Supermarket across the road and warned us that at Bursa there would be no where to buy drink except at the hotel. It looked like more than half the bus dropped their bags in their rooms and went shopping. We went to Doug and Ngaire’s room and were joined by Damien and Noelene for drinks before an enjoyable meal which included some slices of beef. Margaret and I watched a Movie from Gocke called “My Life in Ruins” about a tour guide in Greece. It was a laugh relating it back to our tour. The local team must have won the football as at about 9.30 the car horns started going crazy and didn’t stop until well after I went to sleep.
I gave the hotel a nine (out of 12 now).
Monday 23rd – Day 10: Ankara – Bursa
A five hour drive ahead of us today so we are back to 6.30 wake up calls and on the by by 8. We head out of Ankara, the second largest city and head for Gordion, the city of King Midas. Remember the midas touch where everything turns to gold. We had to detour off the main highway for this and there was nothing much to see except the tulumus which were little man made mounds with a body (and his worldly possession) buried under it in what looked like a log house. The weather has warmed up and it was a very pleasant interlude before getting back on the bus. The main roads here are very often a duel lane road for each direction I guess like our motorways but not. The traffic flows well until you hit the towns
Next stop was Bursa and the Green Ottoman complex which was a Mosque beautifully decorated in tiles. It was in the process of being restored. The girls had to cover their shoulders so we saw a collection of scarves come out. It was like a group of older country woman. We all had to take our shoes off as well. Not the best idea as my feet stunk. We then went across to the tombs of some important Ottoman Sultan and his family.
Next was the Grand Mosque where it was shoes off and scarves on again. This one was huge and again beautifully decorated. Lot of people in praying or reading the Koran.
We were then given an hour and a half at the adjacent bazaar. Little alley ways to wander around in but again silk, jewellery and clothes, nothing exciting.
Our Hotel was the Kervansaray Termal Hotel. It was an older hotel but very nice. We were lucky again and ended up with a suite but that also meant we got to host the drinks with Sharon and Gocke joining us. I gave this a rating of 8.
