Princes Islands

Three intrepid venturers gathered at Kabataş bright and early this morning. By the time all arrived there was already a horde of locals waiting to catch the ferry to the Princes Islands.

Much like the earlier blog about travelling to Asia for a couple of bucks this one was a great bargain too. For something like NZ $3 we took a 1.5 hour ferry trip across the Bosphorus and headed south into the Sea of Marmara. It was a pleasant balmy trip with something like 5 stops at the other islands before reaching Büyükada or the "Large Island".


After a much needed Turkish breakfast - cheese, salami, tomato, cucumber, bread, omelette - we rented some bicycles for $10 each for the day. The good news is that they weren't your usual rubbish bikes. They had good gears, tyres and suspension.


After a few tips for İsa and Veronica on how to setup the bikes and use the gears we were off.


At 5 sq kms Büyükada isn't huge. We could have walked but taking the bikes made it so much more enjoyable and gave us time to stop frequently. The only traffic to contest with was horse drawn carts that tourists travelled in. There was perhaps 2 cars in the whole day but in comparison to the carts it was nothing.


The riding was a nice mixture of gentle hills and straights. When we reached the entrance to the Monastery of St George (scroll down) we had to hop off the bikes and push them up the hill.


It was some slog with İsa apparently fairing the worst. I say "apparently" because I took off and left the other two behind. This was for a couple of reasons: 1. All the stress with work, home and visa had been building up inside of me and this was the first chance I'd had to release it all, and 2. The sooner it was over the better as far as I was concerned!


When İsa and Veronica did appear Isa collapsed on the chair. We were both worried about him so plugged him with sugary drinks. He just wanted to sleep!


The trip back down was over in a flash.


At the bottom we figured that the other place we wanted to see was an orphanage the was said to be the 2nd largest wooden structure in Europe. So we headed off for a nice ride only to find ourselves back at our start point.


It was funny to find the entrance to the orphanage was just across the road from the entrance to the monastery. We didn't mind at all as it was such a nice day and the rides were very enjoyable.


I didn't know that the orphanage was derelict and hence was hoping it might be an opportunity to volunteer for a bit whilst I work out my next move. 


When we got there it was clear it was all closed up and the gates to the entrance were locked as well. Not to worry. This was probably a good thing as going inside would most likely have resulted in death due to the run down  condition of the buildings.


So we journeyed back to where the ferry was and had a lovely late lunch.


The ferry trip back was noisey-as with so many children fired up from the excitement of the day. And as with the journey out they had fun throwing food to the seagulls who followed the ferry where ever it went.


All in all a very successful day :)