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Iberian Spring: Day 2 Istanbul to Portugal
Soundtrack: “The Four Corners of the Earth”, Weddings Parties Anything Slept pretty well in a very soft bed. Woke a few times, having no idea what the local time was, but eventually was too awake to go back to sleep bout 30 minutes before I’d set my alarm. I find it a little depressing when I wake and reach for my phone, only to have it cheerfully ask me if I want to turn off my upcoming alarm. The answer is almost always “No, I want to go back to sleep until it’s the time I’ve decided is early enough to get things done, even with allowing extra time so…
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Iberian Spring: Day 0-1; Perth, Kuala Lumpur, Karaburun
Soundtrack: every song by every band about spending time in airports and travelling (on repeat) So it begins again. Having spent 4 months back in the real world of day jobs, traffic, kicking against the pricks and generally just doing what has to be done these days, it’s time to dust off the passport. It’s been a long few months, so this break is very welcome. It’s a crazy old world out there. Flight tracking maps have a couple of vey obvious gaps, and we’re heading right through those to the other side. We’ve had to do some last minute flight changes to keep out of the way, including changing…
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@home, 2024 | baltics24, estonia, europe, finland, helsinki, istanbul, latvia, lithuania, riga, tallinn, turkiye, vilnius
Baltics24: Days 19-20 – Istanbul – Home
Home. Not Istanbul, nor Constantinople, nor Byzantium. Not Vilnius, Riga, Tallinn, Helsinki, Stockholm. Just a couch with a dog that has mostly forgiven, and the heater on, because we’d certainly acclimatised to 30 degree weather and are feeling the chill of an otherwise mild Perth winter. The journey home was uneventful, Singapore Airlines generally took care of us well (except for their website stuffing up L’s gf selection, and their online help being next to useless to correct it — Jeshua I’m keeping my eye on you). We bounced through Changi with enough time to grab some duty-free, and it’s good to see Changi airport has a lot more stores…
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Baltics24: Day 18 – Istanbul
And yet, despite everything, it’s still not Constantinople. I’m beginning to think that I can’t go back to Constantinople. Our last full day in Istanbul, and kind of the last day of the trip. Tomorrow morning we grab breakfast, then a car takes us to the airport, then the next stop is a couple of hours in Singapore before the final stretch home, where a dog should be very happy to see us. Today was all about commerce: Byzantium/Constantinople/Istanbul has been a centre for trade for a while, like most of its history. Marco Polo was here (though I don’t think he graffitied the Hagia Sofia). Out of all this…
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Baltics24: Day 17 – Istanbul
Still not Constantinople. Today was about ticking off the big ticket items, the Hagia Sofia (reminder, pronounced “aya sofiya”) and Topkapi Palace (rough translation “palace with too many stupid tourists”). The Hagia Sofia (translation “Holy Wisdom”) was built in the 6th Century to be a cathedral, after several other churches in the same spot had existed (the one immediately before was burnt down when some chariot racing politics got out of hand). Then when the Ottoman empire showed up, they stripped out all of the cathedral trappings and turned it into a mosque. Then came the Young Turks who turned it into a museum, before in 2020 the current folks…
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Baltics24: Day 16 – Istanbul
I’ll write the second half of day 15 after this, but figure I should get today down while it’s fresh, a few extra hours won’t hurt my memory. I’m also distracted keeping one eye on the absolute shitfest that is England vs Slovakia, it’s currently half time in extra time and JFC it seems that England have finally managed to turn up and remember what that funny white framed net thing at the other end of the pitch is for. It’s been painful to follow. Istanbul (not Constantinople — I promised that would get rehashed often once I got here), or Byzantium if you’re really really damn old. Probably one…
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Baltics24: Day 15a – Vilnius – Istanbul
This might end up as a two part entry as it’s a little after 2am and we’ve just checked in to our Istanbul Hotel. So if I fall asleep typing this I’ll throw some more words at the screen in the morning. The main tasks for today in Vilnius were shopping, shopping, and shopping. All the last minute souvenirs and presents and that kind of thing, including getting the snow dome. Important stuff. Checkout of our “interesting” apartment (it did the job but had a few quirks, like the sensor for the shower light and exhaust fan with a 5 second loop) was at noon, but our flight wasn’t scheduled…
