An Exercise in Irrelevance

The hassles and bustles of Istanbul came to their completion with a scrum for the one of the regular ferries to the Islands. It turned out to be unnecessary, though because it wasn’t that full and there were plenty of seats. The journey was calm and pleasant except for the occasional waft of diesel fumes and a fractious child behind me.

First impressions of Buyukada were not great; but this just turned out to be the feeding frenzy of merchants surrounding the arriving boat. The island itself is small, calm and relatively peaceful. They have no cars except for essential services; this means lots of bikes and the ever present smell of horse dung which, thankfully, I have become used to now.

The place is lovely (with a few cheesy bits — the noises upstairs sound distinctly like people dancing to a Hammond organ). Most of shops and resturants are focused around the ferry terminal; the most utilitarian shops like the supermarkets, fruit stores and emergency horse carriage shops are a couple of hundred metres away. Further out, it’s residential. After that most (about 2/3s) of the island is still covered with pine woodland, with a couple of roads that you can hire a bike and cycle around. At the very top, there’s a Greek orthodox monastry to which there is a steep, windy and cobbled road; murder in the warm local weather.

It’s not an island for beach lovers; there don’t appear to be many. Near the hotel most of the access to water has been turned in concrete piers often tied to private housing. There are a few places you can get into the water, though, which is murky but clean. In short, there’s not that much to do here except to chill out, walk around and eat. Perhaps the place is the better for this.

We’ve lucked out this time on hotels. The Marine House hotel feels relatively new, making it well furnished inside. The staff have been friendly and efficient, including welcome juice cocktails when we arrived, followed by wine, fruit and dipping chocolate room service, soon after. It’s also central and cheap. My general feeling of this place is that the vast majority of the visitors are Turkish; I guess that they the hotel is starting out and actually cares about repeat custom.

Home tomorrow (if the flights work). Looking forward to it.

Written on 17/07/2009

Have been in Istanbul now for several days. Been down the Bosphoros, up a castle and in a mosque. It’s an impressive place. The central tourist trap, Sultanahmet, is also overloaded with places to go and see, from many different ages. From an Egyptian needle (1500BC according to the guidebook, 400BC according to the plaque), through to the Byzantine hippodrome which used to house a huge swimming pool where they raced the beasts after which it was named, to the Palace which housed the Ottomans, through to the Blue and Aya Sofia Mosques. This city, perched across the straits, gateway to two continents has been the centre of several huge empires for many centuries, robbed only of it’s crown when Ataturk decided that Ankara was the place for his capital, on the basis that finding somewhere to erect state buildings in Istanbul was going involve knocking down several UNESCO world heritage sites.

All of these classic tourist traps make the place well worth a visit: the Aya Sofia is stunning inside, with a magnificent domed space and fabulous mosaics. The Blue Mosque has more going for it on the outside; it’s an active mosque (which the Aya Sofia is not), and it’s been well light, but the blizzard of lighting cables dangling from the room make the inside disjointed in a way that even the restoration scaffold of the Aya Sofia fails to. Still, it’s free to enter, so no complaints. Topkapi palace is huge and full of beauty, organized as multiple rooms and buildings around four courtyards, rather than a single big palace western-style.

What about the rest; well, it’s very easy to get a hotel here in the heritage centre of Sultanahmet. We’re in the curiously named “And Hotel” (yes, it’s a pun); it’s not great. The shared facilities are old and worn; the bedroom is badly decorated and small; there’s been a power-cut and a curious smell of solvent one afternoon. Breakfast is okay, though, and the view from the top is fun. Food has been, well, disappointing I think is the only real way of saying it; I don’t think that I have had two meals that I would class as good; ironic that I can get better, cheaper food of much the same style in Newcastle. The only other problem is that, especially in Sultanahmet, everyone is after your custom and they can be very pushy. This can be tiresome after a while; I’m fed up of answering how I am, and where I am from.

There are also several scams on the go: the one taxi that we took went the wrong way (a spiral is not a good way to get anywhere), and also flipped the meter over to the night rate (50% higher) after distracting our attention — arguments ensued while he tried to convince me that the meter was broken. The second scam is a shoe-shin scam. Guy walks past with shoe shine box, accidentally knocking off his brush on the way. You call after him. He looks surprised, turns away, then turns back offers you a shoe shine, apparently out of gratitude, but then demands a stupid amount with menace. It’s difficult; I realise someone shining shoes probably ain’t rich; it’s pathetic act rather than a callous one. But it’s tiresome and irritating; as with my car hire experience last year, it saps energy and means that you have to always operate with suspicion and distrust.

Next, the plan is to move down to one of the Islands which should be a bit quieter, although I am sure someone will still be trying to sell stuff.

Written on 15/07/2009

Now in the grandly titled Delta Nature Resort which is about 20km upstream of Tulcea. We were bought here by a bloke called Vlad; fortunately, he had none of the xenophobic nature of his namesake; rather, he was a jovial, engaging man with a slightly old car. He drove us here carefully, except for a perilous moment when he tried for the dubious extra security of his seat belt while travelling at 50kph.

The Nature resort. Well, it’s a big wetland lake like so many of the others that we have seen over the last few days, reed beds, hanging trees and, of course, birds. The resort has been embedded on the side of the hill, not really adding to the place, but not detracting too much from it either. It’s has pretentions to being five star; we were given a fruity cocktail when we walked through the door, the receptionist knew who we were without look it up, and took five minutes to describe the many features of our chalet (“this is the wardrobe” — good to know). Any attempt at having an “environmental feel” as my Rough Guide tells me, is destroyed by the double aircon units, and general feeling of excess here.

It’s got a slightly tatty feel for swanky place. A guy had to climb down a manhole to switch on the jacuzzi; he left the cover off, the hole left waiting to catch a small child. The pool is small and the underwater light fittings slightly wobbly. But it all worked, so I am now swum, showered, jacuzzied and sauna-ed. Best of all was a wobbly, imcompetent hour rowing on the lake. Got to see two snakes this time, the occasional fish, and the birds up close, as well as many water lillies and reed beds, generally while crashing into them.

Back to the inevitable chocolates on the bed, with covers carefully turned down. Always an effort to do it yourself, I find. Not sure what the food is going to be like, but pretentious and not that friendly for the veggie I suspect, as well as being pointlessly expensive.

Quite enjoying it, in spite of myself, but am glad we are here for only a day; without a car, we would be have been stuck with expensive taxi rides everywhere, and the polite staff would drive me mad after more.

Written on 09/07/2009

Am in Crisan, a small village on the delta of the Danube in Romania. It’s a strange village because it is two dimensional; spread out across up and down the shore of a narrow spit of land, trapped betweeen one of the two main branches of the Danube in front and a reed bed behind.

All around the river branches and reforms. It’s just a short boat ride till you are on a stream with banks lined with reeds, travelling through large ponds choked with water ferns and lily pads. As the boat travels through, frogs leap for safety, out of the path. And there are birds everywhere; I’m not one of lifes twitchers, but here you can see the motivation. Pelicans, herons and ibis are common. Occasionally in the distance, a flash of blue is the most you are likely to see of the kingfisher, elusive, but at least you see it often.

The village is quiet and peaceful. I’ve not seen a car move, just a JCB, but boats everywhere. It has little tourist stuff going on; there are a couple of pensione, including the one we are in, one canoe hire place, and two bars. Most of the people who visit are fishing or birdwatching. I wonder how it will be 20 years time. Will the Danube rise; will it turn into an hippie outpost; will it become a tourist spot with bars and souvenir shops selling ethinic tat by the yard?

Tomorrow, we travel to the north of the main stream; not sure whether the environment will be much the same, or whether we will see many other kinds of bird. I don’t really care; it’s enough to relax regardless.

Written on 07/07/2009