Shopping

We woke up late, dawdled, had breakfast and checked out of our suite.  We trudged, with the small roll-aboard we’ve both been living out of these last two days, the couple of blocks down the street to our main hotel and checked back in there.  We were also reunited with our huge boat-anchor suitcases which were in storage while we were driving around the west side of Turkey.  It’s nice to be reunited.

Diane decided to risk her skin in the name of science.  Today’s destination was the famous Grand Bazaar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Bazaar,_Istanbul). It is a huge place, and this photo shows only one of many (10? 20?) halls of wares.  We went there with the shopping objective of purchasing a Turkish Bath towel and a pot scrubber.  There is a famous place there for that stuff which we sought-out and Diane purchased the finest of wares. 

After that, the rest of the bazaar was anticlimactic and we just wandered around.  I took pictures.  It is noteworthy how attractive wildly colored ethnic pottery looks when resting in an exotic store in Istanbul’s famous Grand Bazaar.  I also began thinking that I might look good in a shirt with gold piping.

After lunch in a street café near the Grand Bazaar, we headed to The Mosque of Suleiman the Magnificent.  This required some iteration even with my GPS.  Once there, we learned that it had been closed for extensive restoration since 2007 and is scheduled to reopen later this year.  Oh well.  It is supposed to rival the Blue Mosque inside.  We visited a couple of mausoleums for the Sultan and his wife.

I walked Diane over to the Turkish Bath.  While Diane was doing that, I wandered around the Old City a little more and even went into the Blue Mosque again.

I reunited with a thoroughly exfoliated Diane (gawd, I am glad I didn’t go) at our agreed to time.  We strolled around a restaurant district a little, stopped for a “pita”, which is more like pizza and went back to the room.  Another day done well.