Day 2 in Turkey. What a day! We got up and ate a fantastic breakfast (French Toast) at the hostel and then went out to the Hagia Sophia. This building was incredibly majestic. It kind of just looms over everything. It was built in 537 AD under the emperor Justinian and began as a church. In the 1400s, when the Turks took over the sultan requested that it be turned into a mosque. He wanted it done very quickly so because of this, care was not taken to make sure the art inside was preserved. Spires were added on and the beautiful Byzantine mosaics inside where also covered, and many were destroyed because of this. In the 1930s, it became a museum and when they were restoring and cleaning inside the church, they found remnants of mosaics all around the building.
This is one of the more in tact mosaics.
We spent at least two hours roaming around the floor and then the upper galleries of the building. It was definitely a sight to see.
After that, the boys went and did the Turkish bath thing and Libby and I wandered around Sultanhamet by ourselves. We went into one rug/ceramics/lamp store and started chatting with the owner about his family and his culture and his religion and all the traditions/rituals/rites associated with it. After about an hour or so, he asked us if Libby and I would like to sit down and have tea with the workers in the store. In Turkey, that is a HUGE deal - being invited to have tea with a Turk is a great sign of loyalty and friendship. So, of course we sat down and enjoyed apple tea served in a tulip shaped glass. What an experience!
We spent the evening journaling in a cafe near our hostel with tea and baklava. We met a couple there that were from Katy, Texas - were Church of Christ and live in the same area that my good friend Tyler Gentry from Harding does. It really is a small, small world.
Wednesday morning we woke up early and headed to the train station for 8:30 am train to Greece. Of course the trains in Turkey and Greece are never on time. And, a city as big as Istanbul the train station was tiny. We got on our train -- just hoping that we would eventually make it to Greece. We notice once we get on that we are 4 of the 5 passengers on the whole train - the rest (we were pretty sure) was cargo. There were more conductors than there were passengers! The 5th passenger was a Japanese guy named Ken - he very quickly became our friend. Nick, Tyler, Libby and I got into our compartment (that turned out to be a couchette) and we folded the beds down and we slept for a good three and a half or four hours. We woke up close to 1 because we knew that's when the train was supposed to get to Uzonkopru - the border town of Turkey - where we would switch trains to get across the border. We had a very narrow window within which to switch. Well, needless to say, the train was supposed to arrive at 1:15 and it was 1:05 and we were still a good 45 or 50 kms away.
When we woke up we heard voices in the compartment next to ours. They were American voices, Not Turkish voices. Lo and behold, the voices were coming from Coulter and Travis. They always appear out of nowhere.
Since we were running late, we figured we needed a plan. In order to make sure that all our trains worked and we would get to Greece by the next morning, we HAD to make that train at the border town so that we could get to Thessaloniki. Well, at the rate we were going we were going to have to RUN to catch the 2:03 train. Nick and Tyler decided that if we had to - we would cross the border on foot. (NOT SMART).
Anyhow, we were getting really close and Nick walked up to the conductor and said "Uzonkopru?" and kind of gave the "what" face and the conductor just chuckled, pointed out the window at something on the ground and yelled "TT!" It was a turtle. It didn't really matter though because we got to the town about 10 minutes later. We had our packs strapped on and we were waiting at the door when the conductor came out of his compartment and said, "Police! SIT!" (at the time, we thought he said Please, sit!) So, we sat, just as he told us to do.
Two very important looking uniformed men got onto the train and looked at us and said, "Why you have your bags on your back? Sit. Give us passports." Of course we couldn't refuse so we apprehensively handed over our passports. And, in some sort of broken English he told us to wait there and that he would go to the post office and copy our passports and he'd be back. "This train will take you to Pythion in Greece. Stay."
So, stay we did. We sat for a few minutes - 15, 20 - and got increasingly nervous because we could no longer see the man. Then, all of a sudden, our car started moving. We jumped up - screaming "PASSPORTS!!!!" And they stopped, reversed and pulled back into the station. At this moment, Ken was not happy either.
Still we sat and we saw an engine and some cargo cars go by. We got up to look around the car and realized that that was OUR engine that passed by. We were just a lone passenger car sitting on the tracks in Uzonkopru Turkey...with the Turkish police in control of our passports. Another 10 minutes go by and then BOOM! There's a very big jolt. Thankfully, it was just our engine reattaching itself. Not even 30 seconds later and the police got back on board and returned our passports, telling us we were good to go.
But no - we were NOT out of the woods yet.
We crossed over this bridge where there were Turkish flags painted on every beam and then all of a sudden they became Greek flags. And, of course we were hanging out and taking pictures of the border...because it was cool!
We stopped in Pythion and of course, we had to do another passport check since we were re-entering the EU. The Greek police got on, asked for our passports (we had just gotten them back!!) and then asked if we had taken pictures on the bridge. When we said yes, he asked to see our cameras and he deleted all of them. Obviously a breach of national security or something.
After another long and drawn our process we got our passports again. And, after many trials and tribulations including but not limited to: Pythion as a ghost town, again the only 7 people for miles, the supposed train station, the schedule posted was handwritten and getting on a bus not sure where it was going to take us but ending up in Alexanderopouli where we finally got a train...we arrived in Thessaloniki.
Here's the train schedule....hehe.
After a sleepless night on an overnight train, we arrived in Athens.
We found a cab and FINALLY made it to Porto Rafti.
We spent the day in town at the Plaka and climbed up to the Acropolis. It was incredible.
This is Libby and I in front of the Parthenon that is unfortunately covered in scaffolding.
We ate gyros and hung out in the city and then headed back to the HUG campus. The next day we slept in and hung out with our friends all day and then went to the Athens mall (I know.) and just visited and goofed off and it was great.
Saturday we took a ferry out to Aegina and rented four wheelers and tooled around the island all day. It was so deserted, but it was amazing. We ate lunch at this restaurant where the owner really catered to our every want and need because we were her only customers and after that we found a huge rock face and slept outside listening to our iPods by the sea for about two hours. So surreal.
The water sure was a pretty color.
We headed back Sunday evening by boat and ended up getting back to HUF around 7 or so Monday night.
And, thus ends second free travel.
It was a huge adventure.
Ciao!
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