Traveling with Ellen

A day of travel.  We were taken off the ship at 3:30 am in order to make our flight on time at the Istanbul airport. This meant wake up at about 2:45, but of course, neither of us could sleep so at about 2:30 we were already up and dressed. We went down to the atrium (deck 1) on the ship and had coffee and a pastry while we waited for our group to be called. Then it was the long walk through the Istanbul marine terminal, through customs, locate our luggage and then find our bus. The bus finally pulled out at about 4:30 am with a 40 minute drive to the airport.  It's a huge airport!  After an attempt at entering one of the airport doors, we were sent to another because the first door was for Priority Turkish Airlines travelers only!  You couldn't even enter the airport through that door! Signage is 'just ok' when we entered, and went through security (just to get into the airport).   We finally found British Airways check in area.  They hadn't even open...

  What a day!  I had no idea what to expect in Instanbul Turkey.  I had an early morning.  My tour left at 7:30 am.  The port talk about Istanbul told us all about how busy the city was and how we would have to get from the ship to the bus.  The marine terminal in Istanbul is completely underground.  It took over 10 minutes of fast paced walking to get from the ship to the bus.  It was explained well.  We were told to think of it like an airport terminal.  It was exactly that. My tour (additional charge) was called "Istanbul's Amazing Edifices" and the tour lived up to its name.  The bus took us close to the Topkapi Palace.  Because we started so early, it wasn't open yet, so we walked to the Blue Mosque.  The real or correct name is the Sultan Ahmed Mosque. It's named because all of the blue tiles inside.  It was incredible.   The mosque was absolutely amazing.   It was constructed between 1609 an...