Eep! Travel!
Yup, we're going to Turkey! This is the long-awaited honeymoon which may have never come, what with all the moving/travelling coming up in the next year. But we're saying "neeners" to caution, to the bad economy, the inflation, and taking the trip. I'm pretty happy with my ticket shopping: I got tickets for less than it cost me to go to Cairo 7 years ago.
We're leaving San Diego on April 17th, arriving in Istanbul on April 18th, leaving Ankara on May 1st for Vienna, leaving Vienna on May 2nd for San Diego. Other than the airport locations, nothing else is planned! How fun. I'm trying to determine whether or not it's worth our time to go all the way to the east of the country to Lake Van. There's an ancient palace with cuneiform tracts that I studied in college! Buuuuuut... I could satisfy my archaeology bug with Çatalhöyük, which I also studied.
So what are we going to do in Turkey? I think we'll bum around Istanbul for a couple days. See the sights, eat the foods, wander the bazaars, get a feel for the place. Then it's travelling around to archaeological sites, like Troy and Çatalhöyük and to the underground cities in Cappadocia. Maybe Lake Van, maybe Trabzon and the Black Sea, and end our trip in Ankara (the capital).
The almost-more-difficult thing to plan is what to do in Vienna for 18 hours. I was there for a week about 9 years ago. A couple hours of daylight to see the sites, have some Wiener Schnitzel (not hot dogs, the real thing... or maybe goulash because I lurrrrv it and they have Hungarian restaurants in Vienna), maybe catch a concert or something and then fly out in the morning.
We scaled back our original trip of going through Eastern Europe because of the Euro being so high, and the train travel far exceeding the price I am willing to pay. Plus, the Eurrail pass doesn't work over there, too many national systems. And Turkey's still affordable and the trains are cheaper and we really really have places we want to visit, as opposed to Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria, which would be nice. Someday, when we have more money, the dollar's strong, etc.
In the meantime, we'll be living in Morocco and I imagine visiting Carthage (in Tunisia), Spain, Dakkar, all sorts of awesome places!!
We're leaving San Diego on April 17th, arriving in Istanbul on April 18th, leaving Ankara on May 1st for Vienna, leaving Vienna on May 2nd for San Diego. Other than the airport locations, nothing else is planned! How fun. I'm trying to determine whether or not it's worth our time to go all the way to the east of the country to Lake Van. There's an ancient palace with cuneiform tracts that I studied in college! Buuuuuut... I could satisfy my archaeology bug with Çatalhöyük, which I also studied.
So what are we going to do in Turkey? I think we'll bum around Istanbul for a couple days. See the sights, eat the foods, wander the bazaars, get a feel for the place. Then it's travelling around to archaeological sites, like Troy and Çatalhöyük and to the underground cities in Cappadocia. Maybe Lake Van, maybe Trabzon and the Black Sea, and end our trip in Ankara (the capital).
The almost-more-difficult thing to plan is what to do in Vienna for 18 hours. I was there for a week about 9 years ago. A couple hours of daylight to see the sites, have some Wiener Schnitzel (not hot dogs, the real thing... or maybe goulash because I lurrrrv it and they have Hungarian restaurants in Vienna), maybe catch a concert or something and then fly out in the morning.
We scaled back our original trip of going through Eastern Europe because of the Euro being so high, and the train travel far exceeding the price I am willing to pay. Plus, the Eurrail pass doesn't work over there, too many national systems. And Turkey's still affordable and the trains are cheaper and we really really have places we want to visit, as opposed to Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria, which would be nice. Someday, when we have more money, the dollar's strong, etc.
In the meantime, we'll be living in Morocco and I imagine visiting Carthage (in Tunisia), Spain, Dakkar, all sorts of awesome places!!