Our first destination on our shore excursion was the Galata Tower. It is one of the oldest in Istanbul; built as a lighthouse in 528 out of wood, then rebuilt of stone masonry in 1348, and then captured by the Turks when Istanbul was conquered in 1453.
We enjoyed a marvellous view of the city from the tower.
We then walked over one of the many bridges where many fishermen were catching mullet and mackerel.
We then stopped briefly at the mosque on the other side to have a quick look inside. It's not really my thing so we didn't stay for too long here.
We went to the spice market, and even though I find this particularly interesting I think the bazaar we were at was catering for tourists rather than locals.
What was interesting however was an authentic Turkish coffee. Oh wow, I thought I liked strong coffee, but this was something else. I even put in a whole sugar lump to see if there was any difference. Um, not really. No wonder the guy (who spoke barely any English) gave us a glass of cold water to go with our coffee. We also ordered Kien an icecream - Jef said it was an interesting something. I didn't try it, but Kien did have a few licks and didn't say yuck.
We stopped for meat kebabs before heading back to the ship, where we stopped for some tea prior to boarding.
The sunset over Istanbul was amazing as we sailed away from port. We watched it first from our balcony in the room and then from the top deck. Jef did a great job capturing these images!
