We then walked to the Grand Bazar, which was extremely crowded and with the narrow alleys and large amount of people, really brought out the claustrophobic in me!
We stopped at another small mosque that had some gorgeous tile work!
We walked through the spice market and then stopped at a local place for a delicious lunch! Afterwards, we had free time, and most of us ended up at the Topkapi Palace. It was an impressive former sultan's palace, and in the treasury (where unfortunately no pictures were allowed) were some of the biggest emeralds I have ever seen as well as an 86 carat diamond. The grounds were gorgeous, and we visited the harem as well that at one point housed over 400 concubines.
While on the ledge of the harem enjoying the view of the city below, I spotted a ship that looked familiar to me across the bay. It was the Corinthian II, the ship on which I traveled along the Western coast of Africa this past February, March and April! I decided to splinter off from the rest of the group to go say hello to some friends who worked on board. Unfortunately I was unable to get to the ship, thanks to strict port controls, but I did run into some familiar crew members on the street and had them pass on messages to friends onboard! What a small world!
I then had dinner, headed back to the hotel to meet the rest of the group for our transfer to the train station. We took a ferry across the bay to the Asian side of Istanbul, where we caught an overnight train to Ankara. The train cars were comfortable, and we all had a great time on the way to Ankara!
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