Another day in Istanbul

One of my very good friends in Istanbul is Suphi (you say Soup.hee)  Anyway, I've known him for maybe 9 years now - so we've been friend for a LONG time.  He works on a cruise ship right now but he is home on a vacation between contracts now.  So we were able to spend some time together doing this and that.  One of things we did was take a boat trip out to the Princes' Islands in the Marmara.  Here are some photos of that trip.  We had a picnic, wandered around the island called Buyukada (it means Big Island) and then went to the beach.

I walked down the hill from Beyoğlu to the Ferry terminal.  Here's a picture from the bridge.  There are many fishermen on the bridge (the bridge has cars and trucks rumbling along as well as the Street Car - so it's busy and not the first place you'd think of if you were trying to find a fishing spot.  But it seems to work!)  The sea-level part of the bridge where I was walking is full of restaurants (fish, of course!) and cafes.  Very fun place.

Of course once we got there we found out that the ferry to the Islands had moved up the Bosphorus.  So we got on the Tram (Streetcar) and just made it as the boat was leaving the dock! 

Here's the view at the small town on Buyukada.  As you can see, it's a VERY popular place for tourists on the weekend.  The weekdays are less crowded, but it's summer so in a way every day is a weekday.  Schools are out, people go for the summer to rented houses and apartments, and there's no escaping the crowds!

The beach was not just a simple beach.  It was a Destination Beach with a DJ.  He played tons of fun (Turkish) music and lots of people were dancing.  But you're probably noticing that all the boys are dancing together.....that's what happens here generally.  The boys dance together (well, not together, but in the same general space and laugh and have a good time) and the girls dance together.  Although Turkey is officially (constitutionally) a secular country a lot of the norms and practices are still a little religious (I don't call it Muslim because so many things are exactly the same as you would find in rural America or Europe.)  There were obviously some boyfriend/girlfriend combos dancing together, and the girls were all wearing bikinis, but still some things were done separately.  Anyway, they were having a good time, laughing and just enjoying the beach.  So, here you are - a little slice of life at the beach in Turkey.  

Finally, this is the boat back to Istanbul.  Standing room only after a LONG wait with everyone muttering about the late boat, the lack of information about what was going on and all that.  Just like anywhere.  Then the mad rush to the boat (no one was pushed into the sea, so nothing really bad happened!)  Then standing all the way back to Istanbul (just less than one hour.)

That's it for this post.  More later!