Life's Journey

Today was our first day in Turkey. I'll be honest I was a little nervous about visiting Turkey. In my head I pictured it as a very poor and dangerous environment. I was surprised and pleased to find that I was totally off base with my thinking. It was a great day. We had booked a private guide and driver again today. He came recommended from a friend and I am so glad we found him, he was fantastic. He was waiting for us at the port when we arrived. I haven't gotten tired of seeing a guy holding a sign with my name on it.

Our journey began with a drive along the Aegean Coast, it took about an hour to get to our first destination, the Temple of Artemis. This was a cool spot, there is not much left of it but it is one of the 7 wonders of the ancient world. From here we were able to see many other ruins off in the distance including Basilica of St John and the 14th century Isa Bey Mosque. I was glad to have Denizhan with us to educate us on the history of this area. We drove a little further up the road to enter Ephesus. The city consisted of 600 acres and over 200,000 people lived here in ancient times. They are still uncovering more about this area - this is an archeologists dream I would guess. I think they said they have only uncovered something like 20% of the entire area.

We were able to walk along the marble roads, you could see the grooves in the road made from the chariots. Some areas have been rebuilt from the archeologists findings. We saw a variety of old retail buildings and homes. We were able to walk through a Roman bath that was fairly intact, it was crazy to think that they had running water and a sewage system. Further down the road we saw a statue of Artemis and a carving of the goddess of Nike. The details in the carvings and mosaics were amazing, these would be hard to do with today's technologies and tools, I can't imagine how they created these back then. The next structure we saw was the library - I think this was one of the most impressive. It was all made of marble and had huge columns in the front that were intricately carved. This was the largest structure in the city (except for the stadium). Only the men were allowed to enter the library, the women were not to be educated, they were meant to raise the family and take care of the home. Across from the library was a brick type building that they thing was the brothel due to some of the carvings in the stones. Also they found a tunnel leading from the library to this building. The thought is that this was a way for the men to get to the brothel without their wives finding out because women were not allowed in the library. Tricky! Men were sneaky bastards even back then!

Further into the city we found the theatre was still fairly well intact. You could walk through the seating area - this was capable of holding 25,000 people. We were even able to walk through the tunnel that the gladiators came through, we could see where they kept the lions and other animals. It was crazy to think about what had occurred in tis very spot, there is so much history here. We also learned that The Virgin Mary reputedly spent her last days at nearby Mt. Pagus which you can see in the distance.

We left the ancient city of Ephesus back toward Izmir where our ship was at port. We stopped at a rug making studio. I'm wouldn’t consider myself a "rug person", I have carpet in most of my house and when passing a rug store I never really understood the desire. As of today I have changed my mind. This was an amazing stop for me and one of my favorites of the entire trip so far. We were able to see how they spin a mile of silk from the silk worms cocoon to use for their rugs. We met a woman who is considered an expert at rug making and after watching her for a few minutes I was able to understand why. She knotted and cut and knotted and cut and knotted and cut faster than I was able to see. She slowed down just to show us the knotting technique she was using. In this example she was using a wool blend thread for the rug so it was large. They let me sit next to her and tie one of the knots. This was very cool and just made me have more respect for the artist that she truly is. Years can go into making one rug! She then showed us a piece she is working on using the silk threads. Holy cow this is crazy detailed! Because the thread is so much thinner you can do soo much more with detail but the lines are so small they are barely visible so keeping track of where you are in your pattern looks nearly impossible. After this they took us into their showroom. WOW all I could say is WOW. These rugs are beautiful! They pulled out more than two dozen different rugs made from a variety of materials in every shape and size. He taught us the difference between a well made rug and a poorly made rug. He also taught us how to tell the difference in the materials used. The silk rugs appear to change in color when viewing them from different sides. They were beautiful. I will never pass by a handmade rug again without stopping to admire it. We even ended up purchasing a small rug that we will have framed and hang in our home.

From here we went to another popular artistry in Turkey, a ceramics studio. They make a huge amount of white clay pottery and paint them with great detail. They use bright colors and textured paints to create beautiful works of art. We were able to watch them create the pottery on the wheel and then see an artist at work painting in great detail. Then, of course, we were taken into a huge studio of finished pottery available fore sale. Yup, couldn't pass that up so we picked up a few items for the house.

I think our treasures we purchased today will always be extremely special to us. Having seen how they were made and all the time that goes into them gives you a whole new respect for these forms of art.

We arrived back on the ship in time for a yummy lunch then headed to the room to shower. Ah, nap time! Later we will have dinner at the main dining room and watch a show in the theatre We may even pay a visit to the casino to see if the luck is still with us. We will be traveling through a very narrow straight around 10pm tonight, we are hoping to be able to see it from our balcony. We've definitely seen some beautiful sunrises and sunsets already.

Hugs and Smiles,

Sarah