Well, so long Vienna: with your cool retro cars in mint condition… your ludicrous deserts, especially your ice cream pasta… your every second store selling chocolate… your literal translations… your cafe signage… …your naked people running through the streets. This…
An absolutely priceless weather day: hot, but not scorching, a light breeze and a few fair weather clouds which offered periodic relief. We had some strawberries, cherries, yogurt and Nespresso at the apartment, then wandered into the centre. We stumbled…
Six statues? Six statues? I asked for eight statues. This is a disaster! If there’s nothing to do in Vienna there’s a museum you haven’t seen. There is even a Third Man museum (which, alas, is open once a…
The Valens Aquaduct: Goodbye Istanbul. IST to VIE, TK1885: We were checked out of the hotel at 8:30 without breakfast. It was sunny and steaming up but the city doesn’t really come alive before noon. We had booked a comfortable…
Why did Constantinople get the works? That’s nobody’s business but the Turks. Of course I’ve been waiting a week to write that. Above: Christ healing the paralytic at Capernaum. What parable is that? A shout out to Jarome for recommending…
An inscription which means “I am the city of learning and Ali is its gate.” Part of an exceptional collection of Islamic scripts we saw in the afternoon. The one above, a long elegant scroll, painfully detailed, is simply a…
June 1 already! Feral cats are to Istanbul what vending machines are to Tokyo. Today after breakfast we returned to Sultanahmet to the Topkapi Palace, the royal residence of sultans for over 400 years from the mid-1400s to the mid…
It was very hot in the sun, 27 plus, but lovely in the shade, with an uplifting sea breeze. After breakfast at the hotel we navigated transit (not without difficulty), taking the tram to the tourist zone of Sultanahmet. Here…
Why are we flying Montréal Istanbul, a five hour flight and a nine hour flight with a four hour layover? The cryptic rules concerning how additional costs are levied. The sweetest part is that two biz class tickets on points…
On the afternoon we arrived in Banff there wasn’t a lot of time until dinner so we climbed Tunnel Mountain, a sort of local “Grouse grind” in the late day heat; 4.8 kms but only 260 meters. Gorgeous views and…