We took a back to back cruise from Piraeus to Istanbul (Constantinople) and return. Today passengers debark and new ones embark for the trip to Piraeus.
I had contacted our guide from previous visits to Istanbul and Ephesus and booked him to guide us today and on the 25th when we are in Ephesus. It was a fluke of good luck that he had other tours in Ephesus and was able to be with us then. More on July 25 post.
Since we were in Istanbul in May 2013 as part of a group we saw some Churches that we wanted to revisit privately with our guide.
We arranged to meet at 9am at the pier and our itinerary was:
I had contacted our guide from previous visits to Istanbul and Ephesus and booked him to guide us today and on the 25th when we are in Ephesus. It was a fluke of good luck that he had other tours in Ephesus and was able to be with us then. More on July 25 post.
Since we were in Istanbul in May 2013 as part of a group we saw some Churches that we wanted to revisit privately with our guide.
We arranged to meet at 9am at the pier and our itinerary was:
- Patriarchate and Church of St. George
- Church of Mary of the Mongols- was supposed to be on May 2013 tour but bypassed.
- Monastery of the Mother of God at the Spring
- Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora
- Maria"s garden restaurant
- local pastry shop
We had made some inquiries to see if it was possible to have an audience with His All Holiness Patriarch Bartholomew but his office said he was unavailable. This is our third attempt and maybe we will be successful the next time.
Our guide Arman gave us a tour of the Church of St. George showing the tombs of Sts. interred in tombs in the Church as well as part of the column where Jesus was flagellated before his crucifixion.
We then stopped at the gift shop for some gifts before we left the grounds to walk to our next destination, the Church of Mary of the Mongols.
The Church of Mary of the Mongols was a few blocks from the Patriarchate and up many flights of stairs at the top of a hill. We went through a neighborhood that used to be all Greek until the 1920's when the Greeks were resettled out of Turkey. It is pretty rundown and some of the homes as well as the Church and the High school have high walls topped with barbed wire.
Fortunately the stairs have landings and railings to hold onto for safety. Once we reached the top we saw the high school on our left and the Church on the right. The door was locked and Arman had to shout for the caretaker to open the door and let us into the courtyard.
We then walked to the church entrance and then into the church. It is the only remaining Byzantine Church in Istanbul and never converted to a mosque.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_St._Mary_of_the_Mongols
We then walked a short distance to see the front of the Phanar Greek Orthodox College, he oldest surviving and most prestigious Greek Orthodox school in Istanbul, Turkey. The school, like all minority schools in Turkey, is a secular school.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phanar_Greek_Orthodox_College
We then started our descent back to the main road to our van. We passed through the neighborhood and noticed the old homes. Arman said that the area will be redeveloped and the old beautiful homes destroyed.
Our next stop is the
Monastery of the Mother of God at the Spring .
In May 2013 we had a visit with our tour group but it was short and incomplete. We could not go to visit the tombs of the Patriarchs because the caretaker was washing the grounds.
On the way here we passed the Greek cemetery which was locked up for security reasons. It is open on Sundays for visits.
At the Monastery we visited the Church, the underground springs and then went to the courtyard where the Patriarchs and important citizens were entombed.
Greek Cemetery
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_St._Mary_of_the_Spring_(Istanbul)
Once we were done we went on to the next stop,
Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora (Turkish: Kariye Müzesi, Kariye Camii, Kariye Kilisesi — the Chora Museum, Mosque, or Church).
Photos from 2013 visit
Again we are revisiting a site we saw in 2013. At that time the Church was very crowded with tourists and it was hard to hard to hear Arman explain about the icons on the wall as well as see them.
We were fortunate then that the center of the Church was open for us to see.
When we pulled up in the van for the visit we saw that the dome of the Church as well as the surrounding walls were covered with tarps- supposedly for the rehabilitation of the structure. We were there on a weekday but saw no work or workers on site.
There were few people in the Church so we were able to hear Arman explain about the life of Mary and Jesus. Per Arman this one of the few Churches that have icons of the life of the Virgin Mary.
2015 photos
Vendor near the Chora Museum
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chora_Church
If I ever go back to Istanbul and have time I would visit this Church again along with Agia Sophia. Both are beautiful and inspiring.
Since it is now approaching noon we are on the way to Maria's Garden Restaurant from lunch.
In the last several years Maria has had a show on Mega TV and now Alpha TV featuring scenes of Istanbul and the surrounding area where she cooks local dishes. She even cooked on a Bosphorus cruise.
She is a renown chef and has won awards in Turkey for her cooking.
http://merveozaytekin.blogcu.com/benim-hayatim-yemek-yapmak/4761535
http://www.mariasrestaurant.net/
The restaurant is in a residential area of Istanbul. It has indoor and outdoor seating. Since the weather was warm we chose to sit outside. The menu has a variety of vegetarian and meat dishes. We chose the lamb stew with pureed eggplant and beef kabobs. The eggplant was fabulous. I never ate anything so light and fluffy before. We topped off the meal with Turkish coffee and a slice of homemade orange cake. Delicious.
Time is running out and we have to head back to the ship. We planned one more stop at a well known pastry shop to buy some sweets to enjoy on the ship. This shop is near the old cruise terminal. When cruise ships stopped at the old terminal, debarking passengers would leave the port and see all the pastry shops and restaurants across the street.
The new cruise terminal is in an isolated area a couple of blocks from the main street and the tram. No local pastry shops or restaurants close by. There is a Starbucks approx. 5 blocks away.
After purchasing our sweets we boarded our van and the driver took us to the cruise terminal to board our ship. We bade goodbye to our guide Arman and the driver and thanked them for a great day of touring Istanbul.
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