As we were boarding the plane to Turkey, I was thinking to myself that only a three and a half hour flight and an hour bus ride could get us from a city with the same latitude as Ketchikan, Alaska to the coastal town of Side on the Mediterranean Sea. The ease of travel within Europe will never cease to amaze me. Upon our arrival in Side, we were greeted by Christopher’s parents who were waiting in our hotel lobby. They were leaving for Sweden the next morning so we had a very quick visit which included us getting lots of food, sunscreen and other goodies from them!

 

 

 

 

 

We woke up to the 4:30a.m. call to prayer at the nearby mosque and a beautiful sea view from our room. After breakfast on the balcony, we headed to the beach. In a lot of the beach cities in Turkey (and perhaps elsewhere), if you agree to have lunch at a particular restaurant, you can use the sun beds on that part of the beach all day. And so the relaxing and eating commenced.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christopher’s family suggested we go to nearby restaurant called Golden Star. When they had visited Side more than a decade before, they had become friends with a server named James and they had run into him again on this trip. After all that time, they still recognized each other! On one of these trips, they had given James a CD and he still had the CD, 13 years later. When we went to Golden Star, Christopher spotted James right away. James showed me the CD and some pictures of Christopher and his family when he was about 15 years old. My first thought was, Wow, 15 year old Christopher was HOT (he still is)! Fifteen year old me would have totally told my girlfriends that I thought he was cute in hopes that they would tell his friends and then his friends would tell him 😉 Of course, my second thought was, how cool is it that James still has this CD? It’s really pretty amazing.

 

 

 

 

 

The next day, we left the beach early to check out downtown Side. This is what I had been waiting for- some ancient ruins! We saw the Temple of Apollo, the remains of an amphitheater and what appeared to be another nearby ancient structure. Downtown was also full of restaurants and stores where you could by almost anything. This was a great opportunity to see Christopher’s haggling skills. He found some white Converse All-Stars and I found a pair of turquoise sandals. Apparently, the salesman thought these Converses were worth 95 Turkish lira ($47.50USD). Well, that just wasn’t going to happen. After about 5 minutes, we ended up paying 80 Turkish lira ($40USD) for both pairs of shoes. Success!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I don’t want to bore you with all the details of our days (lay out, take a swim, read, play cards, repeat) so I’ll relay all of the really important information; everything we ate. Before almost every meal, we had delicious Turkish bread with tzatziki sauce and a Mediterranean tomato salsa. Seriously, this bread is what dreams are made of. Christopher, not surprisingly, had steak almost every night and it was always very delicious. I had a little bit of everything; lamb skewers, doner kebab, a burrito, meatballs, tortellini in a gorgonzola cream sauce. One night, after having a large burrito, I spotted the first dessert menu I had seen the entire trip. On it? Baklava. It didn’t matter that I was in pain I was so full. What kind of dessert loving woman would I be if I didn’t try the Turkish baklava?? Needless to say, I was extra full that night, but it was a great decision.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

During our trip, I was constantly in awe of Turkey’s beauty. Not only was the Mediterranean breathtaking, as expected, there was a beautiful mountain range to the east of the city. I won’t pretend I had a clue about Turkey’s geography before I arrived, but I wasn’t expecting mountains. We also came across some of the most beautiful flowers I have ever seen. The colors were so rich, the petals were bursting with tropical pigments. I was also impressed that all these flowers survive in such a hot climate. I may have been a little jealous since I have a 50% success rate of keeping flowers alive in our apartment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Before we knew it, Friday night had rolled around. It was our last night in Side and Turkish night at the Golden Star. In addition to our amazing dinner, we also had some amazing entertainment. There was a great belly dancer and Jimmy, one of James’ coworkers, who juggled bottles lit on fire.  Things got a little PG-13 with Christopher and a couple of the other guys sitting in the audience when she pulled them up on stage. I have video proof, but they’ll never make it on this blog.

 

 

 

 

 

 

On our last day, we went to the mosque near our hotel. It was surrounded by a beautiful garden and a gazebo and had marble steps leading up to the entrance. The entire building was so intricately and and colorfully designed. We weren’t dressed appropriately, so we couldn’t take a look inside but I imagine it was also very beautiful.

 

 

 

 

 

As we took the bus ride back to the airport, I watched the mountains pass by and reflected on our amazing week. This will certainly be a trip I won’t soon forget!