Bob and the Turkish Barber

Bob was beginning to look like the wild man of the woods so after much prodding from me consented to go to the barber next to our hotel for a quick beard trim and hair cut.  Meanwhile, thinking the cut and trim would only take the usual 15 minutes, I went to our rooms to make some sandwiches for lunch.  After preparations I sat down to do some research on the web and waited... and waited.  After more than an hour I decided I better go searching for him, expecting to find him chatting with the guys in the restaurant downstairs.

There was Bob reclining shirtless in the barber chair with a mud pack on his face and a look in his eyes like a kangaroo caught in headlights.  When he saw me he glared and warned ‘Don’t you laugh’ which of course I couldn’t help but do.  

Then he bleated, ‘They won’t stop.  They just won’t stop.’  

‘But just tell them to stop,’ I chuckled incredulously.

‘I can’t.  They are holding a cutthroat razor!’, poor Bob laments.

While trying desperately to suppress my laughter Bob tells me the sorry details of his metro man grooming.  They put burning hot wax on his ears and ripped off the hairs, which was incredibly painful.  (Ladies, I ask you – is waxing not something we willingly subject ourselves to?) They put no less than three different instruments up his nose to trim the hair.  They plastered on creams and ointments and mud packs. They trim and scraped and trimmed again.  Bob was sure if I hadn’t intervened they would have started to wax his nipples.

Despite the torture and affront to Bob’s pride, the results are great.  It is the best haircut I have ever seen on Bob and his skin looks 10 years younger.  I better enjoy it while I can because I am quite sure he will never go through such an ‘ordeal’ again!

 

The well-groomed Bob

Aching Athens

After lovely Lesvos, it was a bit of a sorry surprise to see Athens.  The Greek economic woes are really evident here.  The place is rundown and derelict. The pavements cracked, roads falling apart, parks overgrown and full of rubbish, boarded up closed shops and most notably all the buildings are covered with political graffiti.  You might get the impression that the place is a powder keg ready to go off at any moment (and it did explode in March this year and a few years ago) but then you look into the eyes of the people on the street and realised they now are probably too depressed to be activists.  However the areas around the tourist archaeological sites, such as Plaka, are still maintained and awesome but just a few blocks in any direction and the new sorry Greece is evident.  All very sad.

We had a few conversations with some people in Turkey who said that even though their government was trying to get into the EU, they did not want to.  Looking at Greece one can completely empathise with this sentiment.  Unemployment is about 8% in Turkey and 27% in Greece with youth unemployment over 50%.  Turkey is independent and booming and its lira strong.

Nevertheless the historical sites and the Archaeological museum were fantastic.

Bronze statue of a young boy riding a horse.  The expression so intense and done thousands of years ago.

Aphrodite, Cupid and impish Pan

 

Aphrodite

Another impish Pan

Temple of Zeus from the Acropolis

Close up of Temple of Zeus with the Acropolis in the background

One of the many mosaics around the city

Temple of Athena

The Parthenon

The Acropolis from below

More Temple of Zeus - my favourite

Lycabettus Hill

View of the Acropolis and Pireus from Lycebettus hill

Lovely Lesvos

A short ferry ride from Ayvalik and we are in Greece.  It was very exciting and it could have been my over-active imagination but I felt the island of Lesvos, although in many ways similar to Turkey had an easier vibrancy than in Turkey.  We were staying in a great pension in Mytilini filled with antique bric-a-brac.  The streets have marble curbing and buzz at night with everyone eating and drinking along the waterfront.  The food has been superb.  We have quickly acquired a taste for retsina and ouzo.

Harbour of Mytilini, Lesvos

Our pension

Bob enjoying retsina

We spent hours exploring the huge old fort with magnificent views of the Aegean and the town.  The whole place was just open free for anyone to go anywhere and everywhere and we did.  The site of the fortress dates back to the 6^th Century and as with everything in this area was occupied by Greek (Byzantium) and Turk (Ottoman) forces throughout the ages so churches become mosques and then back to churches.  

Looking at the battlements over the Aegean

walls of the fort

restored residency in the old fort

more ruins of the old fort in Mytilini

buildings of the Mytilini fort

On our second day we took a bus to the other side of the island to a small town called Molivos.  It was a lovely quaint place with old stone houses winding up the hillside through cobblestone streets shaded and kept cool by a wisteria canopies. 

Streets of Molivos

 There was another medieval fort to explore, smaller than the one in Mytilni.  We went to the beach (rocky but then sand in the water) and had a very relaxing few hours swimming and people watching.  

Out station in Molivos

View from the  Molivos fort

Lesvos is one of the larger Greek islands but the trip only took about 1 1/2 hours by bus from one end to the other.  It went through hilly terrain of pine and olive trees and very few villages.  The entire island has only 86,000 people and seems to exist on olive trees, fishing and tourism.  We met a few Greek - American expats/tourist that come to the island every year and also some British tourists that routinely come to the island for their holiday.  I can see why as Lesvos is really a lovely spot and our stay was all too short.  But we are off to Athens (Pireas) on an overnight ferry.

Our ferry to Athens, the Ariadne

Ayvalik – Bye Bye Turkey and a few words about Turkish buses

Feeling a twinge of homesickness following our visit to Gallipoli, (In our group of about 15 Australians we shared a lunch table with an older couple who happened to be from Coffs Harbour and their son is living in Bundagen.  Such a small world!) we moved on to the small town of Ayvalik on the Gulf of Edremit as a stepping stone into Greece.  

The area is a wonderful blend of Greece and Turkey.  The town was a majority Greek town predominated by olive oil manufacturing.  In the 1920’s when the population transfer happened during the Turkish War of Independence, the town was essentially emptied and too few of the remaining Turks knew how to continue the olive oil production.  Ultimately the Turkish government had to bring back several thousand Greeks to stem the decline of industry.

We stayed at a simple pansyion in Ayvalik with the most fantastic views of the harbour and the most spectacular sunsets over the hills surrounding the bay.  Each evening was a brilliant show.

 

Ayvalik by day

Sunset over Ayvalik

We took a ferry across the bay to the Cunda Island which was a delight – narrow cobblestoned streets, lovely waterfront cafes and windmills straight out of Don Quixote dotting the hillsides.

 

Waterfront of Cunda

Cobblestone streets

Windmills

We stumbled upon the Taksiarches or Metropolitan Church, a former Greek Orthodox Church turned Mosque then left for ruin following damage by an earthquake in 1944.  The building was restored in the late 1990’s and turned into the most eclectic and amazing museum.  The beautifully restored church with frescos of saints on the walls exhibited steam engines, model cars and ships, old medical equipment, diving suits, old tape recorders, toy trains, tin cars, real cars and motorcycles and dolls from all over the world, just to name a few of the fantastic items on display.

Restored church cum museum

 

Doll collection

So our last full day in Turkey was lovely and we were feeling a bit melancholy about leaving but thinking we may be back to sail these waters.....

But before saying goodbye to Turkey we must say a few words about Turkish buses.  They are fantastic.  Murray’s take note!  We took several long distance bus trips (Tatvan to Ankara, Marmaris to Istanbul, Çanakkale to Ayvalik) and they were all a real treat.  All the buses are modern Mercedes buses with comfortable seats and video monitors on the back offering movies, music, GPS, TV shows and a usb port to charge your phone or listen to your own music.  Every bus has a driver, or two depending on the length of the journey, and a steward.  As the bus pulls out of the terminal the steward gives everyone an ice cream to start their journey.  Then every few hours the steward loads up a little wheeled chart and offers drinks (hot and cold) and snacks.  The bus stops every 2 ½ to 3 hours at the most amazing bus stops.  They are more like an airport terminal than a bus stop.  They are huge and immaculately clean with pretty landscaping outside.  Inside are shops and nice restaurants with really good food – no chicko rolls here!

There were so many good things about Turkey; the people, the scenery, their complex and ancient history, their breakfasts.  We will miss it.

Bye for now, Turkey