First thing we had to do was to call at a Shell fuel station to buy another vignette as our first one was about to run out. This time we paid by card and for some reason was only half the price of the first one, hmmmm, did somebody have our pants down at the border???
Our first day in Veliko Tărnovo was spent walking up the hill from where we spent the night, to the medieval Tsarevets Fortress. It’s a huge place. There are the remains of over 470 residential buildings including a palace and a church. At the north end is the execution rock where people were sent to their death. It’s a sheer drop!!! Not a great way to go. The information boards weren’t in English but the commentary over the loud speaker was.
The second day was spent looking around the town. The first job was to find somewhere to print the Visas for Turkey. We applied for them online at a cost of $20 each. Reading some of the information on the tripadvisor forum for Turkey, we learnt that we did need them in hard copy form.
We asked in a photography shop if they could help and the lovely lady showed me to her computer. Her English was as good as my Bulgarian so lots of pointing and smiling going on. Feeling relieved that we’d found somewhere to print them, I typed in “hotmail login” and what came up was complete gobbledegook (Cyrillic letters) aghhh! With fingers crossed on one hand and randomly clicking buttons with the other, I somehow managed to log in to my emails phew!! After printing the Visas and paying we left and carried on to the tourist information to pick up a map.
There was a lot of building work going on all around the town and I’m sure when it’s all done it will be great. We could imagine how nice, especially the old town, would look in the summer time, but after paddling through muck and negotiating obstacles that health and safety would have a field day with back home, we made our way back to Harriet.
Nessebar’s old town is a UNESCO World Heritage site and the car park is free in winter and a great place to spend the night.
We woke up to the sound of seagulls, a sound I never thought I’d miss but evidently I have.
UNESCO.org writes ... Ancient City of Nessebar
Situated on a rocky peninsula on the Black Sea, the more than 3,000-year-old site of Nessebar was originally a Thracian settlement (Menebria). At the beginning of the 6th century BC, the city became a Greek colony. The city’s remains, which date mostly from the Hellenistic period, include the acropolis, a temple of Apollo, an agora and a wall from the Thracian fortifications. Among other monuments, the Stara Mitropolia Basilica and the fortress date from the Middle Ages, when this was one of the most important Byzantine towns on the west coast of the Black Sea. Wooden houses built in the 19th century are typical of the Black Sea architecture of the period ...
Got up early and drove to the Bulgarian border just as it was shift change. 15 minutes later, the female border guard asked for our passports and vehicle documents. All done, we crossed into No-man’s land and the Turkish border control.
Last but not least we were asked to open all the doors to Harriet including both garage doors. After a prod and a poke and a wander inside the van, the guys smiled and waved us on.
We thought that was it but there was one last stop. At yet another barrier the guy asked to see our passports again, I presume to make sure we had all the correct stamps?? It had taken us an hour all in all and then, we were driving in Turkey!!
It always amazes me how you can cross an invisible border and everything looks different. Where Bulgarian towns didn’t look too bad from a distance, when you got up close they looked a mess, Turkish towns were the opposite. There was a definite lack of trees in Bulgaria but in Turkey there seems an abundance of them. Even the countryside looked different.
Apart from reading “Our Bumbles” recent blog posts on Turkey, and gleaning lots of great information, we found another website called Turkey travel planner. There, we read about the HGS & OGS system of toll roads. I’m sure you can drive through the country without going on a toll road but we didn’t want to risk ending up on one and getting a fine. You can’t pay them by cash or card, you need to get the relevant sticker for your window. We tried to buy one at a couple of fuel stations but couldn’t, then a helpful chap told us to go to the post office in the centre of the next town. It’s a building with yellow signage saying PTT. We’d actually seen one at the border crossing but thought it was a bank tuts.
So after parking up and eating tea, we went to stretch our legs and hunt for some SIM cards. We’d read Turkcell was one of the best and for 5gb it cost 120tl. We could only sort out internet for Andy as he was the only one to remember his passwords. (Harriet’s Hint: make sure you know all your passwords including Apple ID if you have an iPhone, to be able to change SIM cards.)
At least one of us was back online!!
Walking around was such an assault on the senses. Noise, horns honking, people everywhere. The street lights and illuminated shops made it look as if it was daylight rather than 9 o’clock at night. Despite everything, we had a great nights sleep.
We spent the first day in Istanbul walking up to Sultanahmet Square from our camping spot, stopping at the Sokullu mosque on the way. Some boys were playing football in the courtyard and tourists were taking photos, so we took our shoes off, I pulled my scarf up to cover my head and we went inside. The carpet was like an expensive Axminster, no wonder they want you to enter in stocking feet. Some men inside were praying so we just stood there quietly looking at everything and admiring the beautiful interior.
We carried on walking to Sultanahmet square and went to visit the Blue Mosque. We’d been warned it was having some renovation work carried out, but it was free to enter so we couldn’t come all this way and not see it.
Shoes off, scarf up and as we walked inside, we were amazed at the size. It wasn’t as disappointing as we’d expected, and what we could see was beautiful. At least they are not letting the Mosque go to rack & ruin which is good isn’t it. Once outside, scarf down, shoes put back on and as we left we were invited to buy numerous carpets by the local Del Boys lol.
There were lots of bakeries, restaurants and food carts selling all manner of things. We were drawn to the pretzel stand were you could buy plain ones, or ones filled with cream cheese or chocolate and all of them were covered in sesame seeds and didn’t even come to a pound!!
It’s amazing what a day of rest can do, as finally I’d remembered my Apple ID password. So we called back in to the same Turkcell shop and bought me a SIM card. I hadn’t realised how much I’d relied on google for information!!
On the way back to Harriet, we called in to one of the small bread shops and bought a loaf of fresh warm bread for 19p - wow!!
No comments:
Post a Comment