Our first stop in Turkey is Istanbul with a population of 14 million people. It is a very clean, vibrant city with lots of history. There are 3 architectural sites that really stand out:
The first is the Blue Mosque (Sultanahmet Mosque), built at the beginning of the 17th century, with 20,000 blue tiles used to decorate the walls of its interior:
Visually it is a stunning piece of architecture and one of the main tourist attractions of the city.
Next is the Hagia Sophia, built in the 6th century, over 1,000 years earlier. This building was originally constructed as a Christian church. It is walking distance of the blue mosque and is also breathtaking to see:
In 1453, Constantinople (now called Turkey) was conquered by the Ottoman Turks under Sultan Mehmed II and he ordered this church to be converted into a mosque! Inside, there is a very interesting juxtaposition of church and mosque:
You can see where the altar is and beside it to the right is the minbar or pulpit of the mosque where the imam (prayer leader) stands to deliver sermons.
The third major site to highlight is the Basilica Cistern, sometimes referred to as the Sunken Palace, is an underground marvel also built in the 6th century. This is an enormous underground 'water tank' that stored up to 5.5 million gallons of water:
It is supported underground by over 300 marble columns that are 9 metres in height. The ceiling weight is distributed to the columns through arches. To give you some indication of size, it's over 2.5 acres underground.
Our trip includes a tour around Turkey- next up, Troy.
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