I've just come back from this and thought I would write a review of this fantastic holiday.
Sunday 9th November - I'd stayed overnight in a hotel near Heathrow so was at the airport nice and early - had no problems getting the Heathrow Express from terminal 5 to 2 for my Turkish Airlines flight to Istanbul. Although the flight was nearly an hour late, I was impressed with Turkish Airlines having never flown with them before. When we arrived in Istanbul we all got together but could not find our tour manager, he turned up after a few minutes as with our flight being delayed, he sent the rest of the party, flying in from Manchester and Birmingham, to the hotel, rather than have them waiting around for us - I thought this was a nice touch and would have appreciated it had we been there early and one of the other flights delayed.
Monday 10th November
Had a brilliant guided tour round Istanbus, looking inside the Blue Mosque, the underground cistern, Topkapi Palace, and walking around Istanbul - it's a busy and bustling city, but we found it safe to walk around - might be worth watching out for the men who try to polish your shoes though, a few people on my tour nearly got caught out by this as the men say they'll clean your shoes for free, then try and take you to the cashpoint for money afterwards! If you're aware of this though everything will be fine. After a lovely lunch we had free time in the Grand Bazaar - our tour guide very kindly got our money changed for us whilst we were busy shopping. Took optional Istanbus by night tour - did not really see Istanbul by night other than as we happened to be driving to and from the venue, but the entertainment and meal were good so it made for an enjoyable night.
Tuesday 11th November
Optional tour - this was well worth doing. Had guided tours around various Mosques, followed by another lovely lunch, before catching the ferry along the Bospherous - this was fantastic and we docked on the Asian side of the river.
Wednesday 12th November
Travelled to Canakkale via Gallipoli - this was a very emotional day. We saw the monuments where various nationalities, including British, had fought - they are all beautifully kept. Finished with ferry ride and short drive to our hotel - we covered nearly 300 miles today, but saw so many interesting things, and stopped frequently along the way.
Thursday 13th November
Drove to Troy and had guided tour around - I didn't realise how big the Troy site is - there's loads to see - and we had another excellent tour around this before travelling on to Yesilyurt for our lunch - then travelled to the hotel.
Friday 14th November
Travelled to Acropolis, getting cable car up to the top. Had another brilliant tour around this site before driving to the carpet factory for a guided tour - some purchased carpets. Travelled on to our hotel from here.
Saturday 15th November
Drove to Ephesus and what a site this is! It is amazing, and so well preserved. Had another excellent guided tour around before visiting St John's Basillica, then had an authentic lunch before driving to Sirince for shopping and wine tasting before going back to our hotel. Some of my party went to a nearby leather outlet on the way back but as there were so few of them, they really got the hard sell - I'm glad I didn't go. Our excellent tour guide then organised a separate room for our farewell meal and we had a la carte meals of fish/cheese/vegetables/fruit/pastries and it was delicious.
Overall I think this is probably one of the best tours I've been on, made more enjoyable by the excellent tour manager Ugur Zaim who doubled up as our tour guide when we were visiting all the sites - he has so much knowledge and imparted so much of this to us, plus he went out of his way to make our holiday as trouble free and enjoyable as possible, so he deserves a special mention. Our coach driver too was lovely and drove us for miles in safety. There were 31 on my tour and we all got on brilliantly, I miss them now I'm home. I thought the hotels were all excellent, the staff in them very good, and the food was lovely too. I'd never been to Turkey before but I thoughroughly enjoyed this holiday and didn't realise how many interesting things there were to see. The weather was fine, rained a little on two of the days, but not enough to cause any problems, and it was better being there when it was cooler and without the cruise ships being there as theres normally loads more people and we walked round everywhere no bother. All in all a brilliant holiday.
