OR, A DAY OF LONG WALKS IN THE SEARING HEAT FOR MY LOVE OF ALL THINGS ANCIENT.
After nearly a week of stress organising myself in Turkiye, I finally got out to see some archaeology! Heaven!
KLAROS AND THE BEACH.
THE MATURE ART OF TRAVELLING ALONE. MY NEW EMAIL IS: OldBirdTravels@proton.me PLEASE LIKE AND SHARE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE POST!
Category: GALLERIES, MUSEUMS AND ARCHAEOLOGY.
All the culture you want and dream of.
KEW GARDENS
OR DAYS OUT IN LONDON. ART AND NATURE.
Kew is always a must-go venue when it’s going to be boiling hot, so when my mate invited me the other day I jumped at the chance. What could be better than a picnic and wander around at these venerable gardens on a hot July day?
Although I woke a little late, I still managed to scramble and fixed myself a flask of iced coffee, boiled a couple of eggs and made a pita and cheese sandwich with bits of cucumber poking out in this rather crude fare. I also whizzed up a smoothie and put filtered water in my copper flask to rehydrate during the course of the day. The day was glorious and I wasn’t in a moany mood so I went straight into the gallery to check out the amazing new exhibition which indeed was amazing.
Daniel, my British Museum pal, who has been saving my sanity while I wait on Turkiye and the various disasters that have mercilessly struck me, was quietly insistent about the order of the day’s itinerary. He was spot on as I was to find out by the end of this hot sunny day.
Share this:
HIERAPOLIS. OLD BIRD IN HOT WATER AND HISTORY.
OR, A WHITE MOUNTAIN OF CALCIFIED MINERALS
Well, finally this old bird got to swim in Cleopatra’s pool!
Going to Pamukkale from Tire requires a three-hour drive. I was drained and bone weary from the ghastly band and its thumping bass keeping me awake till two in the morning. The weather was shit and I was a reluctant passenger at the beginning. However once on the road, I was reinvigorated and regained my energy and adventure lust.
The countryside is spectacular. Valleys, mountains, lakes, rivers, deciduous woods, coniferous forests and the eternal olive groves are everywhere. I saw places of poverty as well as more affluent communities. The arrival vista at Hieropolis is, however, another thing even in the grey misty weather.
It stretches over a mountain top, glistening white like a huge, white snowy blanket of an ancient giant, thrown casually down landing atop a mountain full of bubbling hot thermal springs. It has a secret bonus, the ruins of the major Greek ‘Holy City’, Hierapolis.
Share this:
ESCAPING LONDON FOR MOUNTAINS AND MUSEUMS IN TURKIYE.
INLAND TURKEY IN SPRING, IN LIKE A LION AND OUT LIKE A LAMB.
Alert: Sorry for the big delay but my plans obviously changed after the ghastly events here with the earthquakes. On finally deciding to come I had a few other hiccups. My Turcel phone decided that it wasn’t working after me topping it up with a data package, well it worked but just for one day. It’s crazy we have spent literally hours on the phone trying to find out why they are insisting that I set up an account over three months ago the idiots! Also, yesterday, when I was writing this, Google decided something more had to be paid on my email so I had that drama too as I kinda need emails for tickets etc. Also, I was told my photo limit was full so I couldn’t store pics. I spent hours trying to resolve it all and had no luck. Other bits threw me off so I sulked a bit, drank beer and got nowhere. I’ll fix it on my return to London but as we know travel always throws a few curved balls to check your mettle!
Springtime in Turkiye is a beautiful thing, especially when you’re escaping a dreary down-in-the-mouth London. It’s full of little lambkins and alpine flowers, olive trees as far as you can see and the soft green fuzz of fresh grass. Water can be heard along the way gurgling in the mountain streams. The villages are stirring after the short but sharp winter and life starts new and fresh. This is the time most tourists don’t see and indeed it is a very different land from the parched land in the summertime.
My usual preparations of cleaning and tidying my place in Soho left me clear-headed and ready to travel. I was heading for a village inland from Izmir, having managed to book a little chalet at an extensive lodge in the foot lands.
Share this:
THE SEVEN WONDERS OF THE WORLD.
ARTEMIS AND HER TEMPLE IN EPHESUS AND EARLIER ‘MOTHER GODDESSES’
Women were revered in ancient times it’s a shame that now everything is muddied and sullied, but here we see a snapshot of our distant ancestors’ love and reverence for the ever-evolving mother goddess through millennia.
Blue skies and hot sun in January in Selcuk, aka the famous Ephesus, home of one of the world’s seven wonders, and a great day to look into mother goddesses and their impact across the globe. After going to the Efe Museum and having an eye-opening proper look at the history there, and getting it sorted in my brain chronologically I walked over to the sad broken and pillaged site of this previously magnificent temple.
I had been to the actual Ephesus site previously and had marvelled at it but never really studied the place, only looking later at documentaries about Cleopatra’s sister having a mausoleum and the sinister side of that particular woman pharaoh.
Share this:
FINDING MY PARADISE IN EPHESUS TURKEY.
OR, HANGING OUT IN SELCUK (EPHESUS)
I’m in the middle of my trip and haven’t had a chance to report in! Been super busy since I got here and knackered for the most part so here’s where I’m at present.
Well my old birds, I’m stuck out here after we cocked up a bit! I have moved from Tire to Selcuk for the rest of my stay at a lovely pension which is a stone’s throw from the magnificent Ephesus. I now have a little breathing space to relax after over-partying on Friday! I was a little too exuberant celebrating on Friday night and rather suffered yesterday. I was a bad old bird.
The bath consists of an elongated rectangular core structure with a central domed room, the hot bang room, which was surrounded by special bathing rooms. To the north are adjoined a lukewarm room without any bathing function, and side rooms with a toilet. To the south lay the warm water reservoir and the furnace room. The bath was entered from the north via a peristyle courtyard. To the east were shops, and in the west was a separate bathing area for women. Constructed in the 24 half of the 14th century A.D., the path was only operational for 60-80 years. Already by the mid-15th century, it served as a cemetery.
Today however I went out and did my favourite stuff, museums and archaeology. This is truly a magical place.
I visited the actual Ephesus ruins two years ago so today had a chance to see some of the artefacts removed and placed in their fine museum in town. As I am still weary I have returned to my Rebetika Pension and am on the top terrace in blazing sunshine writing this with my beer and in a much more relaxed state of mind.
Share this:
HURTLING OUT OF CONTROL.
OR THE LAST GHASTLY DAYS OF SICKNESS AND THE DECLINE OF THE BIG TRIP Alert : This post is very late coming as it’s been crazy here with people going a bit mad and me […]
MALACCA THEN JAKARTA.
OR, TIMING IS EVERYTHING, MINE WAS PANTS.
Top Tip: However well organised you are things can go awry. There was no way to know that they had stopped boats over the Straight of Malacca to go to Indonesia without having to retrace my steps to KL then fly to Jakarta. There was no way of knowing that a massive and contentious protest was on the very weekend that I was over in Jakarta so many things were closed. Shit happens and you just have to deal with it when you’re on the road solo travelling. This however did weaken me again after my healing time in Kuala Lumpur. This was a real bummer as stress always is a thing to avoid when you’re trying to rebuild your immune system as I explained in a previous blog “How My Troubles Began” When travelling, however much of an itinerary you have, you must take time out and rest up. I tried to squeeze in a lot making up for lost time which never works does it now hmmmm?
After my huge success in fabulous Kuala Lumpur, I got a bit cavalier and decided to go to Malacca which people said was lovely. I really should have learned by then that most tourists are idiots and headed straight onto my snorkelling target on the remote island of Bunaken. Stupid, stupid old bird.
Share this:
KUALA LUMPUR, MUSEUMS, ORCHIDS AND BIRDS. MALAYSIA
OR, LEAVING BORNEO AND ARRIVING IN KL FOR A BIT OF TLC.
Journal Excerpts and Perfect Timing a continuation from last post!
KUALA LUMPUR
It wasn’t even in my plan to go there.
Share this:
GODS OF CHOCOLATE AND DRUNKENNESS. EASTER! AND OTHER FESTIVALS IN MEXICO.
Now girls we all like a tipple so I pray to Acan rather a lot while travelling now. Although I don’t care for mead which is the most similar drink. We all are boisterous when we’ve has a few and act the clown just like our newly discovered god.
Old Bird Travels Solo! 