12th to 14th May, Ayvalik, Selçuk, Pamukkale

Today we had a boat cruise around the Aegean Sea. It was a very relaxing day. We were served a lovely lunch of small fried fish (like sardines) with salad and bread. We stopped at a few places for people to swim. We anchored at a small island where we went for a walk and then a swim, the water was very cold, but it was refreshing. When we arrived back at Ayvalik we went for a drive up to a scenic viewpoint  called the devils table, where we were able to see where we had sailed as well as the Greek island of Lesbos. We stayed to watch the sunset before heading back to town to have the local specialty "Ayvalik Tost" for dinner.

13th We set off on our 3.5 hr bus ride to Selçuk. When we arrived we had an orientation walk. We visited the Isabey Mosque which was quite unique and traditional as the carpet on the floor were many different types and sizes of rugs. We also passed by St Johns Basilica, with Aysaoluk castle in the back ground.

After a quick bite  to eat we had a very quick look through the Museum. Then we met back at the hotel as some of us went to Meryemana (Mary's house). This is supposed to be where Mary the mother of Jesus spent her last days. We walked through her house and collected some water from the spring, which is said to be holy. The  next stop on our very busy schedule for the day was Ephesus, another Roman/Byzantine ruined city. It was amazing to see as only 5% of the city has been excavated. The amazing thing about this city is that it was completely covered with marble. It would have been a fantastic sight in its day. At the end of our tour we had a lovely walk to a Gözleme restaurant for dinner. We finished the night at a rooftop terrace bar having a few drinks.

14th After breakfast a few of us had a quick walk to check out the ruins of the Temple of Artemis which was one of the 7 ancient wonders of the world. There is only one column left (with a stork nest on top) as the rest have been removed over the centuries for use in other buildings. We then set off on another 3.5 hour bus journey to our last stop on the tour, Pamukkale.  It was very hot when we arrived and we had to walk up the hill in bare feet. We were expecting the ground to be hot but to our surprise it was lovely and cool. The views were superb. As we reached the top there were many people swimming in the pools and a few Russian girls posing for photos. We took many photos of the travertines before heading off for a walk around Hierlopolis, our last Roman/Byzantine ruins for the trip. This site had a huge well preserved theatre. We stopped along the way to cool our feet in one of the drainage channels until we realized there were leaches in the water. We walked back down to the town and on to our hotel for dinner before catching the bus at 10pm for our overnight trip to Istanbul.