Turkey

Here it is! The Turkey Post you have all been waiting for!! I've done my best to put these pictures in chronological order but with pictures from both our camera and my ipod camera, and also a couple donated pictures taken by students and Bro Jackson, I may have made a few mistakes.
Anyway, I put a lot of time into this and I hope you enjoy!

Lovely map of Turkey

Day I
The plane ride
After eating breakfast in the Oasis, Dad, Megan, and I all said goodbye to Mom and the kids and departed at 11 AM bound for the Ben Gurion International Airport. After waiting in one line for HOURS it seemed, we all realized why we had arrived at the airport so early (our flight was booked for 3:00).
Finally we got on the plane that would take us over the Mediterranean to the country that would be our home for the next 8 days :)

Last view of Israel for a week !

The plane's menu: "Mutfakta Kim var?"

Menu: Shepherd  salad with feta cheese
Chicken schnitzel with potato salad
Walnut pear tart
Choice of bread

Vishna, aka "the nectar of the gods" (dubbed by my dad) was all out. I got to try it later, and thought it tasted like melted cherry jolly rancher.

Vishna is in the center under Meyve Sulan [Juices] 

Dad was out

I tried to get Megan to take a picture with me but she used her pillow defense 

Yay :) <3

I was finished with my chicken schnitzel and potato salad before I remembered to take a picture-- it was good! 

You'd expect a tart to be tart... it wasn't.
It was actually pretty good :) like a brownie

Yuck hazelnuts

The clouds: the clouds were beautiful the whole trip

The Landing: Turkish coastline

Since we left our old Judd Bus in Israel (I don't think it was in our budget to bring it on the plane with us), we got a new one when we arrived in Turkey.

This is the Lucky Judd bus, front view. The lovely smiling woman in the front left hand seat is our wonderful tour guide, Yasmine. And yes, that's me making the face in the fourth row.. haha

Thank you Brother Jackson for the picture :)

The Judd Bus stayed in The Kent Hotel (kent means city in Turkish). Too bad Brother Kent Jackson never got to stay in his own hotel.
We're here! :D *falls into bed*

Day II

Our first day was basically a tour of Istanbul- on foot.

Hippodrome

Megan and Leisl 

Our very first landmark: Wilhelm Fountain

Pretty much my second favorite picture of all time. (My first favorite is yet to come)

Megan, Rachel, Me, Kenzy

Will was taking the picture... haha

My dad

Look at the clouds! They're beautiful.

Diagram of Hippodrome in the students' field trip manual

Theodosius' Obelisk

The Obelisk of Theodosius was brought to the hippodrome from the Temple of Karnak in Luxor, Egypt (I've been there!!! :D)The base to the obelisk of Theodosius is the same base that was used when the obelisk was first erected here in 390 ad. It has never fallen even after great earthquakes in Istanbul.

The base depicts the emperor watching the horse races from the "imperial box".

Kenzy, Rachel, and Me

Serpent's column

Constantine's obelisk

Beautiful: two minarets from the Blue Mosque are visible from the Hippodrome (we're going there next)

Blue Mosque

Sun behind the gate to the Blue Mosque

Judd Fam pic!

Beautiful gold arabic letters

There it is.

We sit to the side as Yasmine, our guide, tells us about the place

The Blue mosque has six minarets in total. This caused a great dispute because normally mosques only have four, and the Grand Mosque in Mecca, which had 6 minarets, was suppose to be the greatest. Ahmet I, Sultan of the Ottoman Empire, (the builder of the blue mosque) solved the problem by sending his architect to Mecca to add the seventh minaret to the Grand Mosque.

Inside the Courtyard; in order to enter the mosque we went through the side entrance, which was on the outside right of the building

Minaret from inside the courtyard

Minaret from outside the courtyard

The Blue Mosque actually doesn't require head scarves, but we had brought ours so we might as well :)

I probably shouldn't pick favorites, but out of the mosques we went to, this has to be the most beautiful (in my opinion).
The first thing your eye is drawn to is the ceiling; the incredibly delicate inscriptions laden in gold and decorative and colorful carvings and paintings practically take your breath away.

no words

Once you've gotten over your awe at the ceiling, that's when you see the stained glass windows.

Soft carpet (oh yeah, we had to take off our shoes and carry them)

Judd Fam pic in the Blue Mosque!

Beautiful

After our last views of the mosque, we step back outside to continue with our tour.

Two green parrots in the tree

The flower, "Mr. Sparkle", is held up and marched in the front of the group.
My dad often told the students "Don't lose sight of Mr. Sparkle!"

The Hagia Sofia is practically across the street from the blue mosque;
we will visit there at the end of our trip.

The cats and dogs here lay around and don't care if you pet them

Judd Fam Pic with Hagia Sophia in the background! 

Judd Fam Pic with Blue Mosque in the background!

Gust of wind.. blew Megan's hat off

Some pretty pictures

If you look closely.. you can see the city in the background..

Beautiful clouds! :D

Topkapi Palace

On the way in..

Judd Fam Pic at the Disney Land gate! (okay not really)

Our guide told us "Disney Land copied us, I think" haha

Seal of one of the sultans

Ceiling O.o wow

After we get through security we start the tour

Model of Topkapi palace

Window: gorgeous !!

Beautiful dome

Ceiling design

Silver dome

After talking for a little bit, Yasmine gave us free time for an hour. There were all sorts of exhibits, most of which didn't allow photography. Sorry...

Gold Ceiling

Half way in between two exhibitions was an overlook of the Sea of Marmara. Very beautiful.

Megan, Rachel, and Rachel with the Sea of Marmara in the background

The beautiful Sea of Marmara

Me in an arch indentation

Star on the railing of the balcony

Holy relics included in some of the exhibits were: Mohammed's sword, one of his teeth, a hair from his beard,  Joseph's (of Egypt) turban, and Moses's staff. I can't say how much of those are actually legitimate.
There were also beautiful golden and gem-adorned displays, and an armory (I didn't have time to go, and now I regret it)
It also happened to have one of the biggest diamonds in the world. :) Awesome. The Spoonmaker's diamond was originally sold for three spoons.

Spoonmaker's diamond
(I got this picture off of the internet.)

Megan and I by a gold fountain (Rachel top left)

The way out..

Um... a fig tree growing out a of sycamore? I forgot.

Basilica Cistern 

Otherwise known as the Sunken Palace (cool!)

Our camera's flash wasn't working..

Thanks Jaquel for helping us out!

Judd Fam Pic in the Basilica Cistern!

We walked on a board walk around the cistern. It was used to supply water for the Imperial palace (built in the same place as the Blue Mosque is now). It's held up by tons of big columns (336, actually) made out of marble and granite. There's actually still water in the cistern, though not very much. There were catfish swimming in it, too. Yum.

Columns.

Many of the Columns were made with recycled material from other structures. Two Medusa heads are used as the bottoms of columns that were too short. The story is that the act of putting Medusa upside down underneath a column was to discourage and mock the worship of greek gods.

Medusaa!

Medusaaa!

At this point we [finally!!!] got on a bus and drove to lunch. If I remember correctly it was a two course meal consisting of lentil soup, and then some kind of meat. Not that I have to think about it... that's pretty much what we ate for lunch for the whole week. The bread was good, I loved the bread; but I am never going to eat lentil soup again. :P

Boat ride on Bosphorus

I was really looking forward to the ferry ride: I wasn't disappointed! It was nice after such a hot day and very beautiful :). Unlike Jerusalem, Turks like to paint their houses extravagant colors. Pinks, greens, blues, purples, yellows, all in their brightest shades. I love it!

I didn't take my camera on the boat; I'm pretty sure it was dead by then. Special thanks to Kent Jackson for the next two pictures.

Megan and me

My awkward pose
I didn't know he was taking this when he took it...

Day III

We boarded the buses and are now bound for our hotel in Çanakkale, which is on the Asian side of Turkey. Turkey is located on both the European and the Asian continents, and Istanbul is on the European side. (See map at the top of the page) I can now honestly say I've been to Europe!

Sea of Marmara on the left hand side of the bus

Submarine pointed out by our guide and professors

Our first stop is Gallipoli, and we were watching the movie Gallipoli on the way there; how appropriate. I had already seen it when they had shown it the Friday before for movie night, but most of the students either didn't come or left half way through because they thought it was boring. I thought it was a really good movie. Unfortunately, there is some nudity, to which Brother Stratford held a cloth over the TV screen.

.

Brother Stratford covering up the screen
In a moving bus

We arrived at Gallipoli, ironically, right at the most important scene/ climax and had to pause it. When we arrived back afterward, the DVD wouldn't fast forward. So my dad ended up having to tell all of the students the tragic ending of everyone ending up dead.

Gallipoli Battle Field Memorial

Agean Sea

Me and Megan

In the movie, the Australian soldiers train in Cairo before they arrive in Turkey; so when they see the mountain jutting out when they first arrived (it was at night) it looked just like the sphinx.

The Sphinx!!

Peace of land jutting out

Anza

After we had sat down and talked about Galipoli, and taken a class picture, we walked a little ways to the memorial. 

The Turks commemorate this grave spot

We were silent as the Schade bus had their devotional. Many of the graves had very touching inscriptions on them.

Even though you had to be 21 to join the war, many 18, 19, and 20 year old boys served their country. The next grave was a 17 year old boy.

He died a man & closed his life's brief day, ere it had scarce begun

Judd Fam pic at Gallipoli with the Agean Sea in the background!

We then had lunch at a restaurant near Gallipoli, right on the Dardanelles. It was my tradition to sit next to Hannah at lunch times. 

Jacky, Annie, Hannah, and me :)
Thanks Annie for the picture! 

Ferry across Dardanelles

Very unlike our two hour boat ride yesterday, this Ferry only took half an hour or so; because instead of touring, we were actually going someplace. We drove our bus onto the ferry and then got out onto the higher decks.

The Turks are very patriotic. The flag is EVERYWHERE

Seagull

There were a bunch seagulls flying along side the boat. Some people on the lower deck were throwing crackers and the seagulls would sometimes catch them before they hit the waves. I think someone even got pooped on, too.

Unfortunately my camera died before I could get any more pictures

Troy 

The pictures I took at troy were actually taken with my ipod, sorry for the poor quality.

Ruins

Troy was originally situated in a natural harbor, and was an important port city for trade; but most of the bay is now filled in with silt deposited by rivers. Troy is now about 3 miles from the Agean Sea.

Me with what used to be the bay in the background

Fig leaves

Dad

Rachel, Rachel, and Megan

Pretty tree

More ruins

Me next to a column

Columns

I don't think I need to go over the story much, so there it is.

The Trojan Horse!

Okay, so it's not the original one. But still, it was cool :)

Epic tree with awesome clouds in the background

Schade Fam pic! Sister Schade, Brother Schade, and Adam.

Dallen and Cassie
Day before they got engaged

 Day IV

Assos

Assos was very cool and windy. We climbed up a long, steep, winding cobblestone road with cute little houses and shops on the sides. (The field trip manual calls it the "modern village of Behramkale")

The way up:

Megan

Sun behind clouds

Me, Rachel, and Megan

Centipedes were everywhere

Jordanian flag pokes up on the top of the hill

The Schade class, one step ahead of us.
The beautiful sky never ceases to amaze me.

What a view!

Columns

Once at the top, we sat down to listen to my Dad's lecture. It was cold and I had lent my sweater to Megan, so my nose was running like crazy until Will rescued me with a jacket and a tissue :)

Thanks Rosie for the next three pics!

I didn't even know she was taking this one..

After a lecture we usually sing a hymn..

I'll go where you want me to go, hymn 270

Gorgeouuus view of the Agean sea!

Next we go take our column pics.. :)

Sister power !
Eek! Windswept hair..

Megan touching the columns behind her

Me touching the columns behind me

Judd fam pic at Assos!

More columns

Please check back as I add more to this post

Pergamon acropolis:

Remember way back at the beginning when I showed you my second favorite picture of all time? My first one's coming up.

Special thanks to Rosie for the next pic

There it is. Best. Picture. Ever.
And I took it! :)

Random gas station stops and hotel/bus shots along the way

The following pictures were taken by my ipod sorry for the poor quality

Day V

Day VI

Grand Mosque in Bursa

Day VII

Iznik





Ancient Nicea

Hagia Sophia

Mosques

Dinner at Kumkapi Neyzen Restaurant

Souvenir time!!