Boat Rides around Istanbul

After passing through Turkey my companions and I spent a number of days in Istanbul. Since my last visit, I have read about Byzantium and Byzantine monuments still existing in Istanbul so I visited a number of additional Byzantine sites and revisited many others (I have added many notes to the February 2008 blog entry on this topic). But one of my companions is a photographer in search of the scenic regardless of historic significance and he wasn't especially interested in historic monuments. He prefered to roam far beyond the walled old city that is so full of historic sites that I was content staying there. I found that there is a lot to see beyong the city walls. Much of our roaming involved walks through picturesque neighborhoods and much was by boat.

Our first scenic boat ride was from the mouth of the Golden Horn to a point beyond the old city wall at a historic and religious neighborhood. From there, we hiked through a moslem cemetary to a scenic outlook where there is a cafe and gift shop dedicated to the French author Pierre Loti. I paid the $6 for his first novel and read a little less than the first third before shelfing it for perceived lack of depth. I haven't yet encountered much of the descriptiveness of late 19th century Istanbul which make his works marketable to visiters to the city. But the view is worth the excursion.

The second excursion by boat was up the Bosphorus--much longer and more rewarding.
Along the way, there are a pair of Ottoman Castles that were used by the Ottomans to cut off supplies to the Byzantines during the seige that lead to the ultimate demise of the Byzantine Empire. The final destination is a Byzantine castle that must have played a role in controlling the strategic Bosphorus. We walked up from the village to the castle and from there caught a glimpse of the Black Sea.

I had taken ferries before to get from the European side to the Asian side but it took a friend's fresh prespective to provide me with the different angle on the city I'm becoming quite familiar with.