Ephesus

I write this on the terrace of our pension overlooking red-roofed houses, İsa Bey Camii, rolling fields, and a setting sun.

Every morning I wake up in Turkey, I feel so lucky to be here. While my bank account has decreased quite a lot, it is, as my mother likes to say, only money, and, as those Mastercard commercials trumpet, this is priceless. And I am so glad to have Marcos as my traveling companion––he's funny, he's sweet, he's the right kind of crazy driver, and he's adorable.

Obviously. [taken at lunch]

It's nice to have someone to split the costs with, too!

The library in the background for both of these, though further away in mine!

Today we woke up pretty early to head to Meryemana, Mary's supposed house, eating breakfast (with deliciously cute sigara börek, pastries shaped like cigars filled with cheese and spinach) before we headed out on the road. Upon realizing that Meryemana was not actually walking distance to Ephesus, despite what the Turks might say––we've noticed that their estimations of distance are often rather shorter than the reality: a "10 minute walk" usually means 20 minutes, and 200-300 meters is at least half a kilometer––we decided to pass and go straight to Ephesus.

We did, however, see the gold
statue of her. Good enough?

Our pension owners had told us that Ephesus is best seen in the afternoon, when there's not tons of tourists, but Lonely Planet had said you get the best light in the morning, so we decided to take our chances with the people.

Fountain (no longer operational)

Turns out he was right: there were thousands of people there, many from a Disney cruise.

Aaaaah so many people! And so many tour groups!

And relatively few signs, which was good for photographing/footaging, but not great for knowing what was going on (Troy's definitely been the most helpful in terms of self-guided tour material provision).

Part of the Lower Agora

I guess they figure they don't need to provide that, since the vast majority of people come as parts of tours.

Near the entrance: lots of stuff!

Many things were remarkably beautiful, but I didn't find it to be completely awe-inspiring.

Bath houses

This is probably because of the throngs of people––y'all know how overwhelmed I get when I'm around big groups, and this was just cranked up to 1000.

Library

The library was really lovely, though the whole time I wished there were still some of the 12,000 scrolls around to thumb through!

One of the arches next to the library

Also, it was stinkin' hot, and there were large patches with no shade (though the abundant columns did provide some cover if you stood in the right place).

As demonstrated here!

The Great Theater: Holds 25,000 people! I was tired, so I didn't walk up into it, but: big!

We spent about 2.5 hours there, and I was tired, hot, and thirsty by the end. While Marcos walked back to get the car, I sat at a picnic table at the lower entrance and read and drank a bunch of water.

Resting in the shade of the male latrines (or brothel, we're not positive which was which)

We then headed to the Grotto of the Seven Sleepers

One of the statues in the library façade

Oh hey it's apparently time to eat! Prayer is blasting out of the minaret of İsa Bey. Here in Selçuk (and Ayvalık, and Çanakkale, and even İzmir), it doesn't seem like many people follow Ramazan at all strictly, probably due to the number of tourists. The neighborhood of İzmir we stayed in was windy small streets and, when walking around, I saw very few women out, and those that were were wearing long skirts and head scarves; once we got on the main streets, though, and got closer to the waterfront, we encountered people eating, wearing high heels and strapless dresses. Just goes to show that cultural norms differ, even in close proximity. We'll have to see what it's like in Antalya!

The second arch of the Temple of Hadrian, the only photo
of it that I took, dangit; this one has Medusa on top

Anyways, we went to the Grotto but only for lunch, as we'd heard the Grotto itself is rather underwhelming. (The story is thus: supposedly, early in the ADs, seven Roman soldiers converted to Christianity and fled to hide in a cave to avoid having to sacrifice animals (/be killed). They were found by some other Roman soldiers who sealed up the entry to the cave; a few centuries later, a flood (or earthquake?) washed away the cave opening and the 7 sleepers emerged to find all their friends and family long gone. Marcos' reaction to this story: "puh-leeeze." Ha!) There's a nice restaurant nearby that serves gözleme, Turkish naan-tortilla-crepe-quesadillas, and has traditional floor seating under woven canopies.

We ordered 2, one with minced meat, onion, and eggplant, and the other with spinach and cheese. They were huge, and we could have gotten away with just one between the two of us, but we took the leftovers home and had them for dinner tonight! We also got fresh-squoze apple (elma, Marcos) and watermelon (karpuz, me) juice, and were very happily full when we left.

Back at the hotel, I tweaked our itinerary a bit (we're now going to Pamukkale; you can see the updated itinerary here [same link as original]) and then took a quick shower to wash off the dust-sweat-sunscreen layer, followed by a joint nap for me and Marcos. We woke up 3 hours later and sauntered off to the market, a relatively short (10-15 min.) walk away. We got there shortly before it closed, so some stalls were rather bare, but a lot were still fully stocked.

A selection of goodies at the market

I bought us some dried apricots (5 TL for about a pound) and dark Lambert-like cherries (3 TL for 1.1 lbs), which we ate with our gözleme out on the terrace for dinner. Marcos also picked up some peach juice (1 L for 2.5 TL), which continues to be very tasty.

Marcos likes to keep our room very air conditioned.
Strangely, I have been finding it to be very cold! How out of character.
So I borrowed his hoodie and put on my one pair of pants (pajama, of course).

Tomorrow we have another full day in Selçuk; we plan to sleep in (me) and visit St. John's Basilica (Marcos) and then do work (me) and either visit a weaving cooperative or check out the Ephesus Museum here in town (Marcos, and me if I'm super productive). It will be nice to have a relatively relaxing day!