Seasons Greetings

Work was kind enough to give me 2 days off for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, so Mike and I decided to take a trip to the historically preserved Ottoman city of Safranbolu, a 10-hour bus ride east of Istanbul. We had checked the weather forecast every day for a week to make sure we dressed appropriately for the weather in Safranbolu, and were excited to see that it was supposed to be above 15 degrees Celsius. We wore fall clothes and were glad to be escaping the relative cold of Istanbul. However, when we arrived at 6:30 in the morning we nearly froze to death because it was close to 0 degrees Celsius! We found a hostel that served breakfast and nursed some tea for a few hours waiting for sunlight and hopefully warmth to come. Unfortunately the warmth never came even though the sun did for a few minutes, but we sucked it up and explored the town.

We first visited the historical museum which had some old photographs and historical artifacts (boring) and some rooms set up as traditional shops (cool). There was a pharmacy, a shoe-maker, a sweets shop, a saddle-maker and a blacksmith, complete with mannequins dressed up and posed.





We then set off to wander around town looking at beautiful Ottoman buildings. There were lots of narrow cobblestoned streets with great buildings everywhere - it's definitely a quaint town with a lot of character. The highlight for me was the street bazar, which took up most of the old part of town and reminded me a lot of Kyrgyzstan's Osh Bazar, one of my favorite places in the world. They were trinket sellers, textile shops, and here and there a tiny restaurant. We warmed up over lunch in a tiny cafe where we were practically sitting in the kitchen. We had great Turkish manti and piping hot tea.








We had seen most of the city in just a few hours and were freezing cold, so we changed our plans and decided to take a night bus back to Istanbul rather than spend a night. After we'd reserved bus tickets we sat outside the tourist office wondering how to spend the few hours before the bus left when a Turkish guy sat down next to us and started speaking English. He said he was a tourism student and a tour guide and offered to show us around Safranbolu for free. Figuring that we had nothing better to do, we let him guide us around town. It turned out to be great- he took us to a lot of places that weren't in Lonely Planet and we learned a lot of history and interesting facts that we'd never have learned otherwise. Some fun trivia included : Safranbolu used to be underwater and the hills of the city were islands in the sea, homes hang deer antlers for the eaves of the roof for good luck, and homes have 2 knockers on the door- one for men and one for women so that the the residents of the house know who should go to open the door.




We then met up with our couchsurfer for tea and dinner and had a nice discussion about English teaching, life in Turkey, and of course football (soccer). No conversation is ever complete without at least a mention of soccer.

Safranbolu is famous for its saffron, so of course there's a very touristy saffron shop. I bought some saffron soap for souvenirs and we got saffron-flavored Turkish delight. We caught the night bus home without any problems and were back to balmy (12 degree) Istanbul weather by morning.




It was a great break from city life and a wonderfully-preserved Old Town full of friendly people and an amazing bazar. I'd love to go back in summer when it's warmer and more inviting.