It was just terrific. They explained everything. You have to be comfortable with nudity, your own,…read moreand the scantily dressed woman who is scrubbing and helping you (if you are a woman). But I would do it again in a heartbeat, so relaxing.

The Suleymaniye Hamam was a cultural experience, that's for sure…read more I wanted to try a genuine Turkish bath, and the Sulimaniye Hamam is not only one of the oldest ones in Istanbul, it's also one of the few that allows co-ed bathing. In fact, it requires you come with a partner to partake. So I coerced my husband into coming along and made reservations for a Turkish bath. We arrived early but they took us right away. You are given a changing room (shared with your partner) and asked to dress in a bikini for women (they give you shorts and a top if you don't bring your own) and a towel for men. You're also given some very uncomfortable wooden sandals. A side note here: They made my husband leave his glasses in the changing room, which left him functionally blind. The glasses WOULD have steamed up in the bathing room, but I think that would have been preferable to him not being able to see at all, AND we saw another person wearing glasses in there. (OK, I saw another person wearing glasses in there--husband saw nothing.) So if you wear glasses and want them on your face for the bath, do it. After changing, you're brought into a large steam room for about 30 minutes to wait for your bath. There's a large heated marble square in the center of the room to sit on, and sinks around the perimeter of the room for you to fill bowls with water to splash yourself. Each of the four corners of the room is a treatment area, with two benches and two sinks. When it's your turn, the bathers will call you in to a corner and begin the treatment. The treatment consists of exfoliation with a loofah, followed by laying down on the table to be scrubbed all over with bubbles. They work on your back first, then your front. The scrubbing includes a little bit of massage, which was nice. Then, you are splashed with clean water to rinse the soap, and moved back to the area next to the sink where they shampoo your hair. Finally, you are splashed with progressively colder water until you're completely rinsed and soap-free. The last part of the experience is getting dry. The bathers bring you into a side room and wrap you in Turkish bath towels. They do not like it if you try to wrap yourself, I learned. Finally, you're brought into a room with benches and tables where you can order coffee, tea, water, or other refreshments. After our sweaty bath experience, all we wanted was water and more water. When you're done, you go back to your changing room, get back into your clothes, and that's it. You can pay for your refreshments on the way out (you pre-paid for the treatment) as well as leave any tips in a designated box. Pro tips: Bring something to hold back your hair if it's long. Bring makeup wipes since any makeup you're wearing will smear. Bring deodorant to reapply, as well as any hair products or makeup you might need, unless you plan on going straight back to your hotel. They do have blow dryers available for use at the hamam. As I said at the beginning, this was a cultural experience. I didn't find it relaxing exactly, especially since I wasn't sure what was going to happen at any given time. I'm glad I went, but I probably won't seek out a Turkish bath experience here at home.

Commissioned by Sultan Abdülmecid the Büyük Mecidiye Camii in Beşiktaş is Ottoman Baroque in style,…read morefamous for its low-hanging crystal chandeliers and natural lighting. Located near the first Bosphorus Bridge and Ortaköy's famous Baked Potato vendors do pay attention to the calligraphies created by the Sultan himself.

What a beautiful building! This mosque is a little further off the beaten tourist path, but it's…read morewell worth heading out of your way for a visit (at least, when combined with my suggested itinerary below.) You might be thinking to yourself: I've already seen a half a dozen mosques, each one with more beautiful tilework than the last. What's special about this one? It's a completely different style -- it's a neo-Baroque style, and very light and airy inside, with high arched windows. It feels like it belongs in 18th or 19th century Western Europe. It's peaceful and serene, and different enough to be interesting. Like all mosques, entrance is free. Men, don't wear shorts; women, cover your legs and head/shoulders. As at most mosques in the city, scarves/skirts are available to borrow if you need them. For a lovely and slightly different evening in Istanbul, here's my suggestion: head up to Ortokoy, grab some kumpir (huge potatoes stuffed with a wild mish-mash of awesome toppings) and/or waffles (also covered in toppings) from the food vendors nearby, take in the beauty of the mosque, and hop on a cheap 1 hour night-time Bosphorus cruise from the nearby Ortokoy port. (The tours are cheaper than the ones that leave from the busier and more touristy areas. The boat's not as fancy, but you'll pay half or less what you would leaving from closer to Sultanahmet.)

Our local tour guide (Safiye) took us down for a stroll on İstiklal Avenue, which is a well known…read moreshopping street in Istanbul. That included taking us inside St. Anthony of Padua Roman Catholic Church. In a City full of stunning mosques and sprinkling of Eastern Orthodox, visiting this Roman Catholic establishment kind of turned the tourist saying of "Oh Joy, another Church!" on its head. We found the interior to be very impressive and comforting. This is the largest church in Istanbul and has Italian pedigree, both in its founding and in its clergy today. Depending on the day of the week, one could attend Mass in either Turkish, English, or Italian. Pope John XXIII preached here for 10 years while he was the Vatican's ambassador to Turkey before being chosen as pope. He is known as "the Turkish Pope" because of his fluency in Turkish and his oft-expressed love for Turkey and Istanbul. Gayle and I were able to admire a statue of him installed within the church's courtyard. I also detected a bit of Byzantine/Eastern Orthodox influence within a few of the "Icons" inside the church. One was how the 3 fingers are put together to signify the Trinity, with the back 2 fingers following. And if we stuck around longer, my guess is that we might have seen people crossing themselves in either the Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox mode.

Went here for Christmas Eve service - absolutely beautiful!! Decorated to the nines both inside…read moreand out. If you're around Taksim Square on Christmas Eve, stop by for a visit at least. If you want to stay for mass on Christmas Eve, come early. 45 minutes before the service and it was standing room only. Very diverse crowd!

This is a must-see in Istanbul!…read more LOCATION It's in a different area than the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sofia so it takes a bit of a tram ride, but it's worth it. TIMING We were not prepared for the sheer size of this palace. Holy COW. We came midday with a few other things to do in the area, and could have left much more time to go slower but still very much enjoyed spending ~2 hours here. This palace is soooo huge, and they have different areas throughout the buildings with exhibitions and displays. See as many as you can! I recommend starting on the right side and working back and around from there. ATTRACTIONS Most of the attraction is the sheer magnificence of the interior decor and design in the palace: chandeliers, stunning rooms and spaces, and lots of art. NO PICS?!? The biggest bummer and reason for docking a star: NO PHOTOS?! You're telling me you're gonna show me the most magnificent castle and I can't take a pic?! That was a huge bummer. You can be sneaky but they do have guards everywhere. What's the harm in a little no-flash memory of the space? AMENITIES They have a cafe and a restaurant onsite, as well as restrooms and some gardens with benches to relax. You'll need it from walking around the massive palace!

A top sight in Istanbul. I liked the walk through that you do through the main building. There…read moreare no photos allowed but it's a huge palace like something you would see in Europe. Outside there are some beautiful views of the coast and city and lovely gardens to walk through. I bought my tickets that day it wasn't too long in the morning. Like any other place, you have to go through security and another line for tickets and then another to enter. It was my favorite place to visit. In the spring the tulips were nice.

Gorgeous garden and small palace. Ihlamur Keske looks like embroidery!…read more There are small cafe inside and tree peacocks walking close to you.

If your time for Istanbul is not very limited, you should see Ihlamur Kasri…read more The place is like a hidden paradise in the crowded city life. The Kasr (i don't know the exact translation for that word, might be a hunting house for the royal family) is an interesting and beautiful place to see, and the garden is definitely gonna make you peaceful. The place cannot be seen as the top of the must see list for Istanbul, still, if you have plenty of time or working foreigner in the city, the place is for you.

The Greek Orthodox Patriarchy in Fener neighborhood is one of the sights that one should visit in…read morethe old part of the city. It's the core of the Orthodox world thus many Greeks come to visit the church. Each weekend they conduct mass and if you're lucky you may meet the Patriach himself as well. Don't forget to visit Fener and Balat neighborhood after/before your visit and get lost in the "old Istanbul".

With chandeliers and all interior design, the patriarchate has a very illuminating feel. Sacred…read morerelics and reliefs are kept here. The stone which was used to tie Jesus was brought there from Jerusalem. Since the 6th century the Phanar Greek Patriarchate has been the center of Orthodoxy. It was first founded by Constantine the Great in 330 AD. By the time Fatih Sultan Mehmed legalized the the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate after the conquest of Istanbul, Gennadios II was assigned as patriarch and he operated the patriarchate from the Apostles Church. The building was moved from one place to another several times.

This is a really high end shopping area with really nice hotels, the view from various areas is…read morenice the architecture of the buildings are very nice. You can find highly regarded name brand shops such as Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Prada, Christian Louboutin and many more. Everything can be spaced out a little bit but I honestly think it's worth the walk because it's a beautiful area, and if you're trying to drive from shops and shop you will be wasting a lot of time because there's traffic in this area for cars most of the day. To go along with all the shopping that you most likely will be doing you will find many good restaurants to curb your appetite once you get one.

I understandably had mixed feelings as I walked down Nisantasi's Rumeli Caddesi (Rumeli St. In…read moreNisantasi. Istanbul.) This visit was intensely personal. The last time a member of our family had walked down these streets was in 1955, when my father, then a young man, born and raised in Istanbul, and a member of the Greek minority who had been in Istanbul (Constantinople) since before Byzantium, and was a loyal citizen of the Turkish state, and former officer in the Turkish army, who along with his brother, my uncle, Giorgo, (whom I am named after,) was the owner of a thriving bakery. Until that night in 1955, when relations between Greece and Turkey worsened over the Cyprus issue, and as part of Anti-Greek minority riots taking place in Istanbul and other parts of Turkey, a mob had gathered in front of his bakery. As my father and uncle slept in the bakery, (they lived in the back of the bakery as was the custom then,) the attack on the bakery began. Among other destructive acts, someone threw a petrol bomb through the front window, setting the bakery on fire and burning my uncle to death (who fatefully had decided to sleep in the front that night,) as my father fled out the back door, barefoot, with only his night clothes on. He joined the throng of other Greeks and minorities as they ran through the Sisli neighborhood, down towards the Golden Horn and The Ataturk Bridge where they leapt into the water for safety to escape the mobs chasing them down to the waterway. He and others were pulled from the water by lifeboats sent from a Japanese freighter that was passing through the nearby Dardanelles straits, and after a harrowing sea voyage, were resettled in Greece, along with other Greek refugees expelled from their ancestral homeland. I and my siblings were thus born elsewhere, when arguably Istanbul was (and is) our family's ancestral home, and also where we all should've been born, raised and prospered, as children of one of the most well known and successful bakeries in that area. (Interesting note: There was a military base near my father's bakery, and many of his best customers were Turkish Army Officers, who came frequently to drink my father's famous Turkish Coffee, eat his fabulous Oriental and European sweets, and to play "tavli", (kind of a backgammon type game, played throughout the Near East.) Despite my father's close relationships with many military officers from the nearby Turkish Army base, and the fact that he himself had been an officer in the army, no one came to his aid while the bakery was burning.) So as I tried to find the exact location of the new building that took the place of my father's bakery, (it was burned to the ground,) i used all the verbal clues he had left me before he died. He had told me that his bakery was on Rumeli Caddesi, in Sisli, next door to the famous Turkish author Orhan Pamuk's house. He and my father were friends, and he was a frequent visitor to the bakery. So if what I had been taught was correct, the location had now become one of this area's (and Istanbul's) most popular McDonald's. With a certain amount of hesitation, I entered the restaurant, and as I approached the counter with my friend, who also spoke Turkish, he suddenly told the staff working there that my father owned the business that was there before McDonald's and that my family had been forcibly expelled during the violence against the Greek minority in the late 1950's. As I introduced myself and began to talk with the young people who worked there, (I speak okay Turkish, as I had learned from my parents,) suddenly one young man spoke up and said in Turkish, (translation,) "Damn, your family owned a store on this street? This is one of the most expensive and exclusive areas of Istanbul. If you still owned this property, you would be really rich!" They then treated me to an ice cream cone on the house. I was dazed as I left, and amid the feelings of gratitude for the kindness and warmth shown to me, I had a large lump in my throat as my mind raced. How life's twists and turns affect ordinary people, and through no fault of their own, how their world can be destroyed in a second caused by the whims of bigger powers and others. And the enduring injustice of it all is the legacy of this visit..............

Absolutely stunning! Hagia Sofia, I was not familiar with your game. It was so interesting to see…read morehow much Christian influence and history is here, which I had no idea about. Our ticketing and entrance process was smooth, though busy - expect lines if you don't go right away in the morning or near closing. Wear clothes that cover your shoulders, chest and knees - and a scarf for covering your head for ladies. They do have some there if you need one. The space is huge! Down on the main floor is just for practicing Muslims to pray, so the space accessible to guests in the higher area. They did have a few spots where you can get audio info, but it was pretty limited info and more of a description of what you're seeing. The ticket covered admission to the museum (not attached, another building) that was VERY helpful and informative! We did that second but wished we'd done it first. Such a stunning space with a ton of history. An absolute must in Istanbul!

Ok, the story is a bit surprising since it was a catholic church during the Roman Empire and now…read moreconverted into a mosque and museum. I was a bit put out off from the high ticket price of $25 per person to go inside. Yes, we paid our fee and did a prearranged guided tour but did not feel like it was not a fair deal. The inside had scaffolding due to the interior renovation that is in the works. I've been to churches all over the world and only the Vatican is worth that kind of ticket price, In my opinion. There are a few remaining frescoes that you can see be seen but overall it was underrated and more of a cash grab to fund reconstruction.

If you take the Bosporus cruise, you will see the Rumeli Hisarı Fortress on the European side…read more Don't miss visiting this fortress because there are great views and there is so much history in this place! In 1453, after a thousand years, the Byzantine Empire came to an end with the Fall of Constantinople. For the next 500 years the Ottoman Empire ruled the area. Rumeli Hisarı means 'Fortress in the land of the Romans.' It was built in 1452 by the order of the Ottoman sultan Mehmed II. You can take Bus 25E (Kabataş--Sarıyer) to reach the fortress. Get out at the Rumeli Hisarı stop.