Tagged With "Istanbul"

Hagia Sophia is surely one of the most widely-recognized buildings on Earth, which is amazing considering that the world is so populated with other buildings modeled on it or even directly copied from it.

The best-known active mosque in Istanbul, the Sultan Ahmet Mosque, popularly known as the Blue Mosque, stands next door to Hagia Sophia, which it replaced as the mosque of the Sultans of the Ottoman Empire. It was built in the early 17th century, on...

Two days and some more touring after our first food walking tour in Istanbul, we were ready for more, and set out on our second. This tour, like the first, was organized by Culinary Backstreets.

A visit to fabled Topkapi, imperial and administrative center of the Ottoman Empire for 400 years

On our first day in Istanbul, after arriving at 4:30 on a Sunday morning and heading straight to a nap we went for a walk to reconnoiter the neighborhood. What a neighborhood! Within 5 to 10 minutes easy walk we passed the Topkapi Palace, the massive Hagia Sophia, a large open square and came, face on, with the incredible Blue Mosque.

Last summer in Paris, we visited an exhibit at the Institute du Monde Arabe, featuring cars and artifacts of the Orient Express and its mystique. A significant part of the exhibit, given the venue, focused on the exotic spell it had for Europeans.

Two Swedish airports have found a new way to relieve departing travelers of their unneeded local currency. A bank of videogames, set up at Stockholm's Arlanda and Goteborg's Landvetter airports have been set up to accept any currency at all to play...

This was our third trip to Istanbul, and we had already covered all the major “must do” tourist locations and several of the minor ones. Yes, Istanbul has some great restaurants, but it’s time to relax and pay some attention to some of the street food.