Hi!
You know you’ve had a wonderful holiday if you’re already planning on returning, and feeling wistful leaving everything behind! Such it is with us here…so…today.
Up at the usual 5:30-ish time (nothing changes, regardless of where we are!) to find that R had received several emails that he had been waiting for … which delayed breakfast until almost 8:30! Chilly and overcast in Bergama, but with the promise of some blue sky in the background. By the time R had finished with his work, it was almost 9:30, so we did get a fairly late start.
We decided to go for just one more “ruin.” (I remember wondering before we left if we would get “ruined out” like we did in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt. As it stands right now, I am still gung-ho on ruins, but R is a bit oversaturated with them.) This time we headed to the ancient city of Sardis, which is due east of Izmir. At this point, we are just about closing the loop that we started a month ago! Where has the time gone???
So…Sardis. Interesting city; magnificent ruins. It turns out that Sardis started life as the ancient capital of Lydia, and was the home of the legendary King Croesus. The city was liberated by Alexander the Great (another one, who, like Hadrian, sure got around!) after which it became first Greek, then Roman.
Additionally, it had the largest synagogue outside of Palestine. Found the city with no problems, other than Emmy deciding that it would be faster to go through cities than go around them…grrr…Arrived about lunch time to find that we had the Temple of Artemis to ourselves! And, that it was starting to rain. Fortunately, the rain never got torrential, and our umbrellas were fine to see the sights. From the Temple, we drove back into town to see the Gymnasium (with swimming pool) and the mosaics left in the synagogue. They were wonderful! Again, walked around with a light rain falling, and basically had the place to ourselves! When we pulled in to see the gymnasium and synagogue there were two tour buses, and we did pass some folks on their way out – but by the time we got back, no buses anywhere in sight! It is SO nice to have ruins to yourself!
Back in the car about 1:00, and heading now back to Selcuk, and the Hotel Nilya, for our last night’s stay. The route there took us around Izmir – which we find has a population of over 3 million people! SOOOOO glad that we decided to cancel our Izmir hotel and stay in Selcuk, where we know the town and the hotel…Got here about 2:15 and schlepped everything (we hope!) out of the car and upstairs to room 11. Very pleasant triple room; nice and cozy. R had more Caltech work to do, and I sat on the upstairs balcony and read a book. I also took a walk in to town to find my Magnum Classic for the day…one cannot break habits at this stage! Also booked dinner for us at Hotel Bella for tonight.
One wonderful surprise is that the stork eggs have hatched – and wow, are those nests getting crowded! One nest we can see from Hotel Bella has four babies, and the other has five! I know those are big nests, but it seems like there are a lot of bodies in there now. Apparently they don’t really start flying on their own until the end of July – would love to see that someday!
We had a nice table on the rooftop balcony, and once again did their set menu. This time we had terrific tomato soup, followed by four appetizers – eggplant mousaka, mixed veggies, stuffed mushrooms and green beans in tomato sauce. We both had the same main course – Adana kebob (spicy beef) with rice and tomato and onion salad. Dessert for me was baklava and something that looked like rice pudding for Robert. Everything excellent, as usual. Then downstairs to again look at their ceramics … they do have some lovely things!
Back to the hotel about 9…repacked and waiting for tomorrow! We will leave here right after breakfast tomorrow, head for the airport, check-in and wait for our fight to Gatwick. Once there, we are picking up a car and heading to Northampton to see Phil, Dan, Leo and Marion for the weekend! Greatly looking forward to it!!
Lots of love,
m
xxx
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