Above:  Our cheap but awesome flight. Walking to the airport We set the alarm for 0615 and left the Tune Hotel at KLIA Terminal about 30 mins later, and walked to the airport terminal to get airside.  Unfortunately, I misdirected Kim to the manual immigration desks when he could have used the kiosks. Regardless of […]

I started the day with burek from the bakery across the road, and an instant coffee in my room. Today, I’m moving to Istanbul, staying near the airport at the Arnavutkoy area in preparation for a morning flight to Damascus tomorrow.  I left the hotel by Uber at 0915 for the 1000 bus to Istanbul […]

Uludag cable car The only thing left in Bursa I wanted to do was go up to mountains near Uludag, accessible by cable car.  After a burek for breakfast, I took a 5 min shared taxi ride to the cable car station to find it deserted at 0900. The signs indicated that opened at 1100 […]

Getting started After about 7h sleep, I got out of bed around 0600.  I had woken up around 0400 but had fallen back asleep.  Despite a 44h day from a rural Fujian tulou to Guangzhou, Kuwait, Istanbul and finally Bursa, I couldn’t sleep any more due to the time difference. I had some tea and […]

Tea factory and sweet shop Today I did an excursion to Uzungol, a picturesque lakeside village with the lake formed about 500 years ago due to a landslide blocking the outflow of water.  The trip came with a few other inclusions. I reported to the tour office at 1000 and departed soon after.  We collected […]

I had opted not to do an excursion till tomorrow, due to wet weather forecast.  It is good that I have a spare day.  Instead, I’ll do the sights of Trabzon further from the bazaar area where I’m located. First up, I walked to the Gulbahar Hatun Mosque built in 1514.  En route, I passed […]

Sumela Monastery Trabzon’s highlight for me was going to be the Sumela Monastery out of town.  In the late autumn season, I had read that public transport options are more difficult, so I booked a tour online with Sumelatur for TRY700 (NZD35) and came with a number of other sights. I walked to their office […]

Arriving and domestic transfer in Istanbul With only 4h between meals onboard the flight from Male to Istanbul, I took only half a sleeping pill instead of a whole one.  I enjoyed 2h sleep horizontally on three seats and managed to doze for a further two. Surprisingly Turkish Airlines served 2 full meals on the […]