A good friend of mine invited me to visit her in Istanbul. Because I had been there already, I decided to travel to Istanbul using other means than usual. This also gave me the opportunity to visit a number of places on the way that I would not visit otherwise. Therefore I decided to make the journey from the Netherlands by train, largely following the tracks of the famous Orient Express. This was a trip that I wanted to make quite a while. The train ride itself takes about 2.5 days and because I had scheduled two weeks, I decided to make stopovers at in Vienna and Romania.
On July 20, I left the Netherlands by night train to Munich. After a tight change over the next morning (the train had a little delay), we finally whizzed with a speed of 230km / h to Vienna where I arrived just before noon. That afternoon I explored the city with its famous St. Stephen's Cathedral and magnificent palaces. Early in the evening I attended a fine piano Recitel in the basement of St Peters Church.

The next morning, a visit to the Schonbrunn Palace was planned. The palace where, in the early 1900's, Sissy lived, is a wonderful example of the Viennese baroque and despite the relatively simple appearance, the inside was one of luxuary and splendor.

In the evening the next stage began. The night train to Brasov, Romania. I shared the compartment with an elderly romanian couple with their grandson, a young Romanian lady and a austrian man. It was cozy and the communication was mostly in German. A good time to practice my German Although we needed to be creative with the space we had for our luggage, the trip went pretty well. Unfortunately, the next morning, the older man found out that his sandals had disappeared. The austrian man had accidentally taken the wrong pair when he left the train. Ut was unconfortable for them but definitely not intentional. The train had a considerable delay and trudged slowly through the Romanian countryside to finally stumbling into the Brasov train station with a delay of 1.5 hours.

Here the guide was waiting. He gave me some info on the buses to Bran Castle which I wanted to visit the next day. That afternoon I went up to a viewpoint with the cable car. The view was very beautiful but haunted by the only significant amount of rain during this trip, I went back down.

The next day I visited the Bran castle in the similar named village. In this castle, various dukes and princesses lived here, including Princess Mary. However, the most famous (or rather infamous) inhabitant of this place was Count Vladimir Dracul, also known as Dracula. After an exile he returned and reigned the area with terror and bloodshed. It was rumored that his opponents were impaled during his lunch. Not very nice of him! In the afternoon I was picked up from the hotel again and brought to the station. Time for the next leg to Bucharest. A beautiful ride through the Carpathians. In the evening we arrived at the Gara de Nord.

The next day I went exploring. Bucharest. First I visited the megalomanic big "Palace of the people" that was built by Ceausescu in the 80's, just before a bloody revolution put an end to his reign of terror. This palace was an epitome of splendor. It was also huge, yes, it was the second largest government building in the world (after the Pentagon). Halfway the tour, the guide told us we had already walked 1.5 km in the building!

In the afternoon I visited the ethnographic open-air museum which hosts a very interesting collection of old Romanian houses and churches. Just before dinner, I visited the Revolution Square. Here Ceausescu held his last speech (where, to his dismay, he was booed by the people). After a walk through the beautiful old town, it was time to go to the hotel.

The next morning it was time for the next and final leg, the train to istanbul. In contrast to all previous trains, there was no air-conditioning in the train. Especially when the train halted for a long time, it was unbearably hot inside. The landscape however was beautiful, after the passage of the Danube we entered Bulgaria thorugh beautiful mountainous area. The conductor suggested that I cold use my compartment for me alone by paying him 20 euros. Since it was very quiet in the train, I took that oppertunity. There were a lot especially Dutch (!) InterRailers on board.

At 2 AM we reached the Turkish border. We had to leave the train but the immigration formalities went smoothly. I just had to play for Bank because most InterRailers assumed there was an ATM on the station where there was none. And some of them didn't have enough euros to buy the visa needed to enter Turkey. Fortunately after 1.5 hours everyone had passed immigration and customs control. The train continued its journey at about 3:30. It was cool outside and finally it became bearable in the train so at least I had some time to sleep. This did not last long because the train stopped at 6 pm and we had to transfer to the bus that would take us to Istanbul. Almost in time I arrived at the Serkici station in Istanbul.

After half an hour, Jan arrived. She stayed in Istanbul because she did a house exchange and invited me to come to Istanbul. That day was mainly devoted to relax and mingle. After breakfast we left by public transport to the apartment where she stayed in the suburb Istinye, in the north of Istanbul. A ride on the tram, funicular railway and metro. It was also obvious that Turkey is modernizing quickly. The Public transport was well orginized with a well-functioning public transport system smartcard which was integrated in all Metro Tram, funiculars etc.. It grants a 10 percent discount on fares by just using it.. The public transport operates on a flat fare of only 50 euro cents. per single ride, regardless of the distance.

The next day we visited the Taksim Square and the Islamic science museum in the old town. This museum showed us that our mathematics and our knowledge of the Greeks and Romans gas largely been passed to the west by Islam.. They preserved this knowledge while it was largely lost in early medieval Europe. The day ended with a beautiful cruise on the Bosphorus. We wanted to be home in time for the next day which would start very early..
At 4 pm we were picked up and taken to the airport. We flew to Cardac airport near Denizli for a two day visit to Pamukkale with its famous travertine terraces. We had booked the Alida hotel, which was run by a very friendly family. We quickly went on the terraces because now there was the possibility to try all travertine baths which ware open to bath in. Every pool differed a bit of temperature.

At 4 pm we were back at the hotel to have diner. and at half past seven we went back upstairs. Now we were equipped with our cameras to shoot nice sunset images..The sunset over the travertine terraces was, in a word: magical!  We stayed on the monument till darkness and at 10 o'clock we were back at the hotel for - again a nice diner, prepared for us by love and care by the landlady.and our well-deserved rest.
The next day we first took a long dip in the Antique pool and baded for two hours in the warm water between the ruins. Then we visited the museum of Pamukkale where a number of antiquities were exhibited in the old bathhouse of Hierapolis. By the end of the afternoon we shortly visited as the "Red Pamukkale", a small and red version of the travertine terrace with much warmer water. After a quick diner, we were picked up and  taken back to the airport. With a  half hour delay we landed just before midnight in Istanbul.

The next morning I had to say goodbye to Jan, After 2.5 months in Greece and Turkey, she travelled back to the States. I had an extra day and after ckecking in into the Berk hotel, I spent the rest of the day by re-visiting the impressive Hagia Sophia and the Basilica Cisterian, the Byzantine underground water storage. There was also a little palace to visit onder the restaurant of the hotel's neighbours, a nice surprise: A ladder led to a number of halls of a pre-medieval castle, the old buildings were literally everywhere! Actually I wanted to go to the Asian side to have a panoramic view to the old city but after seeing the panoramic view on the hotel's tooftop terrace, I decided to enjoy this magical city during nightfall from there.

The next day I took a long bus tour through the city before being pick up for my transfer to the airport. Unfortunately this also was the end of this beautiful trip, at 2:30 the next day I was back in my own bed.