Hi all, it has been a while since we have made a Blavel - but this one marks the start of our two month journey across continental Europe. We have set an ambitious target of starting in Istanbul and ending up in Lisbon, hoping we don't run out of money somewhere along the way.
We arrived in Istanbul on Tuesday and we are staying here for five nights. The temperature is fantastic here - low 30s during the day and mid 20s during the night. And sun! Everywhere! Adjusting to the temperature is just making me want to lie around and do nothing a lot. :)
The hostel is great, we get free breakfast on the rooftop every morning. The first dinner we had was awesome, also on the rooftop and fantastic food. We are located right in the middle of Sultanahmet, which is sort of the middle of the old town - we have several huge mosques right beside us which trumpet out calls to prayer several times a day.
We went on a ferry trip up the Bosphorus yesterday, which is a big strip of water connecting the Sea of Marmara and the Black Sea. It is the actual border between what is classed as Europe and Asia. Istanbul is well and truly what they call a megacity, it's got over 12.5 million people which makes it bigger than London. The housing here is very high density - it reminds me of Tokyo in some ways.
Still to go is visiting the mosques and the grand bazaar, so we will post again soon.
