On day 3 of our cruise we have reached Istanbul, Turkey's largest city. Istanbul is an intoxicating city home to some of the world's most beautiful landmarks and delicious food. Come along as we take two shore excursions with Celestyal Cruises to make the most of our time there. The first is a food tour eating some of Instabul's most famous foods and the second is a cruise along the Bosphorus Strait!
One of the reasons why Istanbul is so interesting is that it one of a few places that straddles two continents Europe and Asia and is split by the mighty Bosphorous strait. One side of the Bosphorus river is the Occidental (European) side while the other is the Oriental side (Asian). It is also filled with iconic landmarks like the Hagia Sophia, Blue Mosque and Topkapi Palace. There are also bazaars and bustling modern neighborhoods. And the food? It's incredible!
The Bosphorus Strait while lovely to sail on, also affords Turkey significant geo political influence. This tiny strait connects the Black Sea to the Mediterranean and is the only access for countries like Russia, Ukraine and others in the Black Sea region to global trade routes. As a result Turkey who controls the Bosphorus strait has major influence over regional security.
It's 11am by the time everyone disembarks the Celestyal Journey at Galataport. “We will eat we will talk and gossip,” our food tour guide Alize says. We have two shore excursions booked to make the most of our time here: a food tour and a Bosphorous cruise. The cruise ship is scheduled to leave Galataport at 8pm.
Alize starts her tour on the European side where we pick up fresh simit from Galata Simitcisi bakery. When the vendor sees me looking curiously at the bread he kindly hands me a free sesame biscuit to try. Kandil simidi are delicious sweet sesame biscuits and Alize explains that they are baked usually in remembrance of people once they have passed. A family will bake 100 of these and they will be distributed to the neighbours by the children.
She stops at a Turkish coffee shop and instructs under us under no uncertain terms: do not add milk to Turkish coffee. Like Italians they consider it ruining the coffee. For the Turkish people, one cup of Turkish coffee for breakfast is said to be good for the heart and digestion. "Any more and you’re asking for trouble," she adds.
Turkey is a majority Muslim country where around 85% of the population are Muslim but not all women wear headscarves. “Everyone follows life according to their choices,” explains Alize who herself is Muslim but doesn't wear headscarf. In the 1930's Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, founding father of the Republic of Türkiye, made Turkey a secular, liberal country where women have equal rights. In fact, Turkish women gained the right to vote before women in several European countries including France, Italy and Greece. Modern day Turkish women can have tattoos, pink hair and piercings.
We board the ferry to cross the Bosphorus strait and while on the ferry, we try the crisp, chewy simit and strong Turkish tea as we cross from Europe to Asia. Changing continents is as easy as hopping on the ferry and or by crossing the bridge over the river. In 2013 they shut down the bridge so that Tiger Woods could make a golf shot from Asia into Europe.
We arrive on the Asian side in about 20 minutes. This is the less touristic side and also the area with more Turkish food and is said to be a more progressive area popular with younger people. Despite the different names of the different sides, the people are the same on both sides.
Our next bite is of Midye Dolma, stuffed mussels with aromatic, spicy rice. This is a popular street food and absolutely delicious, especially the heat of the spice in the rice that lingers on the tongue. You use the shell to scoop out the rice from the other shell.
We stop at a Özcan Turşuları, a third generation pickle shop where Alize hands out cups of crisp pickles. The range includes small pickled plums. All the pickles are sharp and crisp. She also suggests trying some of the brine to drink.
Our next stop for lunch is Ciya Sofrasi where they lay out a spread of tzatziki, hummus and crisp, thin flatbread. There’s also a salad of local greens with onion and pomegranate. They bring around delicious football shaped bites called Içli Köfte with plenty of meat inside them.
The restaurant is also know for its Lahmacun. This flatbread is topped with mince, tomato and herbs on top is so light and crispy and blistered. I watch as chefs slide the breads into wood fired oven. Soon we are walking again and headed back to the European side.
Alize points out the many dogs that lie in the afternoon sun. If they have pink tags in their ear they are spayed and neutered and looked after by the government. Dogs and cats are well fed and well taken care of.
We hop on the ferry and cross the Bosphorus strait again to the European side to arrive at Istanbul's most famous square, Taksim Square at Taksim Mosque. Turkey is a country with an incredible 82,693 mosques - there are over 3,000 mosques in Istanbul alone.
We take a leisurely walk down Istiklal Street one of Istanbul's busiest pedestrian streets with European style buildings and a range of brand name shops and shops selling Turkish delight and other sweets.
We stop by Kasap doner for a doner kebab. Shawarma, doner and gyros are the same thing but in Turkey there are two types: chicken and meat which is a mix of lamb and beef. They’re quite tasty but make sure to careful when eating it as a lot of oil pours out from each wrap with each bite.
After this we head to the second shore excursion of the day. Because disembarkation was a little delayed we have to miss the very last to stop which is the baklava stop for dessert. But we bid goodbye for our first group and join the second shore excursion for our Bosphorous cruise.
First, the group gets half an hour at the Egyptian market to walk around and buy gifts. It’s a good place to buy edible souvenirs and there are plenty of samples to entice you to buy. The Turkish delight is as the name suggests, delightful. Instead of the gelatinised cubes this one is more halva based. We buy some pomegranate and pistachio Turkish delight as gifts – these are around $25USD for a slender log.
They also ply us with samples of pomegranate tea served chilled. It’s so good that I have to buy some pomegranate tea powder – all you do is add water and stir, and there is one unsweetened version and one sweetened version. This is around $15AUD for a small bag and is well worth buying.
Fearing that this is a place that I could easily be talked out of money we meet the guide at the front where he leads us to the wharf where we wait for our boat to arrive for our sunset cruise.
It’s a little chilly in this mid October weather, so most people go downstairs while a brave few stay upstairs. The cruise starts at the Golden horn section that opens out into the Bosphorus strait. First, we will see the european coast and then turn to see the Asian coast Before returning us directly to the boat
It’s a leisurely cruise, although the boats slices rapidly through the water and the sunset colours the buildings golden yellow. There’s a small disagreement on the boat as the pomegranate juices that were offered are actually not free of charge and they demand 4 euro from everyone that took a cup (most people assumed it was part of the cruise). Seagulls surround boats hoping for a scrap of food and they deposit us right near the ship at around 7pm.
Mr NQN and I drop off our bags in our cruise stateroom and get changed for dinner. We stop by the Halara Cove and Bar by the level 11 pool for a pre dinner drink. We both order juices: a detox juice for me with apple, pineapple, carrot and ginger and a mixed juice for Mr NQN with kiwi, watermelon, pomegranate, banana and pineapple.
Tonight's dinner is back at the Taverna buffet and even at 7:45pm it is busy and we finally find a seat after looking around. I'm excited to see that it's Asian night as I've missed having some chilli in the food (although no complaints the food has been excellent on board). There are spring rolls, prawn crackers, pappadums, dumplings, noodles, fried rice as well as beef in black bean sauce, Filipino chicken and sweet and sour pork. I am in heaven.
My favourite item is the gua baos that they fill fresh to order. They open up a massive steamer full of soft baos and then fill them with either chicken or pork and salad. I finish it off with some Sriracha sauce and it's perfect. Mr NQN demolishes two of these and considers going back for a third.
For dessert it is Halo Halo with strawberry ice cream, sweet potato cubes, corn and syrup and fresh fruit.
Because we've been going to be so early (I'm in bed by 9:30pm most nights!) we've never actually made it to a show but since our dinner finishes around 8:30pm we head to the 8th floor auditorium where a lot of the cruise passengers are busy watching the Cirque Canada show. There's acrobatics and singing and there are some talented performers. But the ship's movements starts lulling me to sleep and we return to our room where I fall fast asleep.
So tell me Dear Reader, have you ever been to Istanbul or Turkey?
NQN and Mr NQN were guests of Celestayl Cruises but all opinions remain her own. We flew to Europe with Vietnam Airlines.
Celestyal Cruises
A similar cruise is priced from $1289AUDpp twin share for a 2025 voyage: https://celestyal.com/au/our-cruises/7-nights-au/idyllic-aegean/
Vietnam Airlines
Vietnam Airlines offers 23 flights per week connecting Sydney, Melbourne and Perth to Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi. Vietnam Airlines is continuing to add new routes having recently announced new flights to Milan, Munich and Delhi.
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