1st stop of the day: Topkapi Palace. It was the primary residence of the Ottoman sultans for approximately 400 years (1465–1856) of their 624-year reign.
A cool picture i liked in their palace restaurant.
We found some random lion statues and decided to play!
The entrance to the harem...
A fancy faucet in the wall.
The fancy bed.
The fancy floor couches where you lie around and smoke shisha, or hookah, all night.
The harem's courtyard.
Selfie at the Harem mirror!
Path leading out of the harem.
Cool garden we found by happenchance.
Another happenchance find. We walked by this mural trying to find our way back to the main street after leaving the garden. It's the history of Turkey in mural form!
Including the original Batman!!
A whirling dervish and shisha, of course.
Fun spiral staircase.
View from the boat ride on the Bosphorous.
Sun starting to set...
Another stand that sells loaded baked potatos.
A cute little bean-shaped shop selling coffee and hot chocolate. I would've bought one, but the 5-story Starbuck's caught my attention first!
It's hard to see in this picture, but that whole line of food stands are just selling loaded baked potatos! Talk about competition! And they're all the same price! I don't understand how it works!
Another popular street food: loaded waffles (no maple syrup though ;o[).
Christine bought one - loaded with fruits, nuts, all kinds of syrups (no maple), and stuff i didn't know what was - and they wrap it so it can be eaten with your hands. It was pretty good, but it made Rosemary and me really want maple syrup!
The guy who made Christine's waffle gave us all samples of a banana dipped in chocolate and pistachio crumbs! YUMMZ!
Rosza and me just havn fun!
Not only do payphones exist, but they come in dolphin shapes!
butter head
cool whimsical bike
We walked down this street looking for Taksim Square and came across another market...
Finally found Taksim Square by taksi (taxi).
An Orthodox church in the middle of Taksim Square.
Finally found the whole reason why we came back to Taksim Square in the first place: Shake Shack. Ever since Rosemary heard there was one in Taksim Square, she had been talking about having to go there for a burger and shake.
I got the Shake Stack which is the cheeseburger and shroomburger stacked...and as you can see..TABASCO!!!!!!!!! I also got the "Concrete" ice cream which is whipped frozen chocolate custard with marshmallow cream, shortbread cookie, and pistachio!!!
Paul's concoction: mustard with Tabasco - great for dipping!!
A couple of us didn't eat at Shake Shack and instead got chicken, rice, and chickpeas from this street vendor.
We ended the night at a super chill shisha bar.
Squampous helping himself to some fine shisha.
Squampous sitting on Christine's head ;op
Maybe too much shisha? ;op
Uh-oh, Squampous gettin into the beer...
Goodnight Squampous!
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