Turkish Delight - Istanbul Day 2

We spent most of the day exploring the Topkapi Palace. It was fun imagining how life would have been back in the day. The grounds were huge and well kept. We explored three of the four courts, treasury, and the harem. Our favorite part was touring the Harem and learning about some of scandalous things that took place there. Drama, drama, drama! We also saw a room that contains a hair of the Prophet Mohammed's beard, his footprint in clay, his sword, tooth, and other precious gifts. It has been really interesting learning more about the Prophet Mohammed and Islam.

After touring the palace we had lunch at an outside cafe and watched some of the World Cup (Germany lost!!!!). Too bad Turkey's team didn't qualify for the World Cup. It would have been fun to see the Turks cheer their team on.

We ended the day at the Spice Bazaar. There were aisles and aisles of colorful spices and plenty of different flavors of turkish delight to sample. So far our favorite flavor is pistachio. The bazaar was buzzing and there was plenty of haggling and bargaining going on. After being scammed the previous day, we held strong and walked away with nothing!

PS - the ice cream in Turkey is very strange. It's a bit doughy and doesn't taste that great. It's kind of fun to play with though.