Our Greek Isles/Mediterranean
Crown Princess Cruise May 2009
Kusadasi (Ephesus) Turkey
Here
we are in Kusadasi. We docked about 7:30am not long after we heard some
fighter jets flying overhead, not sure what that is all about.
We met our tour group near the International Cafe and were soon on our way off the ship. There were four ships in port with us. We saw Costa passengers but never did see where they were ported at.
Here are the pictures in and around Kusadasi.
We were off and moving soon after we got settled in. It didn't take long to get to the house of the Virgin Mary. By the time we came out of here and was ready to board the bus there were lots of people there.
Here are our pictures from the House of the Virgin Mary.
From the house of Mary we went on to Ephesus. It was quite interesting
to see areas that have been excavated as recently as 40 years ago. There
is a large part that was underground even back to the 1990's. I met a lady
who had been here in the 90's but she didn't see a lot of what we had seen
today. It was also quite busy. Since there were so many ships in port today
you can imagine the amount of people who were here. It is also a long weekend
for the locals as they had a national holiday on the 19th so many were out
of work and school for a couple of days plus the weekend so they have come
to see Ephesus. The crowds were many!
Our guide took us to the terrace houses. If you are on a large tour they cannot accommodate you. There houses were where the more wealthy people lived. These were levels of houses. The upper most level was where the wealthiest lived. They had an exquisite view of the library which was across the street from the brothel.
Our pictures of our terrace house tour.
This was like the fifth time the city had moved. The part we saw today was built around the first century A.D. It still amazes me to see something from so long ago that is still in pretty good condition considering the time that has passed, the marble floors, the statues, the mosaic tiles on the floors, the frescoes on the walls.
Once we finished here at the terrace houses we made our way by the library and on to the amphitheater before we left. They used to have concerts here they don't do so much anymore.
Our pictures of Ephesus are here.
We went to St Jean's Church before heading over to the museum where we saw a lot of the artifacts from Ephesus. I was in pain from going up and down the steps and in and out of the bus I stayed in the bus at the church. Jerry went and took the camera with him. I did go into the museum though.
Our pictures of St. Jean's Church are here.
After this we went for a bbq lunch. It was really good. We had the local cuisine which was quite delicious. After we finished lunch we went in and heard about how they train the local girls to weave the beautiful rugs. We saw some demonstrations and then were on our way back to the port.
Our pictures of our BBQ lunch Turkey style and the rug factory.
Our guide from Meander Tours was excellent for detail. He knew a lot of the history and all. He was telling us at lunch that he loves to read so he's always reading to stay up on other things. Obviously the main history of Ephesus is not going to change.
We
hit the shops right outside the port. The shop keepers weren't pushy as
we had heard was possible and what we heard from walking by some earlier
on. We had heard you have to bargain with them for whatever you were wanting
to buy. Neither Jerry or myself are much into that.
We also had heard you can purchase items using American dollars. When we asked for prices they would give it to us in euros. We used our euros except in the market at the entrance to the port where we picked up some juice to bring on the ship. They gave us the price in dollars.