Five Feet, Nine Inches Above Ground

Saturday January 31, 2026

Yes, dear reader, there has been a complete and total change of scene! Believe your eyes! My winter travel adventure has shifted from Portugal to the beautiful and magical land of Türkiye. Arrived in Istanbul the evening of Wednesday January 28 to meet up with my friend Mahmood from Iran. He had agreed to be my tour guide for the next twenty days as he has traveled extensively in this country. It took a while to sort out the car rental I had booked in advance and once that was done, we headed off to find the apartment we had rented for the night. Istanbul airport is enormous and it’s about an hours drive from the city. Mahmood graciously did the honours with me as an intrepid navigator using online maps. Those ones. Yes. We had an interesting tour of the city (because of my map reading skills – a poor choice of road) before we finally reached our destination. I managed a shot of a trip over one of several bridges. It was exciting to return to a city I began to discover three years ago, However, this trip will be focused on the coastal cities and towns and their amazing beaches.

In the morning, we set off on a five hour journey to the beach resort town of Kasadasi on the western Aegean coast. We made an early stop for breakfast and to fuel up the chariot. And then it was a drive through beautiful rolling countryside. Hills and fields filled with olive trees interspersed with leafless almond trees. It is winter here – the green and wet kind, not the white and snowy sort back home.

We arrived at our destination with a few hours of daylight left and we both felt the need to stretch our legs.

All those clouds were gathering to create downpour that ended our walk and we called it a day! Tomorrow will be another adventure.