Turkey, March-April 2006 – The Intergalactic Tourist

Istanbul: Looking across the Golden Horn from the Topkapi Palace toward Beyoğlu, with the Galata Tower standing proudly in the center.

In March, 2006, Sandie and I embarked upon a trip to view a total eclipse of the sun in Turkey. The trip was instigated and organized by Michelle Evans, President of the Orange County Space Society. It was also in part made possible by a wealthy Turkish-American industrialist, Kaya Tuncer, who underwrote a considerable portion of the cost of the trip, helping to make it far more affordable than it would otherwise have been. In fact, it turned out to be an incredibly good deal, the best value of any travel package I’ve ever had. Sadly, I never got a chance to thank Mr. Tuncer in person; he passed away a couple of years afterward without us ever having an opportunity to meet him. But I hope that mentioning him here helps to honor his memory.

Sandie was initially reluctant to go to Turkey because she feared she might be kidnapped by janissaries and imprisoned in a pasha’s harem. But I finally talked her into it. I also managed to con my old friends Charles and Elouise Mattox of Bend, Oregon, into joining the tour. In all about 25 people were in our tour group; about half were from the Southern California area, and the rest came from other areas of the USA, with a sizeable contingent from the Chicago area. The tour operator, Troy Tours, provided a wonderful guide by the name of Attila Mahur, whom we shortly dubbed “Attila the Honey,” for reasons which will soon become apparent.

The tour began with a flight on Turkish Airlines from Chicago to Istanbul – we had to book our flight to and from Chicago ourselves – and a short hope from Istanbul to our first stop, Izmir, where we visited the ruins of the ancient city of Ephesus, the Aegean Free Zone and Space Camp Turkey. From Izmir we traveled inland by bus to the thermal springs resort of Pamukkale, stopping along the way at the Greco-Roman sites of Aphrodisia and Hierapolis. After taking the waters at Pamukkale we proceeded to the town of Denizli, where we visited a carpet factory, then turned south and wended our way through the Taurus Mountains to the Mediterranean coast, emerging at Antalya, the metropolis of the Turkish Riviera. A final leg of 50 miles or so brought us to the coastal resort of Side, our destination for the solar eclipse of March 29.

While at Side we enjoyed additional excursions to the classical sites of Perge and Aspendos, the park of Kursunlu, and the harbor of Side itself with its Temples of Apollo and Athena.

We watched the eclipse on March 29 from the grounds of our hotel, the Kaya Side, and enjoyed a feast prepared by the hotel kitchen staff afterward that was fit for a Sultan.

The final stage of our journey, following the eclipse, took us by air back to Istanbul, where for three blissful days we experienced the glories of that fabled capital of empires before boarding the the Turkish Airlines flight for our return to Chicago on April 2.