Istanbul: the sights

The Blue Mosque was so impressive, especially in the evening sun.

All across the city bunting advertising the Korean festival in the old city festooned lamp posts, this photo gives you a slight impression of how densely packed the city is, with buildings, traffic and people.

View from the Hagia Sophia.

View of the main shopping street on the European side of the city.  This photo doesn't show you how packed it was, walking the length of this street at home in the UK would have taken ten minutes max, but here it was more like 40-45 mins.  On the left is one of the food wagons found throughout the city, I love that they are shaped like the trams which travel across Takim Square.

Inside the Blue Mosque, the roof was stunning but to tell you the truth... the overwhelming smell of feet reduced the length of our visit.  Dang is stank.

Last view of the city was we fly home.

Istanbul: skyline

The view from the roof-top bar at our hotel, from the tales others at the conference were telling about their hotels we had researched our hotel well!  It turned out to be a lot quieter than many others, and cheaper as well.  Hoo-rah!

Catching the ferry from old city to new city just as the sun was setting, very beautiful.

Yep, we were invited to a drinks reception at the British Consulate. 

Istanbul: the spice and grand bazaars

Entrance to the spice bazaar, I love the neon signs, if I could afford a few I would definitely have neon signs in my home.

I wasn't going to start my Istanbul series of posts with the bazaars because we actually visited these at the very end of our trip but I just love the colours in these photos so thought I would I share these so you get a flavour for Istanbul!  

Let me start this properly, last Monday my colleagues and I flew to Istanbul to attend a conference for International Educators.  It was my first visit to Istanbul and I was equally excited and nervous.  Our journey was delayed at every single point, the M4 was shut for several junctions, there was a technical fault with our plane and we were delayed by an hour then we hit rush hour in Istanbul.  By the time we got to bed we were very tired and had three very, very hectic days of meetings and workshops ahead of us.

On Friday we grabbed three hours in the morning to visit the spice and grand bazaars on the Asia or old city side of Istanbul before our flight home.  The bazaars were a riot of colour, smells and noise.  I wasn't great at haggling and had to send my colleague Iain in to haggle for me, I turned all shy and British-polite!

I LOVE Turkish Delight.  The choice was overwhelming but have to say I'm a sucker for traditional rose flavour.

Not even tempted to try one on but the colours are amazing.

This stand reminded me of our Jim, he plays the ukulele.  If I hadn't taken a ridiculously small suitcase I would have bought him one :/ 

Pashminas galore! 

We were so tired and weary by the time we reached this lovely cafe, three packed days of conference, and early start and a lot of walking had taken it's toll.  I had the best cup of coffee I think I have ever had at this cafe.

Life lately

Disneyland of course!! // the best souvenir from Paris, a fish stapler, awww yeah // whilst exploring Paris we spotted this little fella in his nest, "He's so fluffy!" // MozzyMr: photographer extraordinaire! // foliage that caught my eye // sunflowers from MoMa cheering the place up // French bee and bug hotel // tomato sauce production is now in full swing we should have supplies to see us through winter // Grrrrr (or yawn) 

Writing a blog, it seemed inevitable that I would have to take a selfie in a bathroom at some point it might as well be now*eye roll* // my lovely fern which is affectionately referred to as the muppet plant // we've been experiencing some amazing sunsets around these parts recently, of course photos never do them justice but I like to capture them anyway! // foraging! // blackberries for our bramble jelly // feed me feed me feed me says cat.  Vet says she's getting tubby and needs to go on the diet food // a lovely amber necklace that my father-in-law gave me recently, I've barely taken it off since, I love it! // a friendly and very tame racing pigeon has taken to hanging out on campus recently, he joins us for coffee and just sits nearby enjoying the sunshine // cat slippers and blankets have become my new Friday night favourite, wow life has changed recently!

MozzyMr's bike finally broke (the forks snapped off the main frame, thankfully Moz wasn't riding it at the time or he may have had a very mangled face.  We went to a bike superstore last weekend and came across this beauty, amazing neon colours and only £50 sadly I couldn't persuade Moz to buy it // nor could I persuade him to buy the bike labelled 'bit retro' // Monday's harvest of tomatoes // a new kitchen timer to add to our ever growing collection // the apples on our tree at the allotment look beautiful at the moment, sadly they aren't very sweet.  To make our apple crumbles palatable I have to add A LOT of golden syrup, mmm golden syrup // a parsnip top!  Last year I didn't realise parsnips took an age to germinate and dug over the ground I had planted them in, this year I didn't make the same mistake.  Only 11 have come up (I planted three rows) but 11 is better than none and next year I might perfect the technique further // Thursday's harvest of tomatoes!  MozzyMr has done a great job this year //  a stripy pumpkin, or at least we think it is a pumpkin, the plant label either got blown away or a sneaky bird stole it.  It's probably a squash but I am really hoping it's a pumpkin // more sunsets they're so beautiful but might be a sign that autumn is on it's way?

Animal print love

1 // 2 // 3 // 4 // 5 // 6 // 7 // 8 // 9

Allotment geekery

1. We're a little unsure about the tomatoes, we've had fewer but they've been bigger.  Last year we grew plum, gardener's delight, black krim, cherry and tom-berry varieties.  This year we've gone with gardener's delight, principe borghese, and plum.  These varieties are much flesher than a lot of last years, the black krims we grew last year looked amazing but were powdery in texture (like over ripe apples) and the cherry and tom-berry ones were lovely but would split and ripen quicker than we could pick and use them.  
2. Massive shopping bags are a must at the moment to carry everything home.  You have no idea how much writing that makes me happy!  It finally feels like we're beginning to know what we're doing, and can make decisions based on our own experiences growing rather than shrugging and hoping we get lucky.
3. Successional planting of beetroot was one of my goals for this year and I've been doing well!  Plus I'm actually preserving it this year (boil the beetroot for two hours (!) in slightly salted water, once boiled the skins will rub off really easily, cool completely, chop up, bag into servings and freeze).
4. Eeep!  The pumpkins are coming along nicely, we didn't plant many this year because we didn't really use them in our cooking much and a couple of them rotted but one or two were a must.
5. We are in full on apple season and we've been out collecting blackberries so bramble jelly and apple and blackberry pie will be a must.
6. Our one pear.  Hmm might have to read up on how to care for pear trees...
7. MozzyMr tending to his courgettes, in previous years he hasn't been that bothered by courgettes but this year he seems to be into their care a lot more.  I think next year there may even been growing experiments to get the biggest yield *eye roll*.
8. If you have any left over bread crusts and a food processor, waz them up with some salt and pepper, a clove or two of garlic and some dried herbs (I usually use oregano or basil).  Cut your courgettes up into 1 cm thick sticks dip them in egg, coat them in the breadcrumb mix and bake at 200 c until golden.  Yummers.
9. My butternut squash panic earlier in the year my have been unfounded.  We have a lot of butternut squashes.  A LOT.

Paris: Those little details

The 'I Love You' wall, I Love You written in hundreds of languages... can you spot the English?

Oh boy, there are opticians on every corner of Paris, most of the glasses I reeeally wanted to buy.  I wonder if it might be a change of frames?

In the Jardin des Tuileries seemingly they use goats instead of lawn mowers.... whatev's.

SWAG.

The beautiful roof in the Gallerie Lafayette.