Saturday Excursion

Last week I had the chance to get out and see some of the old ruins here in Turkey. A buddy of mine here in Izmir named "Big" Buttie, decided to drive to Selçuk, Turkey (pronounced sell-chuck). There was so much history going on that I didn't have time to do a lot of reading up on each site that we went to go visit. Needless to say it was very interesting and cool to see some of the places where "old stuff" is. The only unfortunate thing about the visit was it was so incredible hot that after visiting the first 2 sites, I was completely drenched with sweat. Otherwise it was a fun time exploring.

Old Mosque next to St. John Basilica. Inside it was an actual working Mosque. I happened to sneak in and take a couple of photos. Not much to see there but a lot of rugs.

At the entrance to St. John's Basilica. Pretty self explanatory.

Inside the church. This was one of the walls letting into the Basilica.

The Basilica was laid out in the form of a cross. This was looking at the front of the Basilica. On top of the building it had 6 domes. Not sure of the symbology of that but that is what the plaque said. in the middle of the photo just past the columns is the front of the church.

Baptismal font. Pretty neat they had one in the church. The church had a lot of little rooms and such that let off this baptismal area. Not sure what they were used for. One was labeled treasury but there were several others.

Panoramic of the Basilica and a Turkish Castle in the background. While I was taking the photo some random guy came up to me and asked if I wanted to go in the castle. We passed because he was pretty shady looking. He "claimed" he had the keys to get in. Right! I probably would have found myself in a Turkish prison!

This is what is left of the Tempe of Artemis. Notice the person standing next to the column. From afar it didn't look that big but once you got up on it, it was pretty tall. Not to mention there were like 120 of these columns supporting a massive building. Now it is pretty much a swap and there wasn't much to see. They don't even charge to see this site. That is how weak it was.

On the on of the main drags of Ephesus. This is obviously looking up at the amphitheater. It was pretty big. There is still some digging on at the site hence the crane. About now in the trip I was wishing I had gone to the beach. It was very hot out.

At the mid-way point looking down. There were several tour groups there. Several of course had their best impression of some random European music groups performing in the big house!

This is the Agora portion of Ephesus. This was rebuilt if I remember correctly. It was pretty spectacular to see however. This is were all of the tour groups converge so it was hard not to get photos without random Japanese tourists. Man they are everywhere!

Looking up at the stone work. There were a couple of chips in the stones. Pretty shoty workmanship! Nevertheless it was pretty cool to see.

This is the main drag looking down onto Ephesus. The main road here is made out of marble. It gets very slick. I overheard one of the tour guides say that because of this they made gouges out of the marble to give it some traction.

Archway into the brothel. Yeah!

"Big" had to have some alone time. He was catching up on some light reading about Ephesus. Acutally this was a bath. It had running water below the toilets to wash the unmentionables away. In the other corner it looked like it had some type of shower thing-a-majig.

The front door to the Virgin Mary's house. There were no photos allowed inside as there were several people praying and meditating. I never thought this sight would be so important to people but it is. The house boasted of about 4 windows, no A/C (a bummer this day) and no working water. It was about 200 or so square feet inside. It was rather tiny. Not to mention this house was up on top of mountain. It was about a 10 minute drive from Ephesus. I don't believe she had many visitors here. She lived in the proverbial boonies.

The back side to the house.

This is the fountain the is said has cleansing powers. People would wash the heads and drink some. At the entrance, they sell bottles of "Holy water" from the well here. Only 4 Euro a bottle.

The prayer wall. Thousands of prayers and requested blessings are left on paper and then tied to the wall. Pretty interesting to see what people wanted to be blessed with. The wall is about 40 feet long and I didn't check to see how deep this went. I'm sure it has had to be emptied before.