Paces Enjoy Turkey-Greece Elderhostel

Above is the Temple of Aphrodite at Aphrodisias in Turkey. This was one of the many marvellous sites we enjoyed during our three week April tour of Turkey, selected Aegean islands, and mainland Greece as part of an Elderhostel tour.

A whole slue of photographs of the entire journey through the antiquities of pre-Hellenic cultures, Greek, Roman, Byzantine, and Ottoman empires we were exposed to in this educational and fun tour. Take a look at http://elderhostel2007.shutterfly.com/ for hundreds of photos. We've also prepared a DVD of the program.

To me, the best part of the journey was seeing the ruins of Ephesus and Delos along with the Mycenae ruins on the Peloponnese peninsula of Greece. Below is a photo of the Treasury of
Atreus. If you recall your Homer, this was the alleged site where Agamemnon reigned and the Trojan War all began.

Our journey in turkey centered around Istanbul - a most fascinating city as it easily mixes the ancient buildings and ruins of Greco-Roman origin as well as those from the Byzantine and Ottoman periods (including the clumsy work of the so-called Crusaders) with very modern buildings. Traffic in Istanbul makes New York look like a drive in the park. The majesty of the Hagia Sophia (Temple of Wisdom built by Justinian in the 6th century AD) along with the "Blue Mosque" are awe-inspiring (allegedly the Statue of Liberty could fit inside the Hagia Sophia).

Ephesus and Aphrodisias are essentially Roman cities that display the engineering greatness of the Romans as well as their pragmatism.

We traveled to the Aegean Islands of Samos, Patmos (where John the Divine wrote Revelations), Mykonos, Delos, Naxos, and Syros on the Aegean Princess, a 110 foot, motorized catamaran. The Princess was a lot of fun until it hit heavy seas. Then a number of the 23 people on the tour suddenly spent a lot of time in their cabins. Our final journey to Athens was aboard a high speed ferry that was as elegant as it was fast (traveled about 36 nautical miles/hour).

In Greece, we stayed at a lovely hotel in downtown Athens and toured the Acropolis, the ancient agora (marketplace) and numerous other historic sites.

The day we spent on the Peloponnese was a personal highlight in that it introduced us to the Mycenae culture that preceded that of the Greeks.
We traveled this world of ancient wonder with our friends from Canada, John and Joan Brownlie. This was their first Eldershostel.

All was not simply educational, however. The chemistry of the folks involved in this Elderhostel was perhaps the best we have ever experienced in our history with Elderhostel. We had a great time mixing with everyone, enjoying the food (too much of it), and enjoying each other's company. The company of expert historians, especially Sami in Turkey, made the event even more special.

All in all, it was the best Elderhostel we been on so far. It was long - and sometimes demanding. (The Romans, unfortunately, did not invent escalators.)