Istanbul and Malta - just got back!!

DH, myself and our two kids (3 years old and 7 months old) just got back from a fabulous vacation in Malta and Istanbul.  We combined a quick 2 day jaunt in Malta with a longer seven days in Istanbul.  Both were great.  Malta was gorgeous and we really lucked out with the weather because there had been some pretty big storms in our part of the Med the few days before hand.  We took the hop on/hop off bus tour and saw Valletta, Mdina (which is one of the coolest cities I've ever been in), and all of the beautiful countryside.  Malta has some of the most gorgeous land and seascapes that I have ever seen in my life.  I highly recommend going there at least once - even if you do it like us and just combine a quick trip there with a longer one somewhere else.

We flew to Istanbul from Malta on Thurs. of last week.  Air Malta does a direct flight to Istanbul for a pretty good price and it is only a 2 hour trip.  We had to wake up super early for it though - flight departed at 5:35 AM, but luckily the kids both slept through the flight which means DH and I got to relax during the flight as well.  I cannot offer a hotel recommendation for Istanbul as we stayed in an apartment we rented through vrbo.com.  We stayed in the New District, just steps from the Osmanbey metro stop north of Taksim.  It was a good location because it was so close to the metro, so getting anywhere was super easy.  And it was fun to feel like we were a part of the city for the week.  We got to meet our neighbors who were super nice folks (really, I don't think we met a mean person the entire time we were there . . . the Turks are very nice and very hospitable to their guests).  One night, the whole block lost power and they came upstairs to give us a flashlight to borrow

The public transportation in Istanbul is also great - very clean and very efficient.  It can be crowded, but that goes for just about any big cosmopolitan city.  Definitely use public transportation if you go.  I was nervous to use the public transport at first because often times it can feel like more of a hassle than a help when you're traveling with a stroller in tow.  So we took a taxi the first day we were there to the Sultanhamet area and got gouged by a dishonest driver.  He had the meter running properly when we got in the car - I had made sure to double check that - but he must have reset it at some point when we weren't paying attention because at the end of the ride (which should have cost no more than 15 or 20 TL), it was flashing 58 with a bunch of random zeros both in front and behind it and he demanded we pay 58 TL.  I was so angry, but I had no idea how to argue with him in Turkish and so we just paid it and considered it a lesson learned and didn't bother with taxis the rest of the time we were there.  I was pleasantly surprised to see that Istanbul's public transport is VERY stroller friendly - ramps, handicap/disabled entry and exit, and lifts that take you from train level to street level (and vice versa) in every station.

As for experiences - we had a BLAST!  We were there a week and got to take our time (which makes it so much more leisurely and it feels good to not be rushed when you're traveling with young kids).  We saw all of the major sights: Topkapi palace, Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, Taksim Square, Galata Tower, Chora Church, the Old Walls, the bazaars, and that just lists a few . . . there is no end of things to do in this city!  My favorite sites were Chora church, the Rustam Pasa mosque (the interior is covered top to bottom in Iznik tiles - really gorgeous), Emperor Theodosius's old Byzantine walls, and Yoru Castle in Anadolu Kagagi in Asia. A cruise up the Bosphorous was so much fun and I got to see the Black Sea and step foot on Asia for the first time in my life (not as big of a deal to DH since he's been to Asia a few times).  

Of course, shopping is a fun cultural experience in Istanbul. I tried my hand at haggling and did ok, but not great lol.  At one shop in the bazaar, I tried the recommended approach of "offer 50% of what the seller states and work your way slowly towards an agreeable price for both of you from there."  Well, when I offered my 50%, he got all solemn looking, took a sip of his apple tea, and told me he wouldn't bargain over it.  Apparently, I found the one fixed-price shop in the place!  That or my offer insulted him; oops!  We did purchase a Turkish carpet from Sisko Osman (a well respected seller in the Grand Bazaar).  His carpets have less room for haggling because he's so well known and respected, but I felt safer purchasing from him knowing we were getting what he said we were getting (a carpet truly made in Turkey of 100% wool and that it was the age he stated it was); I had read too many horror stories online of people who got misled when they had their carpets appraised to discover that they didn't get what they thought they got.  Even so, we still were able to get $300 off the original stated price of our carpet thanks to a tiny bit of bargaining

We also tried a nargile (water pipe) and that was a fun experience.  The nargile is very popular in Istanbul and I wanted to try it before we left, but I didn't know how to do that with the kids in tow (didn't want to take them to a smoky nargile cafe, and I also wasn't sure if there was a stigma about parents smoking a nargile while the kids were around).  I emailed the landlord of our apartment and he assured me that there was no stigma attached to having the children with us and we should find a restaurant that also had nargile - which was easy enough to do in Sultanhament.  It was a beautiful day, so we sat in an outdoor cafe (so the kids wouldn't be breathing in all that smoke) and tried one while our son had a snack and chased the stray cats out of the cafe and our daughter played contentedly in her stroller.  I've never smoked anything in my life, so I felt sort of rebellious while we were smoking it; but it was fun.  It doesn't taste gross like I expected smoke to taste because the tobacco is fruit flavored and it is filtered and cooled by the water in the pipe.  It was a neat Istanbul experience to have.

And then there's the food. There are tons of great places to eat.  We splurged twice - once at Topkapi when we ate at the restaurant in the palace walls that had AMAZING views of the Bophorous and Golden Horn, and once when we had dinner at a meyhane (basically a Turkish tavern that specializes in meze, or appetizers) at the Flower Passage of Istiklal Caddessi in the New District.  The food was great at both places.  The hummus at the meyhane was some of the best I've ever tasted  Most of the rest of the time, we got our fill of street food for lunch - kebap and doner, and the fish sandwiches you get to go off the Galata Bridge are sooooooo yummy - and cooked dinner for ourselves in the apartment.  When we had lunch in Anadolu Kavagi, a little fishing village in Asia at the north end of the Bosphorous Strait, we shared a few seafood plates that were delicious.  Deep fried mussels are a popular food there and for good reason; they were delicious.  

One thing that really surprised me was how affordable Istanbul is.  I am sure my surprise comes because we've done a lot of recent travel in some expensive places: Venice, Paris, London.  But Istanbul was pretty easy on our wallets.  Part of this is because the dollar is strong against the Turkish Lira - the exchange rate is about $1 = 1.79 TL right now.  Another part is because many sites are free to enter: the Grand Bazaar and Spice Bazaar (unless you buy something), all mosques (a donation is a kind gesture, but not required), the old walls are free to walk along and explore.  And as far as family destinations go, Istanbul is very very child-friendly.  The Turks LOVE kids.  When we went through the Spice Bazaar, our son came out the other end with pockets bulging with little toys and sweets that all the shop keepers kept showering on him hahahaha!

So that's my review.  We had a great time and I cannot wait to get our photos printed to make the scrapbook pages  I also have every intention of returning to Turkey one day to see even more of it; I'd love to get to Ephesus and go further into Anatolia as well.