Cannakale to Ayvalik (via Troy)
We got up early and boarded a bus. This time it would only be an hour ride-whew! It was mostly on bumpy country roads, so I was soon rocked to sleep. When we arrived in Troy, we were greeted by a large wooden horse. The fitting monument was leftovers from a 1970s Hollywood production. We couldn’t resist clambering on up the interiors for the photo opportunity!
Our tour guide came and walked us around the ruins (a pile of rubble more or less). It would have been incomprehesible without the guide. There are a lot of researchers & interns out digging at the site all summer long-but they had long since taken off. Troy itself is still being revived, and there is only a little infrastructure for self guided tours. After about an hour, we stopped off at the gift shop and that was the end of the tour.
We were in a bit of a hurry to get back to town as we needed to catch a 12:30pm bus to Ayvalik. By the time we got back, we had about 20 minutes to grab our stuff, lunch, and be back at the bus station. Unfortunately, the 1:30 and 2:30 busses were totally full-so we were left with a bit of a scamble.
Dennis grabbed a gyro for 1 lira (yummy-he said!). I bought lentil soup for 2 lira, it came with a plastic grocery bag full of fresh bread (double yum!). I was not looking forward to the 3 hour bus ride to Ayvalik, but I ended up sleeping most the way 8^)
The bus was supposed to take us into town, but it ended up dropping us off at the Autogar (main bus station) in the town before Ayvalik. So, then Margeux had to jocky for another bus to take us the rest of the way. We boarded a Dolmus, which drove us about 15 minutes to the Autogar in Ayvalik. It dropped us off there, and then Margeux was beside herself. We managed to squeeze into a number of taxis which worked-but it was very hectic and stressful at the time.
Finding the Bonjour Pension was a bit tricky. I think it was around 4pm when we finally pulled into the hotel. It was 2 streets off the main street. As a side note, the streets in Turkey are more like alley ways. They are small, and cramped. Sometimes they are paved, sometimes they have cobbles, and sometimes there’s nothing but dirt or mud. We were all very relieved to be at the hotel after such a spastic day.
The Bonjour Pension has been in one family for nearly all of the 300 years the building has been standing. It is an amazing home, with two parts. The original part (with spacious rooms, but antiquated bathrooms) and the newer part (smaller rooms, but newer bathrooms). There is a very nice patio area in between, where we ate breakfast and generally hung out. It was just lovely!!! Dennis & I shared a small room next to Louise and Jo. It was nice because we got to mingle with the two of them (and also Heather as she came over for a visit).
The owner of the Pension took us over to his buddies place for dinner around 7pm. We took over the joint. It was good food, but they didn’t tell us the salad would be 10 lira a piece and the wine was 30 lira a bottle! Thus, dinner ended up being quite costly and it took over 15 minutes for us to figure out the bill. (It was a little shady, if you ask me!). I felt bad for Jo & Louise since they obviously didn’t eat enough to warrant such a large dinner bill.