5th stop - Kusadasi

Most folks have never heard of Kusadasi. It's on the southeast edge of Turkey. It is now becoming a resort town, but it is most famous for the amazing ruins nearby: Ephesus. Ephesus is a "magical" word to us armchair archaeologists, but not really known by the general public, at least in the U.S. Only part of Ephesus has been uncovered, and it's huge and amazing.

After a slight mishap with our guide - we couldn't find him and he couldn't find us - we had a great day. Not only at Ephesus, but also at other interesting stops.


Our first stop was at a shrine which stands at the location where supposedly the Virgin Mary lived her last years. The possibility of that location really being the home of the mother of Jesus is quite intriguing to me. The small church built on the site looked interesting, but there was a prayer service going while we were there, so we merely peeked in.

Then we headed to Ephesus. We did book a private excursion, thank goodness. Our guide was a professor. He really tried to make sure he provided us with accurate information, not some of the myths told by most of the other guides. He has a friend who is an archaeologist at Ephesus, therefore his info is as accurate as it gets - as known / theorized at this time.

The Library of Celsus is the most well-known sight of Ephesus. The front wall has been pieced back together. The worksmanship is absolutely phenomenal - and it's mind-boggling that the detail is still visible, considering the building was completed in 135 AD. This pic shows Greg and I on the right, Donnie and Annie on the left, and our guide in the front middle.

Even tho Ephesus is huge, there were so many people that it was always crowded. But it was interesting and fantastic nonetheless. I cannot imagine being part of a huge tour group, in a crowded place like that, trying to see things and hear the guide, etc. We had great, personalized attention. Our guide (can't remember his name at the moment, it's getting rather late!) even had drawings of how various buildings and areas were believed to have looked like - VERY COOL!!!


The amazing detail is seen everywhere, in the intricate designs carved into the stone. It is also seen in a mosaic floor, which somehow has survived quite intact, if somewhat faded.


One of the "fun" highlights of Ephesus is the communal bathroom. This particular toilet area was for men only, but I decided to take advantage anyway! LOL It's interesting seeing the expressions on people's faces when they realize that everyone went to the bathroom in public. It's even more fascinating when they hear that the bathroom was actually a bit of a social place, where gossip and business occurred. The toilet area did have "running" water - the sewer system was quite amazing. Actually, the water and heat system in the baths were phenomenal.

Another magnificent building in Ephesus is the theater, the largest in Asia Minor, which holds over 24,000 people. And this is not the only theater; there is another smaller one. The smaller one was more for senate discussions and perhaps small plays, while the larger one was used for the gladiators.

Interestingly to me - all the streets of Ephesus were illuminated at night with oil lamps. This shows how rich the city was!

There are a ton of other buildings and monuments of interest in Ephesus - several gymnasiums, multiple baths, many shops, homes, temples, etc.

We stopped at the location of the Temple of Artemis, also known as Diana, which was one of the 7 Wonders of the Ancient World. The temple is long gone, and all that one sees is a marshy area with one solitary column raised to mark the spot. There was actually at least 5 different temples at the site, each one built on top of the previous after it was destroyed. The last temple was the huge, beautiful and famous temple. Of course, there are no drawings of it, only written descriptions, which may or may not be correct. But this site has an interesting artist's rendering: http://www.unmuseum.org/ephesus.htm

We visited the Mosque of Isa Bey, built in 1375. It was quite beautiful, austere, and calming. It can be a little startling for Christians to see rugs all over the floor - this is for kneeling on during prayer. One thing I noticed here was that people often "stole" from earlier buildings to build new ones. It looked quite unusual to have Greek columns in the interior courtyard area of a Muslim mosque.

We also spent some time in the Kusadasi area learning about a couple of the industries still in existence there.

We watched a guy making pottery, and then he induced Annie into giving it a try - she did pretty good! Then we saw the ladies who paint the pottery - amazing, intricate designs. One lady was working on a plate that they expected to take 2 months to paint!!! And of course we had to look at their finished products, and buy a souvenir. It's funny how a person is so much more inclined to buy something when they've seen the process of it being made, and especially if they are part of, or feel like part of the process.

Included in our tour price, which was actually rather inexpensive, was a picnic. Ok... I thought picnic in our terms. You know - a blanket or a picnic table, sandwiches and salads. The usual. Yeah, right! OMG, you wouldn't believe our picnic. We had a nice table with regular plates, silverware, etc. There were umbrellas to shade us. Most amazing was the food. We were served a bunch of cold salads, family style. We thought that was our picnic, and we thought it was pretty good. Then we received a hot appetizer kind of thing. Then we got platters with three different meats. We were admiring the outdoor pizza oven, so they brought us some pizza. We even had dessert. We were STUFFED - and we didn't even come close to eating everything. And it was all so very nummy!!

After lunch we learned about the 2nd industry: rug (carpet) making. Before we had gone, I had read horror stories of people being cornered and made to watch a long display of carpets. Well... we kind of got caught with that too. But I actually thought it was quite interesting. First we saw how the carpets are made - by hand on various sized looms. Then we went into a different room and the door was shut. That should have been our first clue to BAIL. But we thought our guide wouldn't keep us there long, as we kept saying that we hadn't made it to the museum yet. Well... they brought out rug after rug after rug, and showed us the differences between wool and silk and mixtures of both, and showed us the various designs, and how some look different shades depending on how they're viewed. As long as we were just sitting there, I accepted the coffee that was offered. OMG - I knew Turkish coffee was strong, but wow! - it was MUD!! hahaha... anyway, I personally think I enjoyed the carpet display more than I would have liked the museum anyway!!