Istanbul, Turkey

Well where to start, some of you probably just said the begining. Ok! The beginning, we loaded our Alitalia flight in Chicago at 3pm Chicago time. I decided that I would take some Tylenol PM to help me sleep hard. In flight we flew up and over into Canada to head to Rome. The flight wasn't totally full which made for a more comfortable flight. Remember I took that Tylonol PM well they are magical. I slept hard until about 7 and it was time for dinner which was pretty good: fruit, meat tray, cheese, pasta, beef and veggies. Once that was done I don't remember much after that, it sleepy time again. We landed in Rome 7:42 (11:42 Indiana). We waited about an hour for hour next flight to Istanbul. This flight was great I was like my boys in the car out like a light before we left the parking lot and pretty well slept until the plain hit the ground.
We went through passport control and collected our bags with no issues which is good with a group of 37. We now meet Tansu (taun-sew) who right off the bat is a ball of energy, which makes for a great trip with someone who is excited about what they are showing. We had a change of schedule originally we were to start out with seeing the Blue Mosque, instead today we went to the Sultons Palace. Tomorrow is a national holiday celebrating children. So we travel straight from the airport to the palace. Some exciting things we saw was the original prtective walls to emperor Constantines palace, they were pretty pretty solid still. Of course as we to the left we see that soft but the view the other way was awesome too. We saw ships waiting there turn to pass from the Aegean Sea to the Black Sea. Seeing the fresh fish market was awesome to. The Sultons palace was a sight to from seeing things that I couldn't take pictures of like his clothing, swords, jewlry, and most of you womens favorite thing an 86 karat diamond, yeah wow. One of the interesting things we saw from a distance was the Prophet Muhammad's clothing stored in a gold case as well as the original Koran stored of course behind many layers of glass and gaurds. Traveling further along in a room off to the side there are men 24hours a day reading aloud the Koran, or singing. I do have pictures (yes I shot pictures) but will have figure out how to upload them later.

We arrived at the Kent hotel which is awesome (becca thanks for the washclothes) and unloaded our stuff and checked in and went straight up for dinner. Dinner consists of two salads and a fried cheese(yummy), rice and chicken with mashes potatoes on top. Dessert was baked rice pudding. Also, there was a trinket at the table look up "evil eye". After dinner took a short walk to get bottled water. Now it's time for bed early morning and full day ahead starting at 7am. Oh how I love mornings.

Hi dean and maddox I hope you are being good for mommy. I am looking for some fun toys to bring home I saw one a really cool one today. Hopefully I will see them again. I love you Becca and will hopefully chat at you soon.

Till the next update LZ