Originally when I planned this trip, this day was going to be only a travel day. However, because of the post-Ramadan celebration it turned out that the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul would be closed until the absolute last day we were there. That meant that we’d have to catch it just before we left for the airport. It opened at 8:30 on Monday, so we got an early start and arrived there around eight. I thought that the place would be huge and that they wouldn’t really care if the people entering were staff or not, but they had guards posted at each gate and they recognized the staff apparently. There was nothing for us to do but go find a shady place to sit and to kill a half hour. Once we got inside, things were just opening up. I was hoping for something dramatic, but actually it was similar to other markets that we had already explored in Istanbul. There seemed to be a certain pattern to it – each block had a few clothes shops, a lamp shop, a pottery and plate shop, a jewelry shop, and a spice/food shop. The market was made up of hundreds of blocks like that, so there wasn’t that much variety if you kept walking. The more you saw, the more you saw the pattern behind it. Still, we had fun walking around, and seeing the shopkeepers setting up for the day and the camaraderie that they shared was worth the trip.
So we went on back to the hotel, grabbed our suitcase, ate a quick breakfast, and then had the hotel call us a cab to take us to the airport. The trip to airport was smooth and very quick. We took the train and had transferred once when we arrived, so it was our first time to see exactly where the airport was in relation to our hotel. It was a little expensive (48 Turkish lira) but worth it to rest our legs a little after the big walking day yesterday. Strangely, during the taxi ride our hotel called the cab and asked us for our credit card information again. I’m still not sure why they would need it, and why they didn’t ask us while we were still there, but there it was – we were reading off our credit card number to the hotel clerk over the taxi cab driver’s cell phone. I hope he doesn’t have a good memory.
At the airport the check-in was a piece of cake, and we had a little time to kill. Our flight was at 1:30 pm to Madrid, and it went pretty smoothly. From Madrid we changed to the domestic terminal using a bus to catch our next flight on Iberian Airlines. The domestic terminal design looked almost exactly the same as the Kansai airport back in Osaka. Maybe the same architect? We had lots of time to kill here, as we were taking an evening flight to Granada. Unfortunately there weren’t many restaurants, and the terminal seemed to be under construction so that limited our options even more. We did manage to find a cafeteria, and we had a wonderful meal of tortilla Espana and quiche with a half bottle of red wine. At the cafeteria cash register the cashier asked if we wanted them to open the bottle, and since I wasn’t carrying an opener of course we said yes. They whipped out a corkscrew and popped the bottle for us, and gave us a couple of nice glasses too. The wine was much better than I expected. Welcome to Spain!
It was finally time to head for the gate, so we went through security on the way. Kuniko put her hat through the x-ray machine per the staff request, and since it was so light it was brushed off and stayed inside the machine. I tried to be helpful by telling the security staff in my best Spanish, but my Spanish was a little rough. I ended up saying “My wife’s head is inside that machine.” I’m lucky I wasn’t arrested right there. But they could clearly see that my wife’s head was right there on her shoulders, and they put it together. Belly laughs all around and I learned that it will take a while to get used to using Spanish again.
We reached the gate but apparently the flight was delayed another hour. We had lots of time to walk around, read, and people watch. Finally caught the flight, and arrived in Granada after only 45 minutes. It was a very small plane, and a very small airport, so some of the luggage handlers started putting down luggage right out there on the runway after we landed. Some passengers thought it was their chance to grab them early, but the staff freaked out and shouted at them to go to the terminal and wait. So close, yet so far, I guess.
Once we got our bag we found our pre-arranged driver waiting for us. It was a taxi driver, and he drove us into town at light speed. We didn’t speak at all, and we finally arrived at our hotel around midnight. Fortunately the owner of the hotel was waiting up for us, and he showed us to our room. The place was in a very old neighborhood but decorated very nicely in kind of an Arabic style. He gave us all the info we needed for the next day, and then left us to hit the sack. It was another busy day of travel.
