First Full Day In Heaven

I wake up early on Day 2 in Kusadasi, and I walk out onto the balcony, and the sun is still coming up over the Aegean Sea. It is hard to believe the view that we have from our hotel room. We get dressed and head down to the lobby to head towards Ephesus…..I believe this puts my bus hours somewhere in the vicinity of 36 hours the past 2 weeks.

Ephesus is definitely a really cool place. We walk around all the remains of the old town that are still in the process of being restored. The town was estimated to have a population of about 150,000 based on the fact that the theater holds 25,000. Apparently the multiplier is about six based on the fact that only the head of the household could go to the theater. We get to walk into what are basically super old school “apartments,” very neat. We have seen a lot of really old stuff in the past 2 weeks, so this stuff seems pretty contemporary at this point. Actually, it is really neat, and very cool to think that the Aegean use to come all the way up to the edge of this town and is now the shoreline is about 20 miles away. All in all, very cool.

Next stop is a small museum on the edge of Ephesus. On the way in, Joe and I buy 1 lira handcrafted flutes. We figure this will be a good addition to Roberson Drive. We walk through the museum and see some artifacts that have been pulled out of the town. The group then grabs an Efes and sits out in the beautiful Kusadasi sun.

As soon as we get back to the hotel, we jump in our bathing suits and head down to the pool/Aegean. Paul and I swim around in the pool for a little bit and then the group decides to head down to the Sea. Most of the males in the group decide to go look for rocks to jump off of. We find a good one right off the bat that is about 8 feet with about 7 feet deep water to land in. We all do the feet first thing first, and then round two is a bit riskier. Everybody throws in a dive, and Voeltz decides to throw in a flying squirrel. I try my best to time the picture to get him whilst grabbing his ankles, but in the sun, I can’t tell what I’ve got. I find the nearest shade, and I immediately realized that the picture came out perfectly (above). Can’t wait to show Tim. We swim around the corner to see if there are any more rocks, and we find a group of kids jumping off a set that is more like 15 feet. Climbing up them is a huge pain in the feet, but well worth it. I don’t have my camera at this point since you had to swim to get there, but we all have a great time jumping from these a couple times. We then head back to the hotel as it is close to dinner time and all the swimming around has us good and hungry. (doner?!?)

Once back at the hotel, we all decide to clean up and meet in the lobby for dinner. Joe, Rob, and myself are all pretty set on getting what might be our last Doner Kabob, but the group tends to think we have had too many. So the three of us set off for Doner; we are not really sure where we will find it, but it is Turkey, and they seem to be everywhere. As it turns out, the closest place is about 2 miles; we find that out about 25 minutes after setting out down the road. Oh well, the weather is beautiful and the scenery is amazing. I grab myself two Doners and some chips (fries), and we set back out back towards the hotel. We stop on the way to grab some Efes, and Joe and I see that they have 5L minikegs for 20 lira. We get a couple of those since we invited the whole group back to our hotel room for drinks and good times. After hanging in our room for an hour or so, we decide to give the main bar street another try. We dip into a new club opening….about the opposite of my scene, but when in Kusadasi. I chameleon myself to the crowd as best as possible. We then try one more “pub” that happens to also pretty much be a club. Good times, but most of the crew heads back early to make sure to make the most of our last day tomorrow.

Once back at the hotel, Voeltz and I decide to go for a late night swim. Turns out, the pool gets cleaned at night and the chlorine is ridiculously strong….so the obvious move is to get a quick dip in the Aegean to rinse off. Great end to a great day. Getting kinda sad that tomorrow is our last day together, but I can’t wait to soak it up. This place really is amazing.

Drew In Kusadasi,
Out