April 8, 2024 Sea of Marmara, Ancient Troy

April 8, 2024 Sea of Marmara, Ancient Troy

From our travel itinerary - Departing Istanbul, we travel west across "Trace," the European portion of Turkey. The summer homes along the Sea of Marmara will provide the scenery as we travel. Our bus boards a large ferry to cross the Dardanelles Strait, giving us views of the bunkers on the hillside and the ocean-going vessels. During our journey, we hear the commentary of the British major losses and World War I defeat in the Dardanelles Strait. Disembarking in Canakkale, we travel a short distance south to the area known as Troas, where Paul had a vision during his second missionary journey and was called to Macedonia (Acts 16:8-13). Paul spent a week in Troas preaching, and Eutychus was resurrected (Acts 20:6-12). We will visit ancient Troy, which was excavated in 1873 by Heinrich Schliemann. 

Ronnie again was willing to write the blog for me. Thanks to him, I'm only one day behind now. ha!

After two nights in Istanbul, we boarded a mini bus (12 people in our group) and spent several hours driving down the west coast of Turkey to Canakkale (modern Troy). From the Titanic City Hotel an hour of riding was needed to get out of the City of Istanbul (18 million people—95% Muslim). We rode for 3 hours (stopping every 1.5 hours for bathroom breaks) before coming to the 1915 Canakkale bridge, over which we crossed the Dardanelles Strait. We stopped to hear the Turkish view of their great victory over English, Australian and French armies and navy during WWI. Our guide lost a great great grandfather (hundreds of thousands of soldiers died) in the battle known as Gallipoli (try to watch the movie Gallipoli starring a young Mel Gibson). The victory sealed Turkey’s independence as a republic following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.

beautiful wisteria at one of our potty stops

 

Women & Mens

 

 

Trojan horse trinkets for sale

As we approached Canakkale (Troy), the guide reminded us of Homer’s Illiad and the story of the Trojan Horse (you might want to watch the movie Troy starring Brad Pitt). Whether the story is based on fact or fiction is debatable, but large wooden horses were scattered about the town (including one at our hotel named Kolin). We arrived at the remains of the ancient city which has been an archeological site for at least a 150+ years. Supposedly great treasures were uncovered, but the German archeologist in charge of the dig was also a treasure hunter. He and his wife stole artifacts and escaped back to Germany, but somehow the treasures ended up in Russia. The lost treasure is a thorn in the side of the Turks.

 

archeological ruins - Troy

remains of the ancient city

 

 

 

several unearthed sarcophaguses in great condition

one example of hundreds

 

We walked thousands of steps around that site before driving over to tour the Troy Museum. It’s quite modern and summarizes Troy’s importance in history through a number of recovered artifacts (statues) thru the Greek and Roman periods. It had already been a long day when the group voted to drive an extra hour to visit the small archeological site of Troas. In Acts 16:8-11, Paul sailed from there to Greece. We walked down onto the sandy beach, but Jan and I laid back from the main group because the wind was blowing at sand blasting speed. Here is a short video of the message Pastor Craig Bollinger gave at the location: https://www.facebook.com/CtKInCharlotte/videos/1099434041264669 

We made it to our hotel about 7:30 and had dinner at 8pm. We had to be up by 4am the next morning to travel to our next location. Our doggies walked 8K+ steps today, but it was just as tiring as the 13K+ steps we walked the first day.