New Years in Istanbul (2013) and some Turkey Visits!
12/28/13 When I arrived in Istanbul for the first time, it was pretty late at night. I was happy I had a friend from Travel Buddy who was waiting to house me. By the time I arrived at his apartment, I was ready for bed. So, not much more to talk about. On my second day, my host had to go to work. Luckily, he had a free brother. His brother took me to a park and we walked around the city for a while. It was awesome to see the coast and all the local attractions. We stopped for a drink. I ordered what I thought was an iced coffee, but it turned out to be a delicious ice cream. We then made our way to the center of the city, near the boats. We had dinner, and the food was terrific. Afterward, we took a ferry over to the European side of Istanbul. Then, I met up with some other travel buddies and the party really began. It happened to be Samina's birthday. So that's just added another reason to celebrate. We walked around looking for pubs. After visiting a few, we settled...