Wood and wine

So obviously I couldn't be this close to wine country without visiting some local wineries, so I booked on a tour that started with Muir Woods remarkable sequoias (old and very tall - not as wide as the giant sequoias in Yosemite though).

The trees can be upto 2000 years old - most of these ones were 200-800 years and can reach up to 300 feet tall.

Looking straight up!!

Close up of the foliage on the forest floor.

So having done our bit in supporting the National Parks we headed to Sonoma for the real purpose of the trip!

First stop was Meadowcroft winery - with a lovely oaked Chardonnay and a tasty Pinot noir.

Found my twin at the next winery, the Larson family winery. Lots of yummy wines here including their three lab cab which is self explanatory:

After a quick lunch in Sonoma town - very pretty around a park square, but too hot to sit outside - we headed to the Robledo winery where the brothers showed us the vines and explained a lot about the wines.

After a quick Golden Gate view stop we headed back into the city - a fact that I didn't know about San Fran is that you can take your own wine into all the restaurants for a corkage charge - so we knew what we were drinking with dinner!

Where's the bridge? A few days in San Fran

On arrival in San Francisco the weather was a bit unseasonal. I felt right at home! Just like London with the drizzle and cloud...

Just below the cloud!

It's in the fog... Somewhere (view from the DeYoung museum)

Found it!

However it soon brightened up - and I found the bridge.... But lost the chowder...

No visit to Fishermans Wharf is complete without trying the touristy chowder - not the tastiest I've had, but the sourdough bread bowl was good!

Sea lion hanging out at pier 39

So on my rainy day I walked from Union square, down market til I hit the ferry building on the waterfront, then along the piers to Fishermans wharf and back up Market to the shops (hey a girl is only human!)

The following day was glorious sunshine and so we (now with Vix and Ian) headed out to Golden Gate park for a Wholefoods picnic in the sun, followed by some culture at the DeYoung Museum - which also had great views over the city.

Think you can see Mission Delores in the distance here.

The park.

But there wasn't any view of the bridge due to very specific fog which only covered it and pretty much nowhere else!

Portrait of George Washngton cleverly made out of dollar bills.

After our culture we headed up Haight - the San Fran equivalent of Camden high street - and got some $3 happy hour punch :) several of those in fact!

To sober up we walked to Castro to hit up a taqueria on Valencia street - the party was really kicking off at Castro due to the Supreme Court judgement on section 8 :)

We then walked past Mission Delores on our way back mot the metro - excuse the crappy shot, I think my picture asking abilities were impaired by the margaritas we had with our tacos/burritos!

Excessive/epic Ephesus and the unlikely transport mode..

Not sure I can use the word epic again - when is too much?!

Ephesus earns the epitaph I think! There was certainly an excess of archeological stuff to look at - the site really gives the feel of being in an ancient city - Tiva was splurging out and explaining it all to us!

However the most exciting part of the day was not the slushies or the slope houses but the transport - tractor trailer through the lanes ducking under branches and avoiding the mud splats....

Think the locals were a bit bemused!

Anyway back to the archeology....

The library - was the third largest in the Roman empire at one stage.

Many triumphant arches - in fact lots of ways to honour the different or visiting emperors - e.g Hadrian got a lot of arches on his tour of Turkey!! And also a way to dodge tax - if you dedicated the arch/gate to the right person you could get special status for the city

The goddess Nike - can you see the swoosh?!

The roadway in the posh area

Me being a statue....

Inside the slope houses excavation - they have found lots of well preserved 'high class' houses and some have beautiful mosaics and murals - lots of restoration work done really well also - worth the extra cost.

Final leg of Turkey tour - Troy and Gallipoli

From Pamukkale we headed back North by the coast - stopping briefly in Izmir so Isik could say hi to his Mum and Dad - ahhhh!

We stopped off at Troy - Tiva and I had done extensive readership on Troy in the Istanbul archeological museum ;) and it seems most of the finds are there and better presented! After the excesses of Ephesus and Hieropolis Troy was underwhelming....

But it had a big horse!

We took the ferry over to the Gallipoli peninsular after this - visiting the various war ceremonies (both Anzac and Turkish) was sobering.

Its really difficult to imagine these beautiful sites ripped up with trenches in the middle of battle.

We discovered that the founder of the Turkish Republic - Ataturk - fought here and there is a commemorated story of him being hit by a bullet leading a charge and being saved by a watch in his breast pocket.

A brief stay in Pamukkale

After Dalyan we headed to Pamukkale by bus.

The first obvious attraction there is the white travertine cliffs and terraces - part of the Unesco world heritage site (not sure how many of these I've knocked off the list now but it's quite a few!).

We walked up over the cliffs bare foot - shoes off to protect the whiteness! It was actually very refreshing as it was bloody hot and the warm water from the hot springs that created the cliffs and pools was nice on the toes - just don't step on the hidden rocks or fall in!

So the second attraction once you've made it up the cliffs is the ancient city of Hieropolis - which has tonnes (literally) of well preserved Roman (and possibly older - I lost focus at that point) ruins.

These included the public loos, the basilica turned bath house and numerous tombs.

My epic ice tea was well earned at the top of the amphitheatre!

The third attraction we missed as it was closing when we got there :( It would have been a beautiful round up after a sweaty walk - a dip in the ancient pool. This was basically a hot spring pool with some of the ancient bits in it, very pretty - but be warned it shuts at 7pm!

Ode to ice tea

Strangely enough for an English woman who doesn't drink tea I've become a little attached to ice tea.

Tea at the theatre at hieropolis.

Rediscovering this decades after first experiencing it on the continent on school trips, a cold refreshing ice tea hits the spot when water is too bland and beer too much.

Plus now they have lots of flavours! No more lemon ice tea for me!

Oh ice tea - how do I love thee?

Let me count the ways...

Thirst quenching peach 

is perfect for all day on the pebbly beach

After visiting ancient civilisations 

magnificent mango is quite the sensation 

There is nothing more wonderfully pukka

than ice tea on a boat, motherf*cker!

Classic lemon is quite the tart treat

when you are having masses of grilled meat

Forgoing a slurp of that lovely ice tea 

when the bus ride is long and there no place to pee

After hours in the sun in which we perspired 

sometimes two ice teas are required!

Three lira, four lira, five lira, six,

don't care what it costs, just give me my fix!

Summer is never better than

when sipping ice tea through a straw in a can