They say that too much of a good thing is too much of a good thing. This is certainly true for my digestive system after eating all of that rich food yesterday. Let's just say that I was indisposed today. This turns out to be okay because today's activity is a visit to the Hurrem Sultan Hammam. Think of this as a 16th century day spa. I've never been to a spa and am not anxious to start now, so my uncooperative digestive system gives me a build-in excuse to bag this outing and work on this blog instead.
Our driver picks Chris, Mark and Beth around 2 PM and drives them back to the old town near the Hagia Sophia. The Hurrem Sultan Hammam was constructed in 1555 by Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent for his wife Roxelana on the site of the ancient Roman public bath of Zeuxippus. It was unique in the Ottoman world to have the men's and women's sections constructed on the same axis as a mirror image of each other.
The first step in the process is sand papering the dead skin off of your body using a loofah mitt. The second step is to lay on a warm marble stone and be covered with bubbles. This includes both full-body bubble massage and head and neck massage. Next, they wash your hair with rose-scented shampoo and some scalp massage. Finally, there is aromatherapy massage with rosebud scented oil. Not my cup of tea, but everyone one was very happy with the experience when they got back to the hotel.
Getting back to the hotel was an ordeal. Around 4 PM, it started pouring rain. The single lane road in front of our hotel became for some period of time a river. Needless to say, traffic throughout the city ground to a halt. Our driver managed to get everyone back to the hotel, but the trip back took over twice as long as the trip over.
Needless to say, no one was keen on going out for dinner in this weather. Beth discovered that there was a room service QR code in our room. We checked with the front desk, and they told us that yes, they could get us some food, but that it would take a little longer than usual because parts of the meal were coming from nearby restaurants. They also told us that this was the way to go because services like Uber Eats were not working. We placed our orders and in about an hour, we got a call from the front desk to come down for dinner.
It was not until the next day that we were truly aware of how bad this storm was. Some areas of the city had more than 270 mm of rain (that is about 11 inches) in 24 hr - the heaviest rain event that Istanbul had had in more than 80 years! Here are a couple of pictures scarfed from Facebook to show how bad things were:
No comments:
Post a Comment