Day Fifteen - Istanbul

The morning heat comes hard and unrelenting through the hotel window. It's early, but it's impossible to sleep so we skip breakfast to get a peek at the monumental Hagia Sofia, just a short, sweat-soaked walk from our street.

We round the corner to see the queue stretching at least 100 yards back, packed with Japanese fortysomethings with cameras and a pack of bored looking French students dressed in identical orange t-shirts. Istanbul knows what it's like to be burdened by tourists; at the same time these hordes must boost Turkey's inflating economy. One Turkish student we met said that he had gone to the church four weeks ago and paid half of that currently required for admission.

We take the ferryboat across the Bosporus to Uskudan, in the Asian part of town. For some reason I am disappointed to find out that the part of Istanbul on another continent is - well, the same.

The main plaza is populated with old men seeking shade, gesticulating to one another and smoking every cigarette as if it's their last. Woman in headdresses push prams with brightly robed toddlers and hawkish street sellers approach you with everything from Handmade Ottoman rugs to miniature rubix cubes.

The mosques call for prayer as we catch the ferry to Besiktas, home of 'New Istanbul's' most bustling area, Taksim.

After asking for directions to the suicially piloted minitaxi to get us from the port, I am casually accosted by a man wanting to shine my shoes, which are white and made from canvas. I protest to little avail and he plants my foot atop his decorative shine box before massaging my scuffed, greying trainers with a toothbrush and whitening cream that smelt suspiciously of Colgate.

I laugh as it is being done, not so much due to the stupidity of polishing canvas shoes than the fact the whole process tickles me profoundly. Finished, feet wettened and having any prior knowledge of the shoe-shine industry turned on its head, I reluctantly pay what must have been well over the odds.

We spent the afternoon strolling in and around some of Galatasaray's main streets, with the best shops to be found just off the beaten track, wherein prices decrease by roughly a half. Throughout the trip, I had been banking on Istanbul being an inexpensive sanctuary from the exorbitant prices we've encountered in most of Europe's capital cities. So far, this hasn't proved to be the case an, as I helpfully earlier sat down with my buttocks plush on my only functioning card, I might find myself having to pay those Turkish waiters in kind.

Ended the night with shisha and baklava which, although extortionate, were lovely and served by possibly the best educated waiter I've ever met, him being a PhD student in statistics. It must have been him that set the prices.