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📸 Photo Essays: Make-up Edition
A little bit of housekeeping this week: I realized I forgot to post my photo essays from our Danube River cruise trip. Well, that’s not completely true. I posted my Turkey, Hungary, and Croatia photo essays, but then I got sidetracked with life, and forgot to post Serbia, Bulgaria, and Romania. In putting together my…
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📸 🇹🇷 Photo Essay: Istanbul, Türkiye (and a few closing thoughts on the city)
We were on the ground in Istanbul for less than 48 hours. There was A LOT to absorb – overstimulating is probably the right word. I felt like I was taking pictures of everything and nothing at the same time. And as much as the photographer in me wants to be using my Leica or…
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🍷 🇹🇷 What to Drink in Istanbul: A Sip-by-Sip Guide to Turkish Drinks Culture
I’ve been studying wine and spirits for over two decades. Whenever we travel, I’m obsessed with what I call drinks culture — what a country’s drinks reveal about its people, history, and habits. I’ve been known to order several drinks off a menu – just so I can taste them. And I could spend hours in the…
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🇹🇷 How Much Can You Cram Into a Single Day in Istanbul? Buckle Up.
We covered a LOT of ground today. (Fair warning – this is going to be a longer post than usual.) Super grateful to our guide, Necdet, for shepherding us through his beautiful (but chaotic) city. Spent most of the day crowd surfing through the must-sees of Istanbul: the Hagia Sophia, the Basilica Cistern, the Blue…
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🇹🇷 First Impressions of Istanbul: Cats, Smoke, and Perfume
We just returned home from a 2-1/2 week trip to Eastern Europe. We spent a couple of days in Istanbul, a few days in Budapest, then on to a Danube River cruise – our first ever. Lots to unpack. I will share my travelogues and photos over the next few weeks. As usual, I will…