Turkey June 9 - Troy/Bergama - by David (aka Dad)

After arising, we visited the Troy ruins, and Jessica and I clambered into another replica of the Trojan horse to have Karma take our pictures. The ruins were discovered by an eccentric millionaire named Heinrich Schliemann. Unlike other archeologists who believed Troy’s location to be elsewhere, he took the Iliad as his guide, determined by its descriptions where Troy should be, and began digging. And found Troy.



The ruins were interesting, but it is more the story of The Iliad and more particularly of the Trojan horse, and of Schliemann’s story of discovering these ruins, that creates the interest here. I chuckle at the irony of tourists flocking to a spot to see the location of an event that likely never happened, and the replica of a wooden horse that likely was never built.



After Troy, we drove to Bergama to see the Acropolis. On our way, we again missed a turnoff, and ended up driving alongside the ocean through a seaside resort area, with its slow traffic, narrow roads and numerous stop lights, adding most likely another hour to our drive. Of course, that is part of the adventure of driving in a foreign country, getting lost and enjoying what you found. The Acropolis sits atop a very high hill overlooking Bergama. There was a large Roman temple to Athena, below which sat a large amphitheatre cut into the hillside, 200 steps top to bottom. I know, as I counted them on my way back up after having walked all the way down to the stage. Frankly, the technology of the Romans is amazing. Their architecture in building and supporting the temple and the amphitheatre, and all the facilities and requirements relating thereto, is incredible.













After coming down, we visited the ruins of a large building which served as a temple to the Egyptian god Serapis, and condemned by John in Revelation, and was later converted into a Christian basilica. Following that was dinner in the Azur café and then a rather long drive to Selçuk (pronounced “selchuk”), the town adjacent to the ruins of Ephesus (Efes, in Turkish).