Day 48: Thurs 14 Jul - Gallipoli Peninsular

Weather: fine & sunny

After breakfast we drove into Eceabat to catch the ferry across the Dardanelles Strait to Çanakkale. Only took 15 mins on a fast, modern, drive-on ferry. There's a very good Naval Museum there but the indoor displays were closed. Nevertheless the outdoor area was excellent with many relics and displays about the Gallipoli Campaign. Pride of place was a little mine-laying ship that placed the mines which eventually sunk so many allied ships. The Turks get a lot of mileage out of their victory during the Gallipoli campaign, as we have out of the bravery and tenacity of our brilliant young men and the successful tactical withdrawal.

As the ancient city of Troy is only 37km South, the people who made the movie (of the same name I think) donated the wooden (actually made out of fiberglass) horse from the movie to the city of Çanakkale.  It stands in a little display area near the waterfront not far from the ferry terminal and it is quite impressive. It looks ancient and it looks like wood.  

We then headed South, (54km) planning to have lunch on the Island of Bozcaada, which is about half an hour by ferry. However we missed the infrequent ferry by seconds and could not wait around for the next one. So we took lunch at a little local cafe on the beach at Geyikli looking out towards the island.  Four lunches and five hot drinks cost A$16. 

It was a leisurely drive back to the Canakkale ferry and "home".  

Tomorrow we have the six odd hour drive back to Istanbul to look forward to.   

Trojan Horse