The next morning the full glory of the Ottoman house we were staying in came into focus. As I wandered around looking at the architecture I wondered just how many additions this house had over the years. The bathroom, in particular, a slightly rounded room that sat between the hallway and the kitchen definitely appeared to be built after the rest of the house (logically of course as a bathroom would probably have taken a very different form in Ottoman times). The most charming part of the house was of course the upper level terrace (about the size of a lounge room) where we sat in the sun amongst the vines growing, looking down on the town and the ocean in the distance,

Once we packed up and walked all our stuff back up to the top of the hill for the bus to retrieve it, (Despite the best efforts of yesterday’s drivers, the laneways weren’t really designed for motorized transport. We headed back into the hills- our destination? Canakkale, a port town and in terms of tourism mostly just a jump off point for the ferry across to the Gallipoli Peninsula. The drive though was pleasant enough. This is tomato country and the hillsides are littered with greenhouses for both local consumption and export. This part of the world forms part of Europe’s food basket. And as the Turkish economy is not part of the Eurozone, one imagines the food can be produced here much more cheaply. Having said that, the Turks certainly consume a lot of tomatoes. They are a mainstay in Turkish breakfast for a start.

On the way we stopped at the only ancient ruin in Turkey that I had heard of before embarking on this trip. In my defence, I’m not really a scholar of ancient history and the story of Troy does involve a big thing*

But more on that later. Our first stop was at another roadside buffet. And the reason I mention Troy is that it was really the reason the place was here. And as you’d expect from a tourist driven eatery, it also sold quite the array of tacky souvenirs (which of course I find thoroughly intriguing). And this place had all bases covered – as it was on the way to both Troy and Gallipoli. I bought a (crudely) handcrafted Trojan horse calendar – the kind of thing you’d find at a school fete and pay 50c for and TC purchased a book on Gallipoli. The lunch itself was unspectacular but it was a good exercise in people watching. There were quite a lot of older Turkish people about. (Koka Kolanisation – H-Block 101 – the ultimate anthem for anti-globalisation activists. And a great song from one of Melbourne’s best ever punk bands. Full of old skool punk ethos. Their ode to Pauline Hanson is a must.)

We bundled back in the bus and headed a short distance down the road to Troy and it’s great big wooden horse, quite obviously constructed in the 70s (during the glory days of the big thing). It was even painted mission brown. Some serious things happened at troy and not to denigrate the memory of that but really the most impressive thing about Troy was the horse. Of course as a big-thing-o-phile I couldn’t help but climb up inside it. Almost all of my fellow travelers joined me for the obligatory group photo on 25 different cameras.

After that we wandered about the ruins that were really quite unimpressive in comparison to the other ones we had seen. The most interesting part was that there were several layers of ruins here because Troy had existed over several ages due to its position on a hillside looking over one of the most easterly parts of Turkey’s Mediterranean coastline. Troy had been uncovered a long time before the other ruins when archaeological digs were more an exercise in rip and run than preservation and consequently they had been stripped bare of anything significant and left to the elements to be worn down and overgrown. Apparently they were pillaged by a German in the 1800s. And it doesn’t look like there’s been much investment or effort in their upkeep since. Having said that, it is still worth a visit if ancient history (or big things) is your bag. Just make sure you do the circuit in the other direction and come here before Ephesus and Pamukkale.

At least there wasn’t some naff attempt at pageantry to recreate the Trojan horse legend. I can think of a few places in the world where that kind of strategy might be used to prop up a decaying tourist attraction.

A few hours later we arrived in Cannakele and went for a stroll through the town. Actually TC and I were doing a bit more than strolling. We were still without appropriate clothing for our High Tea in Dubai. TC had been furnished with a fab linen shirt and leather shoes but was still lacking a pair of suitable trousers. The ones we had bought in the market turned out to be way too small. We found a suitable pair. I on the other hand was searching for shoes. To no avail.

We had arranged with our tour group to meet with them and our guide and driver for a last supper at a local seafood restaurant by the water. We opened with some traditional starters – I had beans and TC fried calamari of course. Then for mains – sea bass for me and salmon for TC, traditionally grilled.

Then at the insistence of Mutlu, our guide, we embarked on yet another Turkish tradition that was very similar to their Greek neighbours – Raki. Raki is basically the Turkish version of Ouzo and, thankfully, the aniseed flavor is a little more subdued. It was great just hanging out with the group on our last night together. This was the first time I had been on a tour – previously all my travel was self planned and organised, some of it solo – or done for a specific occasion, like a Bali wedding for example.  I felt incredibly blessed on still my only tour to date that I was surrounded by such interesting, likable and generous folks. My fellow travelers and our tour guide and driver would be welcome guests in my home if they were ever to make the (long for most) journey to our part of the world.

We had a walk along harbor after dinner and of course there was ice cream to be had. As always at TC’s suggestion. It was then that we came across one of the first historical monuments that actually resonated with me. It turns out Gladiator was largely filmed in Cannakkale. After this little revelation we walked back to the hotel and got some zzzs before our dawn awakening – perhaps as it should be for a visit to Gallipoli. (Straight to Hell – The Clash – this wasn’t one of the two tunes that got me addicted to The Clash (the very 80s Rock the Casbah and the fan anthem London Calling) but nevertheless it’s the one that’s more pften than not stuck on repeat in my mind with the husky vocals of one Mr Joe Strummer – there are worse things to have clogging your synapses).

*a tacky cultural icon way bigger than the thing it represents and in modern times (i.e. in Australia) generally made from fibreglass