Nicaea

I love American holiday weekends. They give us time to explore. Over the recent long weekend we had we headed to Nicaea (of Nicaean Creed fame), aka modern day Iznik (famous in it's own rite for Iznik tile). Turkey is amazing. There is so much history here, it is really hard to comprehend.

The drive there was actually quite beautiful, and if I didn't think too hard it was almost as if we were driving up the canyon in Colorado or Utah back home. It was much more mountainous than I had thought. It was pretty foggy that day, so this was the best shot I got. Still, a wonderful break from the hustle and bustle of the city though.

The area is also known for it's olive trees. We drove along a small mountain road that had awesome vineyards (orchards?) as far as the eye could see. They were lovely.

Some older trees

One of my favorite things about the trip was the old city walls. They are still essentially the boundary for the city (town) that they were when they were built in 300 BC by the Greek Lysimachus. They were frequently repaired by the Byzantines, and later the Ottomans so you can see some of their handiwork as well. Much of the original though is intact.

There were 3 gates that were the only entrances into the ancient city. The walls have since been pierced in some spots for new roads, but in large part the walls are still in amazing condition!

A view looking down along the wall to give you an idea of how well they are still in tact.

Nicaea was the location for the first Ecumenical Council of the Christian Church, under the Emperor Constantine in 325 AD. This was when they produced the Nicaean Creed, in which the nature of the Trinity was addressed. The second council was also held here in 787 AD to discuss the issue of iconography and the Christian Church.

Ronan in front of the Archeology Museum.

This building was built in 1388 as a hospice for wandering dervishes.

Speaking of Ronan...he was not a fan of going inside.

Every time we got close, and believe me-we tried for a good 15 minutes to convince him to go in- he refused. I think all the coffins in the yard scared him. Oh well, it was understandable; so we instead took a walk around the perimeter and saw what we could.

Lucky for us, that is where most of the stuff was. Just out in the courtyard, so we could still see a lot.

How's your Greek? Turns out, my Greek is not great!

It is so crazy that there are these villages with so many ancient artifacts just lying around; they just decide to line them up next to each other best they can! ha. if only we all had stuff like this in our yards. Those were some BIG pots too. I wonder what they used them for?

Some empty sarcophagi- long ago raided. Beautifully carved though.

Noah and Miles in front of the "Green Mosque" that Iznik is famous for. It's minaret has the pretty green tiles on it.

Another shot of the Green Mosque.

Iznik is THE place for beautiful tile production in Turkey.

This is where all of the beautiful tiles in all the palaces and mosques in Istanbul came from. They are masters of the art here.

It is a very Turkish thing to have framed tiles for your house, to give as gifts, etc. They also do beautiful bowls, plates, pomegranates, tea sets, etc. in the same style and designs. Iznik is even more famous for their Quartz tile. They can be spendy in the Grand Bazaar, but here we had a fantastic time shopping at all the little shops. We got fantastic deals, getting it straight from the source- and we loved getting to watch them actually hand painting the items.

Some of our treasures for the day! We got everything for about 1/3 the price that we probably would have paid here in Istanbul! We think we need to go back before we leave and get some more! I was especially excited about my little olive tree tile. It was an original design by this cute little old man that we got some of the things from his shop. He was very proud of it, and I loved the colors and the reflection on all of the olive trees in the area. Now we just have to take a trip to the framer soon!

To end our journey we enjoyed seeing this smiley sheppard and his flock crossing the freeway merge. Complete with a staff and a sheep dog! He thought it was funny I think that I was taking pictures of him.

This was just coming off of the mountain road to merge onto the main freeway, so still very much in the mountainous part of our drive. It was awesome to see. Turkey never fails to deliver on being where East meets West and Old meets New.

We had a great time, and hope we can make it back again!