I've been to Istanbul twice before and wouldn't have stopped over except to add padding to the QR Award flight. But I love it, so its no burden.
I have no 'must sees' to do, but intend to revisit a few sights following renovations.
First is the Hagia Sophia. Its had scaffolding up inside the past two times and I was hopeful of it all being done. I rocked up at 8:30 intending to have a coffee nearby for 9:00 opening, but a queue had started, and was growing fast, so I joined it, hoping for a little quiet in there first up.
Hard to take this seriously:
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Just amazing
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Alas, yes, the scaffolding is down, but now they have ghastly crowd control barriers all around the interior of what is a working mosque. But its still breath-taking looking up
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And unfortunately you can't access the gallery upstairs any more, where there are some wonderful 12th century mosaics. I wrote and had pics of them
in my 2020 TR.
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But at least there is the one on the exit, which most people blithely miss as its above and behind you as you walk out
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