Rockin' Rollin' Ridin'

We live right next to the railway line. There is one building in between us and the line, and as it goes past here the line is not underground but down below the level of roads and buildings so there is not much noise. All the same it has taken us five months to actually get on one of these trains.



The carriages are very basic. Hard plastic seats, and plenty of standing space. The doors mostly close automatically, but some of them take quite a yank to get them open.

On Thursday we went west towards (and past) the airport, and discovered the little beach at Florya. Yesterday was our day off so we decided to head in the other direction, east - into the main part of the city. We went to the end of the line, but on the way we noticed one or two interesting things to get off and investigate next time.

At Sirkeci, the end of the line just before the Golden Horn, we found a litle Tourist Information office. On the window was this map of the various train systems on the European side of Istanbul.


What a good map! We dropped in to ask for a copy of it. The little man behind the desk was pleased to see us. He spoke some English, and was sitting there with his study books learning about Past Simple Passive Verbs - we gave him a brief free lesson. But he told us his office was very poor, and he could not give us a copy of the map.

"You have a digital camera ... ?" he asked. And so we collected a copy on our camera instead.

As you can see with a glance at the map, public transport in Istanbul gives a lot of options. This map shows just the trains. There are also buses - big and small usually running the same routes - and dolmus (shared taxi), and taxis.