Exploring Turkey

You like ruins? Turkey's got ruins. You like handicraft markets? It's got 'em. Swimming in the Mediterranean? Of course. But there's only one place that brings all these elements together in a spellbinding and historical atmosphere - Ephesus.

Located on the turquoise coast of the Aegean Sea (just 4km from the nearest Greek island), the grand old city of Ephesus was founded about 1,000 BC. It reached its height of importance in the centuries before and after the birth of Christ. But has only been part of Turkey for the past 1,000 years. "Only".

For you Culture Vultures out there, here is a trivium for you: There are actually more Greek Ruins in Turkey than in Greece (much to the chagrin of the Greek Tourism Board). Reason being, much of coastal Turkey was once part of Greece - and Ephesus was this region's biggest commercial, artistic and spiritual centre.

The original builders and inhabitants were first Greeks, then Romans. Their building styles and sense of adornment are complimentary, but noticeably different. If you have only the most cursory interest in architecture, this place will come alive in your imagination.

Why? Because the way this compact city of antiquity is laid out, you still can very much feel what life must have been like at the dawn of modern western civilisation. That's between 80 and 100 generations (italics) ago, to put the time in perspective for you.

The marble streets - gleaming in the sharp autumn sunlight - are lined with the marvellous to the mundane. You make your way past temples, fountains, amphitheatres, shops, public baths, terraced houses with whimsical mosaics adorning their floors and walls.

You imagine sage old men in togas philosophising, while kids join their mothers to the market, running ahead to play hide-and-seek amongst the massive yet delicate statues and columns lining the streets...

At the bottom of the main street (or Marble Street) you come across the most jaw-dropping of Ephesus' spectacular ruins - the elaborate facade of the Celcus Library. In it's heyday, it housed over 12,000 hand-written books! This made it one of the largest library collections of the antiquity.

Interestingly, the library proper was surrounded by a second set of walls - to keep the humidity and the temperature variations inside stable in order to prevent the books from degrading. A primitive form of aircon!