TURQUIE
Capitale: Ankara
Population: 75 627 300
Superficie: 783 562 km2
Monnaie: livre turque
... C'est bien le ciel pur et la mer bleue du Levant. Là-bas, quelque chose se dessine; l'horizon se frange de mosquées et de minarets; mon coeur bat, c'est Stamboul !
Pierre Loti "Aziyadé"
Street of Old Istanbul in the Fatih area
Azat Galimov
with the kind authorization of the artist
www.azatgalimov.com
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 Avant mon arrivée en Turquie, que faisais-tu Aziyadé ? - Dans ce temps-là Loti, j'étais presque une petite fille. Quand pour la première fois je t'ai vu, il n'y avait pas dix lunes que j'étais dans le harem d'Abeddin, et je ne m'ennuyais pas encore. Je me tenais dans mon appartement, assise sur mon divan, à fumer des cigarettes ou du haschisch, à jouer aux cartes avec ma servante Emine, ou à écouter des histoires très drôles du pays des hommes noirs, que Kadidja sait raconter parfaitement.  Sultan Ahmet. Old street in the heart of Istanbul Azat Galimov |
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ISTANBUL Grand Bazaar is one of the largest and oldest covered markets in the world with 61 covered streets and over 3000 shops, employing 26000 people. Its construction started during the winter 1455/56 shortly after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople and ended five years later.
On en prend plein la vue !
la MOSQUÉE SULEYMANIYE
The construction work began in 1550. It was Mimar Sinan' master builder period work and his attempting to overcome Hagia Sophia. This colossal imperial mosque has coloured window glasses decorated with flower embroideries, its marble inner walls adorned with tiles and inscriptions. The dome has a diameter of 27,25 m and is 53m high when measured from the base.
Le complexe de Suleymaniye est un monument historique important pour la Turquie. Le quartier environnant et le complexe portent eux aussi le même nom. L'ensemble du complexe se situe sur une superficie de plus de 70 000 m2.
Dans la tradition Ottomane les grandes mosquées n'étaient pas seulement des lieux de culte isolés, ils comprenaient aussi des services sociaux pour la communauté. Ici, le lieu de prière était le bâtiment central fait dans une conception en forme de U. Le complexe comprenait également plusieurs écoles appelées "Madrassas" (école pour les études de récitation coranique, une école pour les études de "hadiths", une école de médecine, une école primaire et une université de quatre classes) un "caravansérail" pour les passagers, un hôpital, une maison pour souper que l'on appelait "imarat", un bain public, une bibliothèque et des tombes. Dans le nord du complexe se trouve la tombe du Sultan Suleyman et de son épouse Sultan Hurram. Il y avait aussi de nombreux magasins autour du complexe pour répondre aux besoins commerciaux de la communauté ainsi qu'apporter des revenus pour l'entretien de la mosquée.
Une fois la construction terminée, il y eut une cérémonie d'ouverture au cours de laquelle Sultan Suleyman a grandement honoré l'architecte Sinan. Lorsque l'architecte eut humblement offert la clé au Sultan, le Sultan lui rendit cette clé en lui demandant d'ouvrir la porte de son oeuvre lui-même.
Quelques chiffres:
4 minarets, 2 avec 2 balcons, 56 m de haut; 2 avec 3 balcons, 76 m de haut. Diamètre de la coupole: 27,25 m: hauteur de la coupole: 53 m, 32 fenêtres; nombre total de fenêtres: 238; superficie totale de la salle de prière: environ 3500 m2
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The greatest Ottoman architect whose ideas, perfected in the construction of mosques and other buildings, served as the basic themes for virtually all later Turkish architecture.
The son of Greek Orthodox parents, he entered his father's trade of stone mason and carpenter. In 1512, however, officials of the Ottoman government entered his village for the purpose of drafting Christian youths into the service of the sultan in Istanbul. Sinan, whose Christian name was Joseph, was chosen and he began a lifelong service to the Ottoman royal house. Following a period of schooling and rigorous training, Sinan became a construction officer in the Ottoman army eventually rising to become chief of the artillery.
He first revealed his talents as an architect by designing and building military bridges and fortifications. The number of projects he undertook is massive - 9 mosques, 34 palaces, 33 public baths, 19 tombs, 55 schools, 16 poor houses, 7 religious schools, and 12 caravanserai, in addition to granaries, fountains, aqueducts and hospitals.
His three most famous works are the Sehzade Mosque and the Mosque of Sultan Süleyman I the Magnificent, both in Istanbul, and the Sultan Selim Mosque in Edirne.
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The apogee of Ottoman architecture was achieved in the great series of "kulliyes " (a complex of buildings, centred around a mosque) and mosques that still dominate the Istanbul skyline: the Fathi kulliye (1463-70), the Bayezid Mosque (after 1491), the Selimiye Mosque (1522), the Sehzade kulliye (1548) and the Suleymaniye kulliye (after 1550). The last two kulliyes were built by Sinan, the greatest Ottoman architect, whose masterpiece is the Selimiye Mosque at Edirne, Turkey (1569-75). All of these buildings exhibit total clarity and logic in both plan and elevation; every part has been considered in relation to the whole and each architectural element has acquired a hierarchic function in the total composition. Whatever is unnecessary has been eliminated. This simplicity of design in the late 15th and 16th centuries has often been attributed to the fact that Sinan and many Ottoman architects were first trained as military engineers. Everything in these buildings was subordinated to an imposing central dome. A sort of cascade of descending half-domes, vaults, and ascending buttresses leads the eye up and down the building's exterior. Minarets, slender and numerous, frame the exterior composition while the open space of the surrounding courts prevents the building from being swallowed by the surrounding city.
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 The Ottoman Empire, a major Muslim power that controlled southeastern Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa for centuries had disintegrated by the time of World War I; its possessions formed separate states, and its centre was reorganized as the republic of Turkey. Mustafa Kemal (later Atatürk) declared the creation of the state of Turkey in 1921. Under his autocratic presidency (1923-38), the Turkish Republic fostered Turkish nationalism and secularism and imposed its firm control over the economy. |
Covering 80 000 square metres, the Topkapi Palace, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was the primary residence of the Ottoman Sultans for approximately 400 years of their 624 year reign. At its peak, the palace was home to as many as 4000 people. Construction began in 1459 ordered by Sultan Mehmed II, the conqueror of Byzantine Constantinople. Following the end of the Ottoman Empire in 1921, Topkapi Palace was transformed into a museum of the imperial era, presenting a Turkish collection of classical antiquities, (manuscripts, ceramics, armour, textiles and other of the decorative arts).
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 Haydarpasa train station, built between 1906 and 1908, a gift to the Sultan from Kaiser Wilhelm II |
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Took a ferry across the Bosphorus to Haydarpaça train station and boarded a train for a 4 hour ride to ESCHISEHIR where I had a 4 hour wait before my sleeper train to IZMIR where I arrived at 10:00 the next morning.
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trailhead of the 500km Lycian Way from OVACIK to ANTALYA |
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| viewpoint over the beach at Ölü Deniz |
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| cap Yedi Burun Coming up from KABAK at sea level, the night before was spent at ALINÇA, a village of just a few houses perched on the topmost slopes above sheer cliffs descending in steps interspersed with tiny terraces, 800 metres above the sea with fantastic views over the deep inlets and the cape of Yedi Burun. I was only about a kilometre away from Bayram Bey Pension just over the ridge when a thunderstorm developed with heavy rain and fierce winds.
The rain pounded all night on the roof of my 3 metre square wooden bungalow. A single mattress on the floor, a primitive shower thirty metres away. True hospitality and divine food. |
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| my bungalow in ALINÇA |
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| cap Yedi Burun |
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The best memory I have among others is that of the tiny village of GEY. The village is on a slope down to the sea and has cobbled paths and dirt roads around a central tree and pond. The fields are stony and steep and the water supply has only just been connected via a pump house on the hill behind the village. Many of the villagers are Alevi, a Shiite form of Islam. I was the only guest at Bayram's House. Never before have I seen such hospitality, such kindness. A simple family with natural and graceful good manners. Fantastic food. Went for a stroll on "main". A man, the owner of a small shop with very limited supplies as families around here still make yogurt and bread and, apart from vegetables, flour, sugar and tea are self sufficient, invites me over for a glass of turkish tea. A boy, passing by on his way somewhere, carrying a small pail of home-made sweets, scoops some out on a napkin for us to enjoy.
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Reached GAVURAGILI, a tiny village on a slope above the sea the following day. On my way there, roughly at alt 600 m, as I was taking a break just off the stony path, I hear someone calling...
Looked around and quite far away noticed someone waving and approaching towards me. A shepherd, with a firm handshake invites me to follow him to his home in the village of BEL, some two kilometres away, a village gradually deserted by the people who prefer to take up tomato cultivation in the greenhouses near PATARA and who nevertheless contributed to a new pink and green mosque. He phones his wife... I know only a couple of words of turkish but I gathered he was telling her he was bringing over a foreigner. Sweated my way up behind him ....
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The resilient shepherd families of this area have formed yearly patterns of movement spread over wide areas and altitudes. Each family knows where another will be on a given date; all pitch in to help move the flocks.
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| tomato greenhouse in LETOON |
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roman era amphitheatre in Patara
Arrived in Patara saturday afternoon. Staying at " Flower Pensiyon ", family run, great food. Breakfasts that can take you almost right to dinner. Boiled egg, cucumber, tomato, cheese, black olives, delicious honey right from the beehives around. This has been the fare ever since I arrived in Istanbul. I will take a well deserved rest here for a couple of days. 86 kms since tuesday morning through rough terrain, rapid elevations rising in bends, and descents down in long hairpins with occasional superb vistas over the mediterranean.
From Patara, will move on to Kalkan, 7 hrs away hoping the gorgeous weather I have enjoyed here will persist.
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| St Paul fit escale à Patara durant son troisième voyage apostolique |
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| at the Flower Pension in PATARA |
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| porte à KALKAN |
Left KALKAN this morning at 09:30. Took the KAS road out of the village for 2 kilometres towards ULUGÖL, a district of KALKAN on the highest point of the KAS road. Just before the pass, on stony paths and tracks, reached a domed ottoman cistern way up there, set among several houses, just by the road. Chose to stay on that road, climbing relentlessly practically for three hours in full sun, and reached the village of SARIBELEN. Finally reached the isolated newly built "Moonstone House"a mansion/pension owned by british expats of 4 years.
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| déjeuner chez le berger |
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| gentille bergère |
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Deux semaines ou presque que je marche sur d'anciennes routes romaines et chemins muletiers, semés de vestiges des civilisations Grecque, Romaine, Byzantine et Perse, dans les pas de pèlerins et de mineurs, d'envahisseurs et de bergers.
Je verrouillais ma chambre à KAS vers 13h30 avec l'intention de remonter à GÖKÇEÖREN (alt 850m) sur le pouce pour y retrouver mon sentier là où je l'avais laissé samedi dernier dans l'après-midi, y faire deux étapes, GÖKÇEÖREN/ ÇUKURBAG - ÇUKURBAG / KAS. Pas de trafic. Attendu deux bonnes heures avant de trouver une âme charitable qui me dépose presqu'à mi-chemin au hameau de YENIKÖY, juste quelques maisons, pas âme qui vive, mis à part un dindon qui glousse dans un enclos.
Rendu là, après avoir fait le poireau une heure et demie, j'ai avorté mon projet et ai pris à pied le chemin du retour vers KAS. Marché deux kilomètres quand un paysan fier comme un paon sur un rutilant tracteur bleu flambant neuf s'arrête et me fait signe de monter.
Et nous voilà partis, moi, debout à côté du chauffeur, mon sac sur le dos me cramponnant sur le dossier de son siège, descendant d'une altitude d'environ 600m cette même route en escaliers que j'ai faite à pied samedi dans l'après midi et qui, par une série d'épingles à cheveux successives dévale avec points de vue sublimes sur la Méditerranée, ses quelques îles, sur KAS et sa petite marina.
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Beaux petits hôtels à KAS, pensions, bars et restaurants en terrasse directement sur la mer. Rares voitures, les gens déambulent à pied dans ses petites rues, certaines joliment pavées avec une suite de petites boutiques arrangées avec beaucoup de goût, des talées de lauriers roses, et des guirlandes de bougainvillées que dégueulent à profusion les balcons.
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| rafraîchissements Un raki s'il vous plaît... |
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dinner in UÇAGIZ
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| sarcophages Lyciens à Simena |
Left UÇAGIZ this morning after a good breakfast and a short thunderstorm. A steady walk of six hours started with a gentle stroll through fields across the isthmus which joins the Simena ridge to the mainland. Reached the village of KAPAKLI. Descended steeply from a little olive grove down to the deserted white pebbly Çakil Plaji and went for a quick swim. Reached ÇAYAGIZ and then DEMRE, the terminus of my trek on the fabulous LIKYA YOLU.
Çakil Plaji
Çakil Plaji
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LYCIA was an ancient maritime district of southwestern Anatolia, on the Mediterranean coast between Caria and Pamphylia, and extending inland to the ridge of the Taurus Mountains. In Egyptian, Hittite and Ugaritic records of the 14th and 13th centuries BC,t he Lycians are described as wedged between the Hittites on the north and the Achaean Greeks on the coast. Nothing more is known of the Lycians until the 8th century BC, when they reappear as a thriving maritime people confederated in at least a score of cities that made up the Lycian League. Neither Phrygia nor Lydia brought Lycia under its control, but the country eventually fell to Cyrus general Harpagus after a heroic resistance. Under Achaemenid Persia and later under the Romans, Lycia enjoyed relative freedom and preserved its federal institutions until the time of Augustus. Annexed to Roman Pamphylia (AD 43), it became a separate province after the 4th century. Archaeological sites at Xanthus, Patara, Myra, and other of its cities have revealed distinctive funerary architecture with rock-cut sepulchres imitating wooden structures. |
Lycian sarcophagi
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| 12 km walk around the KAS peninsula... Terminus de ma randonnée de 198 km sur la Likya Yolu à Demre. Sur le retour vers Istanboul. Étape à Kash. Rando de 12 km en matinée autour de la péninsule. Villas de rêve. Je rejoins ma chambre, très haut perchée à la Pension Carreta, avec une bière Miller et une petite pizza Margharita. Superbe journée ! Took a bus yesterday from Demre back to Kas. Went for a 12 km walk all the way around the peninsula. Dream homes. Picked up a small Margharita pizza and a Miller beer on the way back to my room at Carreta Pension. Gorgeous day ! |
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 On the shore of the Marmara Sea Azat Galimov www.azatgalimov.com |
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This is how I was greeted when I arrived in the yard back at Flower Pension in PATARA
just before noon.
Left KAS this morning on a mini bus.Riding the road snaking along the beautiful coast.
Will take a bus PATARA / MARMARIS tomorrow morning.From there, I will take the ferry to the greek isle of RHODES...
Then back to MARMARIS and ISTANBUL.
De Kas, un bus m'a ramené au petit village de Patara où j'ai fait ma lessive. De Patara, par une route sinueuse longeant une côte superbe, rejoint Marmaris, toujours sur la côte. De là, le lendemain, débarqué en territoire grec sur l' île de Rodos après une traversée de deux heures. Visite de la ville médiévale et de la synagogue Kahal Shalom. D'une communauté de 4000, la majorité d'entre eux ayant fui l'Espagne durant l'Inquisition, les Juifs ne sont plus aujourd'hui qu'une centaine. Beaucoup sont partis au début du siècle à la recherche de conditions économiques plus favorables. le 23 juillet 1944, 1673 d'entre eux furent arrêtés et déportés à Auschwitz.
Laissé sur place la faune touristique et pris un bus pour le petit village de Lardos sur la côte est, à une cinquantaine de kilomètres au sud.
Trois litres d'eau dans mon sac, dernière rando, celle-là de 22 km aller-retour vers le monastère cadenassé de Ypsenis et au delà. Visite en chemin de deux chapelles, ouvertes celles-là. N'ai vu âme qui vive de la journée ni trouvé le village de Laerma où je comptais passer la nuit. Une pauvre carte, pas d'ombre, des chemins partant dans toutes les directions dans la montagne aride et totalement calcinée par endroits m'ont fait renoncer et rebrousser chemin.
Repos à Lardos où j'occupe un petit studio. Vassilios, le patron aime bien recevoir ma visite dans son bureau pour boire avec lui un verre (ou deux) de vin résiné, le sien propre et faire un brun de causette en fin de journée.
Et le voyage continue ...
And the journey continues ...
nomadensolo@gmail.com
2 commentaires:
Toujours d'aussi belles photos, j'ai voyagé d'abord à travers elles avant de découvrir la Turquie par moi même et je n'ai pas regretté.
So long Jean Marc
Beautiful photos, inspiring journey! You make me want to grab my pack and hit the road. :) Really great page!
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