I was a nervous wreck about the possibility of NOT having a flight to Mongolia the next morning so I got up at 3 worrying. (I’m such a worry wart). The prayers woke Trek up at 5:50 & it was the first day of Ramadan so the whole city of Istanbul was hustling & bustling from the break of dawn. Trek got up & ran 6 miles while I got ready, & then we both sat down together & started making more phone calls to try to figure out our flight situation. Luckily, we did get ahold of Mongolian Airlines & they did indeed see our reservation, but let us know that we needed to check in at the Turkish Airlines desk because it was a Turkish Airlines flight. We were still nervous because we had talked to Turkish Airlines the night before & they didn’t see us on any reservations. We decided to try to not think about it & enjoy our last few hours in Instanbul before heading to the airport.
We decided to have breakfast at the same place we ate the day before because it was SO delicious & one of the least expensive places in the city. We loved the father & son running it & we ate like kings once again. It was SO good.
After that, we walked about 1.5 miles to the Spice Bazaar & wandered for an hour looking at all the fun things they sold at the bazaar. (I love open air marketplaces. You get to experience so much culture, meet people, & just have fun. After the bazaar, we took a walk across the Galata Bridge, enjoyed the waterfront, & went back across the other bridge there. It was a 5 mile walk, but it was beautiful. On our way back to the hotel, we grabbed some Sahlep (one of my favorite Turkish hot drinks. . . similar to hot Horchata). Then we picked up our bags & looked for a taxi to take us to the airport.
We found a taxi driver that only took credit cards (that should have been the first red flag for our next “adventure”). We asked how much it would be & he told us it would be 900 Turkish Lyra (about $25). He put us in his cab & immediately started smoking while we were in the car. It was AWFUL. We asked him to at least open the window. We could tell he was annoyed at us for asking, then he used the remainder of the hour in the taxi cab to call various friends on his phone (while driving) & laughed, talked, & just flat out didn’t pay attention to his driving at all. Trek & I were SO SCARED we were going to get in a wreck before the day was done. When we finally arrived at the airport, he demanded we pay 1400 Lyra which was 500 more than we agreed upon when we got in the cab. We argued about the price & insisted on paying what we originally agreed upon & he agreed to the 900. As he charged our card on his credit card machine, he very suddenly added several zeros & clicked the button before we could stop him. He started driving off & threw our credit card out the window at us. The charge ended up being $312.00. I just cried. I was SO upset. I know there are worse things in the world, & I was SO grateful we had arrived safe & sound. Things could have been much much worse, but a part of me was still upset. We could have used that $312 for our entire stay in Mongolia. It was heart wrenching knowing it was just gone.
We checked into Turkish Airlines & much to our relief (especially after the mess with the Taxi driver), we got our boarding passes to Mongolia. We checked our bags, & hung out at the airport until it was time to fly out. We had dinner at Popeyes (why on earth was there a Popeyes Chicken in Turkey? So crazy. It was horrendously overpriced & it was AWFUL. Barely any food & it tasted terrible. That last day in Turkey really was something. We arrived at our gate 1.5 hours before we were supposed to leave & as we arrived, the Turkish Airlines staff were yelling at all the passengers to get on the bus NOW. It was so bizarre. It was 1.5 hours before boarding time, yet they were herding us like cattle as fast as they could. We got on the bus & drove out to the plane & they had us board 1.5 hours early. It was crazy. We just sat there for what felt like forever waiting to take off. The flight attendants on that flight were all mad at each other for some reason. They were yelling at each other, arguing both in the back of the plane & in front of all the passengers. They were throwing things at each other & then just being outright rude to everyone including the passengers. It really was the most bizarre thing I’d ever seen on a flight. The food on the flight was great though. They fed us both dinner & breakfast & both were absolutely amazing for airplane food. Trek & I both slept about 3 hours which was pretty good because we had a VERY LONG day ahead of us. But . . . . I was going to see my baby girl!!!! The excitement was real.
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