Istanbul Part II

I just love the feeling of being anonymous in a new city and getting lost. No joke. Best way to get familiar with any new place is by getting lost a couple of times... Just make sure things don't get too ugly though :)

Istanbul isn't exactly a new city but it is still very unfamiliar to me. I have been there a couple of times and thought I knew what was going on but I hadn't got a clue besides the very obvious touristic spots. So this time, I did something that isn't written on the travel books - dive in through a random winding street and pray it will take me somewhere. I was also praying to get lost. These are the photos from my mini adventure.

The nostalgic architecture through the winding streets off Istiklal Street. 

Who knew the walk down the hill from Istiklal Street would lead me to the main road to Besiktas? Near the Mimar Sinan University (famous for arts and architecture education) is the Istanbul Modern museum which was just waiting for my visit :)

The interesting mosque as seen from the ramp up to Istanbul Modern. 

I was not allowed to take any photos in the museum; so naturally I took a photo of this interesting installation by an architect (couldn't dare to take another photo of his details unfortunately). 

The view from the museum's restaurant is just so breathtaking...

.... but unfortunately most of it was blocked by cruisers, not just this one but THREE of them! Great timing cruisers, thank you! 

I don't like to be mainstream, so instead of following the main road, I saw this winding path is a thousands of steps, so I thought to myself CHALLENGE ACCEPTED!

... My legs really hated me the next day though...

Became friends with an old grandpa and a bunch of cats :)

The view as I was climbing up was just so breathtaking! Experienced nothing like this before in my life.

My long journey up the stairs and ramps lead me to Cihangir, a hipster area of Istanbul known to house bunch of Turkish celebrities. I ended up running into 2 of them. Famous faces, rather than names because I don't know their names :) I felt like such a stalker walking back and forth with my massive Canon to make sure they actually were famous. Too scared to take any photos though... so ended up taking photos of the anti-government street graffiti. 

The walk further up was quite challenging,  but very exciting at the same time. I ended back at Taksim Square and from there I took the underground to our hotel in Levent. Great adventurous day well spent.