March 13, 2014: Istanbul, Turkey! We landed at 4pm and don’t fly out until 1am, so we hopped a cab into the city, grabbed a room at the Doubletree with points, freshened up, and then hit the town. Our first stop was the Grand Bazaar, where Jen scored some amazing mosaic tealight lamps for our back porch.  This market is where the market scenes of Argo were filmed! It was incredible, I could have spent all day there.  From there it was off to the Ahmed Sultan Mosque and Hagia Sophia, which we arrived at shortly after sunset so worship call was happening.  Beautiful colors all around.  After a rough time finding a place to eat, we landed at the Hodja Pasha Cultural Dance Show where we got our cultural fix for the layover.  Grabbed some baklava for the road, and back to the airport for our next overnight flight to Male.  The Turkish Airlines business class lounge was simply incredible.  We could have easily spent the entire layover there (pool table, golf simulator, race car track, pianos, endless food and more!) but I’m glad we went to see Old Town too.