Day 2: Istanbul (airport) and Belgrade

Istanbul was Constantinople, now it's Istanbul not Constantinople...

5/8/22

Arrived in Istanbul 9am my time, and 4pm locally. I am sleep deprived and dehydrated. The Turkish airport apparently does not have any water fountains in the whole place (??) and I am too cheap to pay for bottled water. It’s a very beautiful airport, with probably the most shops and luxury brands of any airport I’ve seen.

The 10 hour flight (Sheesh!) passed with very little sleep on my part- the people behind me did not speak English and banged on my seat and shoved it forward while I was sleeping apparently because it was in the way of them eating, but I ate just fine with the person in front of me having their seat down the whole flight… I was pretty miffed to be jostled out of my hard-won little bouts of sleep.

The upside to this is I may get sleepy at the right time on Belgrade time!

Turkish Airlines did spoil us though- we got a kit in a cute bag with everything we needed for sleep. The airplane bathroom even had a lovely cologne to use next to the soap!

After another flight, we backtracked to land in Serbia around 9. We made it to the hotel, and headed right back out for some food.

I had a pepperoni and cheese pastry kinda like a calzone but flakier. Really tasty!

What I can see so far of Belgrade is pretty stone classic buildings lit up, and that it is overall very clean. Cafes lined the streets and were lively with people even at 11pm on a Monday. There's lots of streets in the main part of town where we're staying that are pedestrian only. Take a look at this slideshow below.

It takes a little bit to hit you sometimes, but I am starting to recognize that me, I, Katherine, am in a hotel in Belgrade, Serbia. Pretttttyy coool.... :)