Turkish Bath

Today I spent two delicious hours in the Cemberlitaş Turkish Bath (Hamam). This architecturally beautiful building houses a gender-segregated bath which dates from 1594. Some parts of the bath have been modernized, such as the soaking pools, but above the pools one sees the ancient stone ceilings from the original bath house.

The photo below is of this exact bath house but is from the internet; I did not bring a camera into the bath, only a towel!

First I was shown to a changing area and given a towel to wear. Then I was directed through several chambers in which women were relaxing or having a pedicure into the main room of the bath in the center of which is a huge warm marble slab. I laid on the warm slab for about twenty minutes relaxing into the warmth (it is very humid and feels like a not so hot steam room) After thoroughly warming one of the attendant women, poured basins of warm water all over me and used the exfoliating glove I brought for the purpose to scrub. Next this motherly scrub-woman brought a bowl in which she made an amazing mountain of silky, foaming, soap bubbles and proceeded to scrub me from head to toe, in a massaging fashion, twice, all this while I was soaking in the warmth from the marble stone. After all this soaping my guide brought me into a little side chamber (every area in the bath is through an archway and covered in grey marble) to have more basins of warm rinse water poured over me. Next I was led by the hand (the attendants are used to serving non-Turkish speaking bathers) to another side chamber with very low lighting and two large pools, one 92F and one is 100F. I soaked in these pools for about 30 minutes and then returned to relax on the warm marble for another half hour or so before a final cooling shower. Not only was I squeaky clean and deeply relaxed when I dressed and left to meet nearby with Mark (who had used this time to see the Turkish Archeological Museum) but the cold I picked up our last night in Rome was much eased by the warmth and humidity.

Mark and I walked down to the Bosphorus for a stroll along the waterfront and to marvel at all the ferries taking commuters to the Asian side of Istanbul and to the New District just across the Golden Horn. We ate in a 4th floor restaurant with a marvelous view of the ferry landing and watched the sun set over the European and Asian side of the city while enjoying another delicious dinner of lamb and roasted vegetables. We enjoyed the night lights as we ate a version of baklava for dessert (our table was just above the Galata Bridge you see in the photo).

Earlier today we took in the Grand Bazaar where I bought my Turkish bath exfoliating mitt after stopping by the restaurant where we ate last night. We wanted to see in the daylight the excavation of a 1st Century Byzantine Palace over which the restaurant, Palatium, is built. Parts of the restaurant floor are made of glass so that you can peer down into the lit rooms of the ancient palace below while you dine.