May 14, 2018
Toronto to Istanbul
In Toronto’s lounge Sunday PM doing the last post. That is only luggage we are carrying with us.
No idea where Colin wandered off to to catch this sunset.
Our seats on Turkish Airlines. No danger of not having enough leg room. One of the reasons I chose to fly with TK was because of the low cost of the additional taxes that one has to pay on a free ticket. For instance Lufthansa charges up to $3000.00 each in taxes for the same flights. I paid a total of $202.50 for both of us.
It didn’t take long for us to spread out 🙂
First thing is to sort out how to make the seat work. Next one is expected to fill out the menu for what we would like for breakfast.
We were given a bag with a pair of slippers in it. We we put them on and put our shoes in the bag. Then we got a bag with all kinds of amenities in it from lip balm to a comb/hairbrush. At the foot of our seats are benches that you can lift the lid and put things into.
This is the wine we chose to drink. Lovely.
I had to add this photo as this was the best port I have ever had. So smooth and that chocolate finish…perfect end to the meal.
Relaxing before said meal. Notice, not even a glass of vino but it came shortly thereafter.
Ahh here it comes. The warmed nut dish was mostly filled with pistachio nuts and a lot of macadamia nuts.
I only had the seafood appetizer but Colin also had the best ever in the world tomato soup. I had one bite and got a bowl for myself. Yes that really is a gold color on the inside of the soup bowl.
The main consisted of baked salmon which was a tad dry but still tasty.
There were two chefs onboard and this fellow was serving the desserts.
We both settled for the chocolate mousse ( even better that my last best ever which was in Paris years ago ) and some of that wonderful porto. That wee bag held an electronic candle so that we could eat by candle light. A nice touch.
Then it was lights out to sleep on our totally flat bed. First they put a nice mattress pad on and we got a blanket and a quilt to cover ourselves with. This fellow slept until 15 minutes before landing this morning. Colin slept off and on most of the night but I only manged to sleep for 3.5 hours even though we had a good five hours of quiet time before breakfast. I have never slept well on planes. Oh well I got to use the bathroom before everyone else and got cleaned up and changed my clothes.
Somewhere around Prague. Love the colors and layout of the fields.
Who was hungry for breakfast? Every bite of fruit was perfectly ripe and sweet.
I ate half the fruit and merely nibbled at the omelet. Along with the fruit course they served warmed breads including mini fresh croissants that melted in your mouth.
This is the new gigantic Istanbul airport still under construction. Scheduled to open in October of 2018, at least phase one.
I had no idea that Istanbul was so large. As far as the eye can see are hundreds upon hundreds of mostly modern high rise buildings.
The much smaller current airport.
Getting off the plane and before proceeding to the in transit international flight area of the airport we were subjected to a carry on bag search and a pat down, then we were good to go. Thank goodness for my research or we would have had no idea where to turn to get to the business class lounge. The gate numbers go from the 200 hundreds to the 500 hundreds. This is the business class lounge spied from a window along the walk. Yes all two stories of it. The lounge covers 3oo square meters and is one of the top ten lounges in the world. The new lounge is supposed to be much bigger 🙂
Which is why we have a 17.5 hour layover here, by choice. Good place to catch up on our jet lag. It is 1:20PM at home and 11:20PM locally, time for some shut eye. Please forgive any spelling/grammar errors, just doing a quick proof tonight as my eyes are closing. Colin’s are already closed.
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Wow Contessa and Colin, the flights alone are a vacation by themselves. You are traveling in style with such comfort. I am a bit envious!
Enjoy your vacation and all the sites. I am very much looking forward to some pictures and your reports whenever you find the time to post them.
Have fun you too!
Super post! Who said money won’t make you happy! We all need a bit of pampering especially on a special vacation . No one knows except for another blogger how much time is spent preparing a post and I am one who knows. Thanks for the effort. The best thing is the pictorial record that you are creating for yourselves . Have fun!
That is impressive. I’ve never seen anything like that . Thanks for sharing all this.
Hope you are getting some rest now.
What a nice way to travel!
Awesome service on Turkish Air. Great post, time to rest up.
Looks lovely! I’ve never flown Turkish airlines but they look great!(I bet even in economy). LH has always been expensive, glad to know Turkish Airlines might be so much cheaper. I would love to spend some time in Turkey too as only have ever done one day at Ephesis on a cruise. Glad you got the name situation sorted. Get some rest!
Thanks for the plane ride!..I’m looking forward to your travels..
Geesh… Nothing like my United flights to get to Iowa!!! Looks like the lap of luxury! But oh so fun!!!
[…] Someone asked if we were traveling business class. I think that is pretty obvious. We are using the last of our free Aeroplan points that we have been saving up for for twenty years. Last year we did a similar trip in business class using our points. We also traveled the long flight over with Turkish Airlines and both believe that we preferred that flight and service more that this one. For one thing they no longer do the dessert cart service. You can read about that flight here. […]