Canakkale

The description of this fairly recent commemorative piece identifies Ataturk as the sun lighting Turkey's future.

We pulled into Canakkale in the early evening.  Once again I proved a lousy navigator and what should have been an easy location of the hotel was not.  We ended up going far afield and winding around narrow, very ugly streets piled with garbage.  Two friends at RC had pronounced Canakkale charming, but it seemed to me a pit.  We did finally make it to the clock tower square and found our hotel.  Very nice folks at reception but as soon as I walked in the lobby I could smell what I think was the coal-fired heating system.  The smell was strong throughout the hotel and that may have contributed to the ferocious headache I developed.  With it still cold and damp outside, I wasn't up for trudging around and selecting a restaurant, so Sim went out and came back with kebap, beer and wine, and we stayed in. At this point I was feeling like the trip was pretty much of a bust. In the morning it was brightening a little and we began to discover some of the charms of the town.  The waterfront is pretty with lots of restaurants and the Trojan horse used in the movie Troy.  We went to a park which had a naval museum inside a ship which explained the battle in March 1915 when the Turks repelled allied forces in the Canakkale Strait. (The Dardanelles)  We also toured an impressive Ottoman fort.

Around noon we headed for Troy, about a half an hour down the road.