Uptown Entry
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Some five km from the heart of Selçuk, past the alleged home of the
alleged virgin Mary, the upper entrance to Ephesus requires running a
short gauntlet of souvenirs, carpets, and no few "Genuine Fake
Watches" (always that same phrasing). Rather than waste our
time with pictures
of them, let's beam straight past them and the ticket booth (20 TL,
approx. US$ 15), and the gate which looks remarkably like a BART
entrance. Stick
your ticket in the slot and push the turnstile. Are we there yet?
A pair of charming college-age sisters from Izmir offered to take my
picture.
One of them wanted a picture of me with her; prettiest young woman - or the
youngest pretty one - I've posed in a one-armed hug with in decades. I
took one of the two of them in front of some Genuine Real Ancient Ruin
(c),
and off we went. They are young, and their feet weren't swollen, so
they pulled irretrievably ahead of me in short order.
'Twas a great start to a visit.
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So here we are, in a world class ancient city on a partly cloudy day in
the increasingly joyful spring, in a land that looks uncannily like
Napa Valley without most of the hype.
Now if only the cloudy part of partly cloudy would yield to the sunny
part, the world would be finely in its orbit, and all would be well.
I shared a wild wheat field with a low-profile bee, and admired
somebody's tomb whose name I promptly forgot. Some fine artists
definitely found employment on that grave.
Coming to the Canyon
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![Young Girls, Coming to the Canyon asian teenagers photographing each other on the wide way](pix/2009/img_3511.jpg)
There is fine stuff in the Upper City: a nice intimate stone
amphitheater, a "water palace", perhaps the ancestor of the Turkish
bathhouse,
and boatloads of columns, some still supporting plinths. (If anybody
has a plinth fetish, let me know; i have lots of
plinth porn, badly lighted.)
But the partly clouds said no good photos of that stuff.
Mr Sun began showing his face shortly afer I crested the saddle of the
hill, and passed through the gate into the Grand Boulevard, promenading
its way down a sloping little valley toward Library Plaza. Plenty of
modern strollers still walk this wide wonderful way, taking pictures of
all the monuments, fountains, latrines (with constantly running
water in ancient times!), and, not least, each other.
![View toward the Ocean looking down the grand boulevard, library of celsus](pix/2009/img_3516.jpg)
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Here is the Fountain of Sumbuddus Oruthus. Lots on nice intact
artwork on the face and lintel. (Or is that really what a plinth is,
and all my badly-lit porn is really lintels. Inquiring minds may as
well learn.)
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There are those partly clouds again, looming behind the fountain.
Library Plaza
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Here we are at the mouth of the canyon. To the left, a lovely green
hillsde with Italian cypress. Before us, the "Library and Tomb" of
Iulius Celsus.
Library and tomb! Sounds like finals week... for the rest of
eternity!
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It's a lovely place and the sun is out. Let's hang out here in front of the library
(and tomb) while we wait for part two.
It won't come tonight. In an hour and a half I'll be on a night bus to Istanbul.
G'night.
Contents Copyright 2012 Jeff Bulf