ISTANBUL

Istanbul sits between Europe and Asia and was the capital of the Byzantine and Ottoman empires. One of our favorite sites in Istanbul was the Haghia Sophia (Aya Sofya in Turkish) or the Church of the Holy Wisdom. It was built by Emperor Justinian and it sits between the Topkapi Palace and the Blue Mosque. It is 1000 years older than the other two as it was built in 537 as a Christian Church and converted to a mosque in the 1400's. As a mosque the beautiful tile mosaics were plastered over and only rediscovered in the 1930's when it became a museum!! We loved the stone floor that had been worn away over the centuries from both the Christian and Islamic worshippers;)