Bloody tourists (Istanbul 4)...

I was out of the hotel and running by 7:15am this morning. Between the Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sophia I passed a couple of hundred demonstrators sat on the ground: lots of flags and chanting. There was a sizeable police presence and, bored silly, they watched me through their riot shields as I jogged past. I think the demo was something to coincide with the end of Ramadan, which takes place today. Possibly it's connected to yesterday's demo by Kurdish women in Istanbul - or quite possibly it's connected to both.

Following breakfast I got a tram to the other side of the Galata Bridge. From here I scaled the hill to the Galata Tower. I would have got the Tünel funicular tram but I couldn't find it. The Galata Tower is just a medieval stone tower, really. However, sitting on its hill and at 61m high, it offers some wonderful views of the Golden Horn, the Bosphorus, Eminönü, Sultanahmet and the Sea of Marmara beyond. If you squeeze past the other tourists on the narrow ledge at the top, you might be lucky enough to get a few snaps to bore people with back home.

Next I walked up the pedestrianised drag, Istiklal Caddesi, to Taksim Square. After a quick coffee I made my way (via the funicular tram) to Kabatas and then joined an hour and a half cruise of the Bosphorus up to the Fatih Bridge and back. There are some glorious sites to be seen on the Bosphorus, for sure. The shores on both sides are bejeweled with some seriously expensive waterside properties. There's not one I couldn't imagine a Bond villain living in.

A tram up to Sultanahmet, and then I joined the queue for the Hagia Sophia. The Hagia Sophia dwarfs both the Blue Mosque and the Süleymaniye Mosque. For over 1000 years it was the largest man made enclosed space anywhere in the world. With it's marbled walls and floors, its different levels and balconies, its two supporting half domes, all crowned by its magnificent central dome, it is a jaw droppingly impressive experience.

The one detraction, as with all popular tourist sites, are the hundreds of other tourists there all thinking exactly the same thing as me. Hordes of people from every possible country stumbling about in bog-eyed, slack-jawed wonder.