Day 4. Saturday 4 April.

A damp, foggy morning starting with the Metro to Sishane station to wander down side streets in the Beyoğlu area to Istanbul Museum of Modern Art. A terrific, light-filled modern (of course) building with interesting exhibitions.

The story of Semiha Berksoy was fascinating – born in 1910, she refused to follow convention, defying her widowed father and becoming a world-famous opera singer and artist.

Took a walk along the breezy waterfront, but it was quite chilly and not overly appealing so strolled up to Istiklal Avenue to join huge crowds, we were going against the flow! Apparently, this pedestrian street is always a sea of humanity.

Arrived at Taksim Square, which was the general area in which we had stayed 15 years ago. There was some sort of demo forming with riot polis in attendance, so we opted to keep moving.

Back at our hotel question of the day was ‘dinner’? From our hotel window we’d noticed a couple of quiet treed restaurants behind the mosque opposite, so wandered down on spec. We dined on the (allegedly) ‘world famous’ kebab at Garaf restaurant ( a menu limited to beef or chicken on flat bread) & started with the old lentil soup. A glass of something would have been nice but it was an unlicensed eatery, so tea was the go.