Ahk-Cha-Co-Ja & the Black Sea

Ahk-Cha-Co-Ja, pronounced in English as such, spelled in Turkish like Akçakoca; A beautiful town about an hour north of us on the Black Sea. We hopped on a bus in the early afternoon to make our way north to the Black Sea. A bumbling bus ride up and over the northern mountains brought us to a cliffed, pebbly Black Sea beach, lined with cottages, quaint apartments with lush flowers exploding from the verandas with a magnificence that can only be described with a feeling, happiness.  I needed the sea. You never know what you love until it's gone and the sweet smell of an ocean breeze brought me back to the shores of Jupiter, Florida, another part of my heart.

The Black Sea

Leyla and Cansu (my amazingly sweet Turkish friends who are also English teachers at Duzce University with me) tagged along with Tas, Nick and I. They, the experts of these parts, and us, the cute yabanci's (foreigners) with cameras. We walked around, gloriously intrigued by the quaintness of the town and the places to explore. We of course, went straight down to the ocean to play. The beach was pebbly and the water cool, but the day was perfect. We had a mini-photo shoot on the beach and splashed around in the waves. After tiring ourselves out, we devoured some healthy food- crackers and gummy worms! Exploring the town was easy, tourist season being over, it was relatively quiet and full of delicious food to eat and beautiful architecture and sea views to see. We even saw some dolphins playing around in the water! (Who knew, dolphins in the black sea?!?) After some good exploration had happened, we decided to head over to the famous Hamsi restaurant and went on to devour two full plates of fish and calamari. It was oh-so-tasty. Two hours later, we could barely pick ourselves up out of the chairs, but miraculously managed it in time to see the most stunning sunset. Inspired by the beauty I was lucky enough to see, I managed to snag a postcard and write a love letter! It was one of those perfect moments in life where all you can do is think about how lucky you are, and how generations of people have watched the same sunset you are watching at this moment. There is something so magical about natures beauty. But I digress, before meeting some other friends, we headed to another restaurant to try the famous Akcakoca dessert, that is only found in Akcakoca. We sat under an ivy-covered veranda while trying this dessert made of friend phyllo-dough, a sweet cream butter and bananas and sipping Turkish coffee.  We went to rendezvous with our friends at another restaurant/bar. There were sprawling patios with lush wood carved architecture and of course, views of the harbor. We all enjoyed practicing our English and Turkish together, laughing at mistakes, and words that apparently, do not translate and ended in bouts of giggles! The men partook in the time honored Turkish tradition of drinking Raki (a licorice smelling alcohol), melon and white cheese. There was of course, more food. I felt like I was back in Italy! Our night ended after some fortune telling (from the remains in our Turkish coffee cups) around 2am. This may have been the first, but certainly the first of many trips to Akcakoca.