By Ricky, on November 6th, 2009 'Melting Ice Cream' on the hillside at Pamukkale © Ricky Yates
Following the visit to Ephesus, the synod members were wonderfully entertained to a barbeque supper at the nearby home of Rev’d John and Mrs Linda Skinner. John and Linda were founder members of the Northumbria Community in the North-East of England. In more recent years, they have run a small guest and retreat house just outside of the city of Selcuk and live a lifestyle that they describe as ‘New Monasticism.’ They very kindly allowed Sybille and I to stay overnight in their home when the rest of the synod members returned to Izmir later on the Sunday evening, ready for their respective flights home the next day.
We had breakfast in the sunshine on their terrace the next morning, in the company, (much to Sybille’s pleasure), of a menagerie of animals including . . . → Read More: Pamukkale
By Ricky, on November 5th, 2009 The Fountain of Trajan, Ephesus © Ricky Yates
Although the Eastern Archdeaconry Synod meeting officially ended with the Eucharist and Ordination Service on the morning of Sunday 11th October, most synod members stayed on for a Sunday afternoon outing and guided tour to the Greco-Roman remains of the city of Ephesus some 50 miles/80 km south of Izmir. Although we had originally booked to go on the coach with everyone else, as we didn’t wish to return to Izmir late on Sunday evening, we instead followed the coach in our car.
Pillars in front of Municipal House, Ephesus © Ricky Yates
I had previously visited Ephesus nearly 35 years ago in April 1975 and wondered how different it would be from how I remembered it. The most obvious contrast was the weather. My first visit took place on a cool day, under dark cloudy skies and . . . → Read More: Ephesus
By Ricky, on November 4th, 2009
The seafront Izmir, Turkey © Ricky Yates
The 2009 meeting of the Eastern Archdeaconry Synod of the Diocese in Europe took place in the Kaya Prestige Hotel, Izmir, between 17.00 on Thursday 8th October until mid-afternoon on Saturday 10th October. We met in a large conference room on the second floor of the hotel and were able to set up the furniture so that one part was suitable for worship whilst the other could be used for listening to our speakers and for round-table discussion. However, like so many hotel conference rooms, there were no windows through which daylight might appear so it was good to be able to get out and walk around the city on the Friday afternoon during a two-hour break in proceedings.
In our Eucharist on Friday morning, we remembered Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna who was martyred for his faith c155 . . . → Read More: The Eastern Archdeaconry Synod in Izmir
By Ricky, on October 30th, 2009 The Dardanelles – Europe on the right, Asia on the left © Ricky Yates
It is a month and a day since I’ve published a blog post and I’m sure some of my regular visitors will be beginning to think that I’ve disappeared off the planet. Rest assured – I haven’t! However, I have been absent from Prague for 23 of those 31 days only returning to the Chaplaincy Flat on the afternoon of Tuesday 27th October having left on the afternoon of Monday 5th October. Over the next few weeks I’m going to write about what I’ve been up to, hopefully making up for the lack of news during most of October.
As the title of this post says, Sybille and I have travelled to Asia and back and we’ve done the whole journey by car! I’ve driven 4,500 miles/7,200 kilometres and we’ve visited twelve countries in . . . → Read More: Travelling to Asia and back
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