House of Mary

Today March 21st was a fantastic day in Turkey, it was warm and we had an exciting day in and around Ephesus. The city/ruins of Ephesus covered a vast area and most of it was toppled due to earth quakes that have occurred over the past several centuries. I have to say that it was kind of awe inspiring to walk in the same area that John would have walked several thousands of years ago. The site has been some what restored however but since it was one of the biggest Roman cities out side of Rome it will take many more centuries to uncover it all. The amphitheater and the library were quite impressive.
After lunch, which is not worthy of mentioning, we headed off to see a weaving factory! Yea... We saw how they made carpets and how the different types of carpets felt. They had pure woolen ones and some that were made from pure silk. Of course they tried to sell our group some carpets, but we avoided buying one. Once we escaped the carpet factory we headed off to Mary's house. This is supposedly where Jesus's mother had stayed while in Ephesus. You can believe the story or not that is what our guide said. He explained all of the facts concerning this belief and left it up to us to judge for our selves. Personally I could believe it!
The day was so nice out that you could see Greece from Mary's house as well as the islands that belong to Turkey. Then we headed over to one of the great wonders of the world, the Temple of Artemus, enough said it was just a bunch of rocks on the ground...and people trying to sell us crap. Now was the time we were all looking forward to going to the beach! (Ephesus was once very close to the sea however over time the land filled in with sediment and now the sea is about 7k's away.)The beach was only 6k's away and the weather was nice and so sitting on the beach for awhile was going to be nice! We got to the beach and the guide pointed it out we turned around and headed back to town, what a huge disappointment for all of us on the bus! No one was happy that we just got to see the beach, we wanted to feel the beach and thought since we were ahead of schedule that we could spend some time there. NOPE nada nothing of the sort. We were heading off to another factory!! This time it was a leather factory, we were not impressed by this, we had enough and just wanted to go home, however since we were captives on this bus we had to go.
Once inside of this factory we had a fashion show, yes a fashion show, where male and female models came out wearing wonderful jackets. The best part of the show was when Jane and I were picked to be models, yes you got it Jane and I were models for a moment in time. I think the kids shot some action shots of it and if you ask nicely maybe you can see them. Once we got out of the coats we and the factory we headed to our hotel, the Paris Hotel, not sure why it is called that but it is.

Tomorrow we are off to Greece and I ask all of you to pray for us while we are there. The reason why is that Greece is going through some turbulent times right now and we need God's protection while we are there. Thanks for reading my blog.
Mike