Today we visited Tarsus, which is one of the highlights of the trip for me. I wanted to see where Saul grew up.

I took over 700 pictures today, so it was fun to go back and decide which ones to use. I have a lot of material for future use 🙂

We started the day in Adana, which is one of the largest cities in Turkey.

Our first stop of the day was to see a Roman road near Tarsus. The road dates from a later time period than Paul, but would have followed the same path that he would have taken to go through the Cillician Gates. Much work still needs to be done to further identify this road.

I posted the picture above on Facebook earlier today and have received more than 50 likes so far. Will I get as many views on the entire post?

I took a lot of pictures of the road. We walked on it for more than a half mile.

Look for a future post about this road.

Here I am in the city center of Tarsus. Back in 1993 they discovered this old Roman road running through the center of the city.

The road is 6.5 meters wide and the middle section is covered by polygon shaped Basalt blocks. Many famous people would have walked on this road through Tarsus. There are shops along the side of the road and this would have been a center of commerce in the city.

This well is known as the Saint Paul Well. This well may have been in use at the time of Paul and is definitely a good example of a city or neighborhood well that was used during that time.

This gate is known as Cleopatra’s Gate, although the structure here was built after the time that she visited Tarsus. However, Cleopatra would have been here as the current gate was built on the foundations of the older ones.

The gate is also known as Paul’s Gate. They try to tie everything to the Apostle Paul in Tarsus.

Another interesting place in Tarsus is the claimed resting place of the Prophet Daniel. I found out that this is one of seven places that claim to be where Daniel is buried.

The main claimant is Susa, Iran. However, other sites in Iran, Iraq and Uzbekistan as make claims as the place where Daniel is buried.We then went to a restaurant that is located by a waterfall on the Cydnos River.

I had a very nice lunch of trout. A nice presentation of the fish and very delicious. The lunch will probably be the focus of a future post, but for now you only get to see the waterfall.

We had a nice drive back to Adana from Tarsus and then took a nice long walk through the area near the Sabanci Merkez Camii or Sabanci Central Mosque.

This mosque is the largest one in Turkey.

The mosque is very beautiful and looks majestic standing on the banks of the Seyhan River.

We then went back to the hotel to rest up before dinner. We did take a walk before dinner and enjoyed looking through different shopping areas.

After a nice dinner we went out for some pastry, and then decided to walk to a nearby park. The park is connected to a cultural center.

LaDonna asked the guard what the cultural center was like and he invited us inside to watch a performance that was being given by children. We watched for some time as they sung songs, performed a play and then put on a traditional dance. We really enjoyed the performance.

Tomorrow we travel further west to visit some of the cities where Paul worked with churches. It is also another day where we move to a new hotel so I have to pack in the morning.

Now for a good night of sleep.

Steven

Remember to visit the Turkey page for more links to previous pages and other bloggers from the tour group.