Blue Mosque - Interior

One of the domes with the famous Iznik tiles. The town of Iznik, east of Istanbul, is still famous for it's blue tiles and pottery.


Another dome with different Iznik tiles. The stained glass windows, of which there were hundreds, are equally as beautiful as the tiles.


There were so many arches, columns, nooks, but a lot of it contained scaffolding for renovations or maintenance, or the view was marred by modern conveniences, like electrical wires or light bulbs hanging down.

The minbar (not minibar), the high platform up the stairs on the right, is where the imam delivers his sermons. The Mihrab is the niche in the center which points toward Mecca. The whole of the interior of the mosque is laid with carpet. There has always been carpets in mosques to cushion the knees and foreheads during prayers. We, on occasion see the older gentlemen with their knitted caps, but had not seen a man carrying a prayer rug or seen anyone at prayer during one of the 5 prayer calls during the day. But the other day, Geoff saw an older gentleman, on his prayer rug in the island between the two lanes of traffic. How do you say stop, drop and pray? And, the mosque was only across the street. Perhaps he felt he didn't have on clean clothes. The Muslims are very particular about being clean to go to mosque. The men that unloaded our furniture brought a change of clothes to wear when they went to mosque.

Close up of some of the blue tiles. Amazing how intricate they are and how they match from one tile to the next.