Search Results for: kadikoy

Birgi – one of the best villages in Turkey

Birgi – one of the best villages in Turkey

Birgi is located on the Silk Road and the town was once an important silk production centre, beginning some fifteen hundred years ago. By 1426 it had come under the control of the Ottoman Empire and in 17th century, Evliya Çelebi noted that loads of silk were being sent from Birgi to cities all over Turkey. These days silk weaving is done on industrial looms but there are still some small workshops producing delicate items on traditional silk hand looms. Birgi was chosen as one of the 3 best villages in Turkey in 2022 by the United Nations World Tourism Organization and once you’ve seen it for yourself, I’m sure you’ll agree. 

Demre

Demre

Modern day Demre is essentially a dusty farming town full of shops selling agricultural equipment and simple lokanta serving up doner or home cooked food. Tomatoes grow in abundance alongside orchards lush with citrus trees but back in the 5th century BC Myra, as Demre was known, was a powerful Lycian city.

Izmir – What to see and do

Izmir – What to see and do

Izmir, Turkey’s third most populated city, stretches around the Gulf of Izmir on the Aegean Sea. It’s where the first ever railway line was built in the country to transport produce grown on farms 120 kilometres inland for export to Europe. The gorgeous Sarayı Borsa, the Palace Stock Market that once saw a vigorous trade in cotton, figs and a range of dried fruits including Sultaninas (dried raisins) brought to Izmir by camel, is still standing.

The magnificent Istanbul Tulip Festival and the History of Tulips in Turkey

The magnificent Istanbul Tulip Festival and the History of Tulips in Turkey

April in Turkey sees the start of spring, and nothing says life is for living better than displays of colourful flowers. The Istanbul Tulip Festival delivers this and more, with tulips growing in a former private garden belonging to the Ottoman Sultans or cascading down the banks of the Bosphorus in a public park in…

Istanbul

Istanbul

Istanbul Istanbul has an incredible collection of sites located on the historical Topkapı peninsula of Sultanahmet, but venture further afield and there are Greek Orthodox churches, dervish tombs, converted hamam and contemporary mosques to explore. If all this sounds tempting, read on! Sultanahmet Kadikoy Uskudar Eminonu Golden Horn Taksim & surrounds Galata Tunel & Karakoy…

Turkish National Public Holidays 2024

Turkish National Public Holidays 2024

On Turkish national public holidays, banks, post offices, schools, government departments and many private businesses are closed. If the weather’s good it feels like everyone is on the road, headed somewhere, and waterfront walks and breakfast places are jampacked with mums, dads and kids plus all their relatives. During two of the longest breaks in…

7 Reasons to visit Istanbul in Winter
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7 Reasons to visit Istanbul in Winter

I’m a winter baby and I love when the temperature drops so I can roam Istanbul to my heart’s content without getting too hot. It’s really lovely to visit Istanbul in winter, as Julia Bayne, business owner at Istanbul Place Apartments – offering historic apartments for short stays in Galata – knows well. You remember…

Liberation of Istanbul

Liberation of Istanbul

When I studied history at high school we learned about World War I from an Antipodean perspective. Heroic Australian Johnnies fought local Mehmets at Gallipoli, the Germans were eventually defeated and everyone went back home again. What we weren’t told about was what happened next, the Liberation of Istanbul and Turkey. Even before the war…