Turkey travel guide

Three times the size of the UK and with a population of 83 million, Turkey is where Asia rises out of the Aegean and marches east. When you visit it may be the geography that seduces you first: the scale of the mountains; the depth of the forests; the clarity of the rivers and the magnificence of a 4,350-mile coastline offering superb sailing, kayaking and kite surfing off some of the most beautiful beaches and coves in the world.
Inland you’ll encounter the fairyland of Cappadocia, the wild highlands of the Taurus and Pontic mountains, and the spectacular Black Sea coast. At the cultural heart of this dramatic land is Istanbul, which takes a lifetime to know and has been entrancing travellers since it was Constantinople. You’ll probably fall for the Turks too, a people with such a sense of hospitality that when they invite you to dinner you’re expected to stay the night. And what dinners: Turkish cuisine has its roots in the territories of the Ottoman Empire and thus is a fusion of foods from Eastern Europe, the Balkans, the Middle East, Arabia and the Maghreb. Book a table at Iki Sandal in Bodrum’s old quarter and you’ll have dishes from ancient recipe books presented and explained like museum pieces.
Stop in a roadside lokanta — or workman’s café — and you’ll eat what Silk Road travellers ate five centuries ago. And that leads on to history, because perhaps only in Israel and Jordan is antiquity so present as it is in Turkey. At Knidos Roman pottery lies ankle-deep on the ground, and at the awe-inspiring ruins of Ephesus you might wonder if civilisation has since gone backwards in certain ways.
The Foreign Office advises against all travel to areas within 10km of the border with Syria, and against all but essential travel to Sirnak and the province of Hakkar.
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Fly — or take the train — to Istanbul to explore the Basilica of Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, the sensory overload of the Grand Bazaar and the foodie backstreets of Sultanahmet, then take a cheap flight southeast to see the canyons, caves and tufa towers of Cappadocia on a hot-air ballooning trip — or rent a car for an adventurous 800-mile road trip along the Black Sea Coast.
For a seaside holiday Izmir offers the big-city break with the urban beach vibe while Bodrum combines the Benidorm-like boisterousness of Gumbet with the nation’s glitziest five-star resort scene. Dalaman is gateway to the boutiquey Bozburun Peninsula and the beaches and coves of Dalyan and Fethiye, and Antalya is the beginning of a strip of hotels and resorts that runs almost unbroken for 100 miles around the Mediterranean coast to Kargicak. By far the best way to explore is by gulet — these luxury wooden boats, still made to traditional designs, can take you to glittering beaches inaccessible by road, anchoring in coves where the water is so clear that swimming is like flying.
You should visit the city of Knidos, abandoned in the 7th century, the Roman city of Patara, birthplace of St Nicholas and where archaeologists say it will take another 250 years to uncover all the treasures they suspect are buried here, and the deserted village of Kayakoy, empty for nearly a century after ethnic Greeks were expelled in 1923.
Turkey has been welcoming visitors since prehistory — the Turks themselves were Asiatic nomads who gave up wandering when they found their own promised land — and across the centuries travellers from west and east have passed on Turkish roads. Accommodation options range from outposts of the world’s most luxurious brands — the Mandarin Oriental, the Amanruya, the Six Senses and the Rixos occupy almost neighbouring coves on the north Bodrum Peninsula — to high-design boutique hotels in Istanbul, antique-filled heritage hotels, waterpark hotels, private villas and family-owned guesthouses, often right on the beach.
You’ll find impressive all-inclusive and family-friendly resorts in Marmaris and Fethiye, riverside inns in Dalyan, cave hotels in Cappadocia and mountain lodges in the highlands. Some of the sweetest honeymoon spots are so well-hidden you’d never find them on your own. You need a Land Rover to get you down the cliff to Perdue and a boat to get you to Sabrina’s Haus in Bozburun. Villas are another popular option, especially around Kalkan, but perhaps the most fun you can have is on a Turkish campsite: they’re well-managed, designed for shade, wonderfully welcoming and often in those beautiful waterside spots that have been protected from hotel development.
• Best all-inclusive hotels in Bodrum• Best villas in Kalkan• Best hotels in Antalya• Best luxury villas in Turkey
Make time in Istanbul for a boat trip to the Princes’ Islands in the Sea of Marmara. Four of the nine are open to the public, and Büyükada, the biggest, is the most popular. You need to get the first ferry of the day to beat the crowds, enjoy breakfast on a sunny terrace and appreciate the startling contrast with the hustle of Istanbul: the island is silent, with only electric taxis and bicycles allowed. Avoid Sundays.
You should also see Pamukkale, a glacier-like terrae of thermal pools formed by calcite-rich springs three hours northeast of Marmaris. The ancients used them as a spa resort — the ruins of Hierapolis stand above the petrified cascades — and you can still bathe in the mineral-rich waters today.
Don’t miss the opportunity to visit Aphrodisias, former headquarters of the Greek cult of Aphrodite and another of the countless, rarely visited wonders of the Turkish hinterland. Arguably more impressive than Ephesus, with a fraction of the footfall and a 30,000-seat amphitheatre you’ll probably have to yourself.
Finally, Gallipoli: the lonely, windswept peninsula at the mouth of the Dardanelles where 51,000 Allied troops lost their lives in an ill-conceived 11-month campaign that ended in January 1916. It’s a place where poignancy sits uneasily amid outstanding natural beauty.
Spring and autumn are the ideal times to be in Turkey, with the latter perhaps the best.
• Best time to visit Turkey
What are the dos and don’ts in Turkey?Hospitality is simply good manners in Turkey, so if offered a cup of tea or a pastry while shopping, accept it. It is not a device to entice you to buy. You should haggle in bazaars, but not in shops, and be extremely careful about buying antiques or even fossils, because in most cases it’s illegal to take them out of the country. Do visit a hammam, or Turkish bath, and, when out and about, don’t take pictures of people without asking first.
Do I need to dress conservatively in Turkey?Turkey is a modern, secular nation with an Islamic tradition so dress should be appropriate to the location. Bare flesh is tolerated in beach resorts, but not in mosques, country towns or major cities, and while shorts and T-shirts are accepted garb for foreign tourists, Turks are much smarter when in public.
Where in Turkey will I find the best beaches?It’s a matter of personal taste, but for the richest variety of vast and unspoiled beaches and hidden, white-sand coves go for the stretch of the Turquoise Coast between Gocova — home of Turkey’s kite-surfing scene — and Oludeniz, though there are some sandy stretches near Istanbul.
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Inspired to visit Turkey but yet to book your trip? Here are the best Tui holidays and British Airways breaks, as well as the best Turkey tours from trusted operators.
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