Once you have made the acquaintance of provincial Turkey, you will be hooked. You will fall asleep dreaming of Asia Minor’s hidden valleys and awaken to their call. Birgi is one such little-known delight – a quiet and dignified small town at the foot of Bozdag in western Turkey. Heir to a long series of […]
Summer is warm in Marrakech, but there are ways to get around the heat – and with most properties in low season, an escapade in style to the city will cost you only a fraction of its usual price. Why don’t you consider La Palmeraie, the massive palm grove just outside the city, as the […]
Whether you travel to Beykoz by boat down the Bosphorus or by road, the distinctive atmosphere of this outlying district of Istanbul strikes you immediately. You leave the crowded concrete city behind and find yourself enveloped by forest. Then you know you have arrived. It has been claimed that it was settled 2700 years ago, […]
An expanse of pale blue is the first impression as Lake Beysehir comes into sight. Then when you wander along the shore, especially on a sunny day, you find that it resembles watered silk, shimmering in every shade of blue. This effect is due to the limestone bed of the lake and differences in depth. […]
Small Cormorant (Phalacrocorax Pygmeus) They prefer areas having watery surroundings. They live in a mild climate and sweet, salty and bitter waters. They generally spend the winter at shores of Lagoons, deltas, and rivers in forests. Mating takes place at the locations where the winter is spent. Usually, they brood in colonies in a mixed […]
(Turkish: Black Eyes, or Gypsy), type of Turkish shadow play, named for its stock hero, Karagoz. The comical plays are improvised from scenarios for local audiences in private homes, coffee shops, public squares, and innards. The play was highly developed in Turkey by the 16th century and was adopted in Greece and North Africa. In […]
HISTORY TIMELINE OF ISTANBUL Pre-Historic Era 7000 BC Neolithic fishing settlements in Kadikoy, Pendik & Yarimburgaz. Byzantium 660 BC – 196 AD (Greek/Pagan) 750 B.C. Greeks sailed through the Bosphorus. 676 B.C. Byzantium was founded probably by Greek colonists from Athens and Megara. 667 B.C. Greek colony of Chalcedon founded in what is known as […]
Butterfly Valley opens onto a cove near Fethiye on Turkey’s southwest coast. This deep steep-sided valley has a floor of approximately ten hectares in an area where almost all the butterfly and moth species from the Mediterranean coastal region are to be found, making it an open-air natural history museum. The abundance of Lepidoptera is […]
Whenever I decide to write an article about Safranbolu, which occupies such an important place in my life, something always seems to be missing. Even if I have decided on the title and the points which need to be emphasized, when it comes to setting it all down in writing I feel that I haven’t […]
Postage stamps are one of the most important ways of broadcasting a country’s image. Carried by letters from their country of the issue to the four corners of the world, they inform the recipient at a glance about a country’s unit of currency, its festivals, flora and fauna, national costume, historic buildings, and indeed anything […]
