Istanbul can be very crowded. We talked to people who waited for two or three hours to get into the Hagia Sophia, and that was in October. The key to touring Istanbul is timing. This is a city that sleeps late, so if you want to tour, you should be up and ready early. Get to your intended stop at 8:30-8:45 in the morning for a 9:00 opening. You’ll beat the tours from the cruise ships and the bus tours if you do. The mosques also open for visitors at 9. Because they close for prayer times, it’s really important to time your visit to mosques around them. But it’s pretty easy – there’s a sunrise prayer, and then the next one isn’t until about lunchtime. After that, there will be three prayer times during the afternoon – so you can see if you arrive at the wrong time, you’ll be in line forever. The places that get the most crowded are the Hagia Sophia, the cisterns and Topkapi Palace. If you can, avoid Fridays, especially to visit a mosque. It’s their big prayer day, starting at 1, and they often go downtown to shop, eat out and worship. If you decide to tour on Fridays, choose a palace or museum.
Istanbul is a city of amazing views. It seems this city offers spectacular vistas everywhere you go. You’ll see lots of signs for terrace restaurants – check them out! Lots of times it’s a bit of an adventure, as you go into apartment lobbies and up past peoples’ front doors to get to a restaurant or coffee shop on top of a building. Don’t let it deter you – the views are worth it. One of our favorite places to get a great view is the restaurant on the roof of the Grace Hotel in Sultanahmet. You have to go through a closet to get to the roof, but it’s worth it.
A beautiful place to have a cup of coffee is the Pera Palace just off Istiklal Street. It was built to service passengers from the Orient Express and was – and still is – the last word in luxury. It was here that Agatha Christie wrote “Murder on the Orient Express” and you can still stay in the room she used. If you go in the afternoon, they will have a tea set up in the lounge area with music. Very nice, but much more expensive than going in the morning and just enjoying a coffee.
One of the most interesting places we visited was The Museum of Innocence, just a few blocks from our apartment. It is a companion piece to the Nobel Prize winning author Orhan Pamuk’s novel The Museum of Innocence, and you can read the first few chapters for free here. The book takes place right in the neighborhood, and he collected thousands of items that relate to the book. They’re displayed by chapter and explained with an audiotape you can listen to in English. While he often quotes from the book, it’s more a window on the culture and mood of Turkey in the 50’s and 60’s and the tension between Turkish sensibilities and the influence of Western culture. We found it fascinating.
Another museum that you might miss without mention is the Mosaic Museum that is near the Blue Mosque. It contains mosaics from the palace floor from the time of Justinian, mid 500AD. They are spectacular.
One of the nice things about Istanbul is that they have a lot of public restrooms. You can use your metro card for entrance. Some of the stalls will have “squatty potties” which is basically a hole in the ground. There will be a sign on the door letting you know. Some of the locals prefer squatties rather than sitting on a pot others have used. but they are usually a shock to tourists. Bathrooms can be very entertaining…
One of our favorite finds in the spice bazaar area is the Beta Tea House. It’s in a beautiful little corner of peace in the bazaar area. There’s a coffee shop, a chocolate shop, and a restaurant there, too. While you might find cheaper tea in the bazaar, you won’t find a better selection – they have over 1,000 different varieties. But the best part is just that it is a quiet and very pretty little place, and there are good, clean bathrooms there, too.
While I don’t usually recommend individual guide books, I’m going to make an exception for Istanbul. Rick Steves has said that Istanbul is his favorite city in the world, and his love for the city shines in his Istanbul guide book. His walking tours are excellent and bring you outside the typical tourist areas, for once. We especially recommend the City Walls and Neighborhoods Walk, although some of the areas he takes you through can be a bit seedy – don’t go in the dark. (Homeless people live between the city walls, and he has you walk along the city walls for a while.) It was one of the most interesting things we did.
A sight that we think is often overlooked, which is on Rick Steve’s City Walls and Neighborhood Walk is Tekfur Palace. It’s the only surviving Byzantine palace in Istanbul. While it is only partially standing, it is a fascinating insight to the Byzantine time period, and full of amazing views, too.
At the end of Istiklal Street, near the entrance to the Tunel, is the Galata Mevlevi Museum. It’s where you can see an actual whirling dervish ceremony, not a tourist performance. We were able to get in during their cultural festival, but they often have ceremonies on Sunday night. You have to get tickets in advance and it fills very quickly. The ceremony lasts about 40 minutes, and they gave us a pamphlet in English which explained what they were doing during the ceremony. It was powerful and memorable and highly recommended.
If you’re interested in travelling outside of Istanbul, one of the best ways to do it is by commercial ferry. They are comfortable and very inexpensive. Absolutely take an excursion to one or more of the Princes Islands for the day. They leave from Kabatas. But you can also travel to Yalova, to Bursa and to other places for very reasonable prices. Bursa is a great destination – you can get a ferry/bus combo ticket that will easily bring you into the city. There is a commercial ap you can use to buy ferry tickets.
While we didn’t do this, if we were to go to Turkey again for a nest, we would probably look into getting a Turkish resident visa. You can get them on line and it’s not difficult. It allows you much less expensive entrance into sights and also makes it easier to buy ferry tickets – with a resident visa, you can buy them on line instead of having to go early and hope there’s room for the ferry you want. (although we never had a problem)
Turkey has a thriving film industry and while their shows can be a bit cheesy, they’re fun to watch because you’ll recognize the filming locations. As of this writing, there are two shows that are currently on Netflix that are full of scenes of Istanbul. Both are dubbed in English. Midnight at the Pera Palace is a fun little time travel story, filmed in the Pera Palace, and The Protector is a fantasy drama that will take you all over the city.
There are also some books that take place in Turkey and Istanbul that might give you insight to the culture. Elif Shafak is a well-known Turkish novelist who has written compelling best selling books about Turkey. The Forty Rules of Love tells the story of Rumi and Shams and the beginning of the dervish society, overlaid with a modern story about an American housewife. The Architect’s Apprentice is about the brilliant architect Sinan who transformed Istanbul and one of his apprentices who also worked in the sultan’s zoo. I already mentioned The Museum of Innocence, but another read that is connected to Istanbul is Murder on the Orient Express. All of them will give you insights to this city.
Our last little secret is to visit Ali and say hello. He’s the cat guy of Cihangir. He is dedicated to feeding and caring for the many, many cats that live in that neighborhood. You’ll find his little shed behind the wine bar and down the stairs that’s here and he’s often there with them. Leave a bag of cat food or a few liras with him to help out his cause.