BY Evren
A practical guide to whirling dervish ceremonies in Istanbul: venues, showtimes, what to wear, and how far ahead to book, updated September 2026.
BY Evren
How to visit the Şerefiye Cistern in Istanbul: opening hours, the evening dervish show, getting there by tram, and what the visit actually involves.
BY Evren
A practical guide to visiting the Theodosius Cistern in Istanbul: opening hours, the evening dervish show, tickets and how it compares to its larger neighbour.
BY Evren
Boat trips in Istanbul explained: Bosphorus cruises, Golden Horn tours, sunset dinners, public ferries and private charters, with September 2026 prices.
BY Evren
Camlica Hill views take in both continents and the Bosphorus at once. Here’s how to get there, what it costs, and when to go.
BY Evren
A guide to Istanbul’s lesser-known cisterns — Şerefiye Sarnıcı and the Cistern of Theodosius — with hours, shows and how to get there.
BY markention
Museum entry in Istanbul has become expensive, particularly for foreign visitors, who pay separate and considerably higher rates at most state and municipal sites. What has not changed is that a great deal of the best of the city costs nothing at all. Every mosque is free. So are both bazaars, the parks, the bridges […]
BY markention
Almost every monument in Istanbul closes in the late afternoon, which leaves visitors standing in Sultanahmet at six in the evening with nothing to do. The city itself does not stop. It just moves, onto the water, up the hills and into neighbourhoods most day itineraries never reach. Here are twelve things worth doing after […]
BY markention
Hagia Sophia is a working mosque, officially Ayasofya-i Kebir Cami-i Serifi, and has been since July 2020. Since January 2024 foreign visitors have followed a separate ticketed route through the upper gallery, priced at 25 euro, entered from a booth opposite the Fountain of Ahmed III rather than through the worshippers’ door. Prayer in the […]
BY markention
The Istanbul bucket list comes down to a handful of unmissable things. See Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque, sail the Bosphorus at sunset, get scrubbed in a Turkish bath, haggle in the Grand Bazaar and eat your way through the city’s food. Most of the essentials sit close together in the old city and […]
