Hidden Gems of Turkey · 3 sites
These are towns that time has mostly left alone. Ottoman houses lean over cobbled lanes, a minaret rises straight out of the Euphrates and kings lie in tombs cut into the cliffs. Walk them slowly, stop for tea when someone offers, and you'll come away with a feel for an Anatolia that the big sights rarely show.
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Birgi sits at the foot of the Bozdağ mountains, and it has managed the rare trick of staying exactly itself. Timber-framed Ottoman mansions lean over cobbled lanes, the old mosque has a wooden pulpit carved some seven hundred years ago, and the painted rooms of the Çakırağa Mansion are worth the trip alone. Have a village breakfast in the square and let the morning go where it wants.
When a dam was built on the Euphrates, the river rose and swallowed part of old Halfeti. What's left is strange and beautiful: stone houses stepping down into green water, and the minaret of Savaşan village standing alone in the river like a lighthouse. Take a slow boat along the gorge to the castle of Rumkale, and look out for Halfeti's famous black roses in the gardens.
Few towns have a setting like Amasya's. Ottoman houses line the Yeşilırmak River, and high above them, carved into the cliff face, are the tombs of the ancient kings of Pontus. This was where Ottoman princes were sent to learn how to rule. Walk the riverbank at dusk when the tombs are lit up, and don't leave without trying the local apples.
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Hidden Gems of Turkey
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