Review of Istanbul Traveller Website - http://www.istanbultraveller.info

Today we review http://www.istanbultraveller.info. This website is part of a massive group of over 100 city websites, produced by the Cosmic Travel Network of Toronto, Canada.

The website provides traveller information for a tourist preparing to visit the city of Istanbul, Turkey. The home navigation consists of:
*Accommodation -
***Apartment Rentals and
***Cheap Hotels in Istanbul
*Getting There
***Istanbul City - Information about the city of Istanbul
***Travel to Istanbul - Reasons why you should travel to Istanbul
***Trains - Train transport in and around Istanbul
***Airport - Information about Istanbul Airport
***Airport Transfers - How to be transferred from the airport to your destination

*Getting Around
***Tourist Information - A travel to Istanbul guide
***Istanbul Transport -The local transport infrastructure and how to get around Istanbul
*What to do
***Nightlife in Istanbul - Insight into the nightlife and clubs around Istanbul
***Sightseeing - Places to visit whilst in Istanbul
***Amazing architecture - A guide to the various architectural delights of Istanbul, including the The Hagia Sophia
***Culture & lifestyle - Discussion about the culture and lifestyle of Istanbul
*Places to go
***Istanbul Beaches - Information about the local beaches available to visitors to Istanbul
***Football in Istanbul - Basic information about Football in Istanbul
***Istanbul Tours - Information about tours in Istanbul

***Istanbul Food - A guide to the local food, which will be available to you
***Istanbul Restaurants - A brief guide to popular restaurants in Istanbul
*Useful Information
***Photos - A photo gallery of Istanbul

***Videos - A collection of videos about the city
***Weather - Information about the weather you can expect in Istanbul


The site provides a lot of different sections of information about Istanbul. It is ideal for the visitor who wants access to basic level information. The content tends to be concise and brief, ideal for skim reading. If you want more substantial and access to more detailed content, you will need to find other Istanbul related sites.

Marmaris, Turkey Travel Review? http://www.marmaris.org

Today we review the website http://www.marmaris.org, this website promises to teach you everything you need to know about Marmaris.

Looking at the home page navigation there are links for:
* Visitor Info
*** Why Marmaris - Information about why you should choose Marmaris for your holiday
*** Marmaris Videos - A range of informational videos about Marmaris
*** Marmaris News - The latest news, events and happenings about Marmaris
*** FAQ - Answers to the various questions you may have about the city
*** Turkish Phrases - An interesting section about phrases in Turkey
* Things to Do
*** Caunos - Details of how to go on a day trip from Marmaris to Caunos
*** Rhodes - Information on how to book a day trip from Marmaris to Rhodes, Greece
*** Pamukkale - Information on day trips from Marmaris to Pamukkale
*** Jeep Safari - Details of Jeep Safari trips you can book from Marmaris
*** Turkish Bath - If you ahve ever wanted a Turkish Bath, details are provided here
*** Rafting - Information on how to book a day out rafting
*** Diving - Fancy diving? This page tells you all about diving from Marmaris
*** Ephesus - Details on how to book a trip to the ancient city of Ephesus
*** Turkish Night - If you want a Turkish night out, visit this page
*** Cleopatra Island - Details of how to book a trip to Cleopatra Island
*** Boat Trip - Aegean Coast boat trips, how to go about booking them
*** Beach Party - Book a beach party, somewhere near Marmaris!
*** Water Parks - Visit the Atlantis Water Park or the Aqua Dream Water Park
* Nightlife
*** Nightclubs - A guide to popular night clubs in Marmaris
*** Talk of the Town - A review of the "talk of the town" night club
* Places to Eat
*** Restaurants - A guide to some of the restaurants of Marmaris
*** Cafe Bars - A guide to Cafes and Bars in Marmaris
* Places to Stay
*** Hotel - Information about the Romance Hotel, Marmaris
An image of the Romance Hotel, Marmaris
*** Apartment Hotel - 1 apartment available for rent in Marmaris
*** Villas for Rent - Details of 2 Marmaris villas available for rent
* Private Tours
*** Private Boat Tours - Information about boat tours, you can book from Marmaris
*** Private Gulets - 2 Gulets available for hire in Marmaris
*** Private Land Tours - 2 Tours available to visitors to the area


There is also useful information on the homepage about:
* Dalaman Airport Transfers - Details about how to get transferred from Dalaman to your hotel/apartment
* Rent a Car - Information on how to rent a car from the Marmaris area
* Forum - Visit the forum to ask/answer questions about Marmaris and also to read other answers
* Marmaris Maps - Maps of the Marmaris area
A Map of the Marmaris area, taken from the Photo Gallery
* Photo Galleries - An extensive photo gallery of c750 photos of the Marmaris area
* Google Currency Converter - A handy currency converter
* English to Turkish Translator



Overall the website has a mass of information about the city of Marmaris. A search on Google suggests there are about 1350 pages.

The Home Page has a Google Page Rank of 4 and the Alexa Rank is 1,127,199 - these are both quite impressive and suggest a popular site. http://www.marmaris.org is strongly recommended for those fact-finding ahead of a trip to Marmaris.

Review of All About Turkey from Burak Sansal - http://www.allaboutturkey.com

Today we review http://www.allaboutturkey.com, this is a website produced by tour guide, Burak Sansal.

With a Google Page Rank of 6 and Alexa Rank of 225,944 the site is certainly popular with both search engines and visitors, this is always a good sign!

The website is available in eight languages (English, Italian, Spanish, French, German, Russian, Arabic and Hindi) - surprisingly with this many languages there is no Turkish version.

The navigation on the front page takes the visitor to the following links:
* Regions of Turkey - This provides information about the seven regions of Turkey - Marmara, Aegean, Black Sea, Central Anatolia, Eastern Anatolia, South East Anatolia and Mediterranean. Clicking on any of the regions drills down to further detailed content
* Top Tourist Sites - About 70 Tourist sites are detailed here. Click the link and read up on your favorites. Two examples would include Mount Ararat and Diyarbakir
Aspendos Theatre near Antalya
* History - For a Tourist site there is a very detailed historical section. There are about 100 pages covering all kinds of historical Turkish topics. Examples include Christianity in Turkey, Ottoman Women and Kenan Evren.
* Culture - There are about 75 pages of information, jam packed with interesting content about Turkish Culture. These are broken down into the following sub-sections: folk culture, arts, turkish cuisine (e.g. Turkish Tea), sports, literature & entertainment, architecture (e.g. Turkish Baths in Istanbul), government, animals and other (e.g. Marriage in Turkey)
Whirling Dervish
* Islam - There is a large section on the Islamic faith in Turkey. Once again, this is unusual for a tourist site, but provides great background and awareness for the potential tourist. Of particular interest to tourists are likely to be the major mosques of Istanbul and religious sites in Turkey.
* Tourism Info - So only now, do we get around to the tourist information! There are 34 sections of information, which provides masses of items of interest for the tourist. I didn't want you to miss this info, so the headings are all detailed here:
Local time in Turkey, Getting to Turkey, Passport and visa information & Visa Fees for Turkey, Turkish holidays, Historical and cultural sites, Fairs, festivals and events & Events Calendar, Turkish facts and statistics, Interesting facts about Turkey, Turkey's physical geography, Detailed Road Map & Interactive Maps,
Seas of Turkey, Turkey's lakes - Van Lake & Tuz (Salt) Lake, Turkey's rivers - Euphrates & Tigris, Turkish climate, Earthquakes in Turkey, Tulips of Turkey, Turkey's flora & fauna, National parks, Thermal Springs (Spa), Yachting regulations & Marinas, The Turkish flag, Solar Eclipses in Turkey, Buying property in Turkey, Marriage for Foreigners in Turkey, Foreign embassies and consulates in Turkey, Turkish embassies and consulates abroad, Turkish information offices, International airlines in Turkey,
Hostels in Turkey, Hotels in Istanbul & Ankara & Izmir, Restaurants in Istanbul & Ankara & Izmir & Antalya, Hospitals in Istanbul & Ankara & Izmir & Antalya, Useful phone numbers and Area codes in Turkey
*My Tours - This is a section detailing the tours offered by Burak Sansal. Well worth reading through if you like the thought of an organised tour to Turkey.
*Photos Gallery - There are 32 photos in the gallery, these are high quality. All images included in this review are from this gallery.
Balloon Trips in Cappadocia
*About us - There is additional useful information about the site in this section


To conclude, the site has very rich content. I think there is something for anyone who is interested in a trip to Turkey. What I like about this site is that it fills gaps missed by other websites and provides that difficult to find sort of content, or I never thought about that. This website is highly recommended and well worth a visit.

Also catch-up with Burak at:
* Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/pages/All-About-Turkey/315572777976
* Twitter - http://www.twitter.com/allaboutturkey
* Blog - http://allaboutturkey.com/about.htm#blog
* RSS Feed - http://allaboutturkey.com/about.htm#rss

Fun in Bodrum a review of http://www.bodrumfun.com/

Today we turn our attention to the massive tourist destination that is Bodrum. The website we are focusing upon is exclusively devoted to all things Bodrum, the website is called http://www.bodrumfun.com/ - so why not have some fun in Bodrum?

A sample screenshot of BodrumFun.com

The main areas of navigation that appear at the top of the page are:
* Home - A link to the Home Page
* News - The latest news from the Bodrum area. Fore example "Bodrum is the place to be for Middle Eastern Royalty".
* Highlights - The latest information on Bodrum highlights and events.
* Culture - A review of the culture of Bodrum over the centuries. Learn about the Bodrum Ampitheatre, Bodrum Castle, Zeki Muren Museum and the Bodrum Museum of Underwater Archaeology as examples
* Shopping - Advice about shopping in the Bodrum area
* Restaurants - A guide to restaurants in and around Bodrum
* Hotels - A review of 4 of the leading hotels in and around Bodrum
* Nightlife - A guide about the Halikarnas club in Bodrum

Also on the home page are a leading article, this is a recent article discussing Bodrum. There are also 5 recent and 5 popular news links.

The Bodrum Ampitheatre

Overall I found the site well worth a visit. The site can quickly be read as there are only about 90 pages, but the quality of the content there is very good.

Visit this site for sure, if you plan to make a visit to Bodrum in the near future.

Turkey 4 Travel a review of http://www.turkey4travel.com

Today we focus on the website, turkey4travel.com - At the time of writing this was ranked at 1,632,034 by Alexa and the Home Page had a Page Rank of 4 - so overall a fairly popular site.

Screenshot of home page of Turkey4Travel.com

So what's within the site, what is there to see? The Navigation is:
* Home Page - The usual, a link to everything else on the site
* About Turkey - Some interesting facts, such as map of Turkey, regions, cities and natural facts
* Turkey Facts - General facts. The Turkish Flag, a lot of general information, embassies and consulates in Turkey
* Where to Go - A tourist guide to locations such as Istanbul, Antalya, Mugla, Aydin, Izmir and Canakkale - Click the link and read up information such as monuments, landmarks, ancient cities, museums, churches, mosques and touristic places.
* Turkey Weather - Brief information about what to expect from the Turkish weather
* Transport & Tourist Offices - A list by country of the tourist offices for countries around the world, useful information!
* Health & Safety - Information about health services and how to remain safe in Turkey
* Turkish Money & Currency Info - Information such as exchange rate, credit cards/ATM's and how to get a VAT refund
* What to Buy - A guide to items to buy in Turkey, e.g. leather, carpets, silk, earthenware, etc
* Visa & Entry Requirements - Information about visa requirements and how to gain entry to Turkey, information provided per country

In the middle of the homepage are three sections of additional content:
* Recent Entries - Details of recent articles added to the site, as an example - Istanbul, 2010 European Capital of Culture
* Popular Destinations - Content about popular destinations in Turkey - Click the link and read information about it, for example the Hagia Sofia Museum in Istanbul

The Blue Mosque in Istanbul - http://www.flickr.com/photos/myhsu/

* Popular Holiday Places - Details about tourist resorts such as Altinkum, Fethiye, Marmaris, Bodrum, Bozcaada, Belek, Side and Antalya

Overall the site is an excellent place to go to find out useful information for your trip to Turkey. I even found the Google Adsense adverts both relevant and interesting, these included some good priced offers for trips to Turkey.

If the website isn't enough, you can also join the Facebook group at http://www.facebook.com/turkey4travel.

Turkey Herald, Turkish News Delivered Online - Review of http://turkeyherald.com

Today's review is of the Turkey Herald website - this can be found at http://www.turkeyherald.com

Some of you might be thinking, is this stretching it a bit to be a travel website? Well actually no, the Turkey Herald contains a lot of information relevant to the traveller, they promote themselves as "Online Tourism News". I would say any potential visitor to Turkey should checkout the site and read some of the latest and archived news stories.



For example today's headlines relevant to Tourists include:
1) Orhan Academia Opens in Kusadasi
2) Havva Hanım delights with garden breakfast on Turkish Aegean
3) Golf in Turkey

If you look through the site and use the search you will find a rich variety of travel related articles.

Sections of the website include:
- Areas - Content for Alanya, Antalya, Bodrum, Dalyan, Didim, Istanbul, Kalkan, Kusadasi, Marmaris and Olu Deniz
- Property - Sales, Vacation Rentals, Mortgages, Insurance, Currency Exchange, Buying Advice, Questions,
- Travel - Questions, Car Hire, Flights, Currency, Travel Currency, Travel Shopping, Climate, Food & Drink, Restaurant Guide, Visas, Weddings and Public Holidays
- Leisure - Golfing and diving in Turkey
- Guides - A range of guides to Turkey
- Lifestyle - Expat, relocating to Turkey, Residents Permit and Working in Turkey
- Interactive - Articles, Have Your Say, Turkey After Dark, Bar Spy, Recipes and Your Photos
- Contact - General contact details, includes advertising rates and writing for the Turkey Herald
- Forum - There is a forum, but to be honest this seems to be infrequently used
- Photos - There is a photo gallery, which at the time of writing had about 1,300 photos about Turkey, e.g.



There really is a lot to read on the website. The only thing I can advise is to make a visit and decide fore yourself. In the meantime, all I can say is that the site is highly recommended.

Republic of Turkey Ministry of Culture and Tourism Website review - http://www.turizm.gov.tr

For those wanting to visit Turkey a visit to the Republic of Turkey Ministry of Culture and Tourism Website is a must. Simply visit http://www.turizm.gov.tr

The site is jam packed with information and is available in the following languages - Turkish, English, German, French, Russian, Spanish, Arabic and Chinese. For the purposes of this review I have used the English version!




The home page has links to all the following topics:
Atatürk - 14 sections of content about the first President of Turkey (1881 - 1938)
History - 8 sections, details the history of Turkey including the Ottoman Empire and the truth abour Armenia
Ministry - 4 sections about the government of Turkey and ongoing projects/works
City Guide - Provides information about 80+ Turkish cities, all with their own separate page. Why not visit Batman province? - Clicking on a link then provides further drilldown information about that city/province
Culture - 15 sections of content covering a wide variety of information about Turkish cultures. For example landmarks, folk dances, costumes, romany culture and much more..
Tourism - 12 sections of content about Tourism. Aimed specifically at the tourist, this section provides information on subjects such as activities, destinations, regions and again much more..
Art - 4 sections of content covering topics such as visual arts, auditory arts and traditional arts - well worth a read.
Archaeology - 9 sections about the wonderful history of Turkey. This covers topics such as museums, historic places (e.g. Ephesus), archaeology, world heritage list, etc - this is a must visit for the would be traveller to Turkey!
Publications - Read through the list of official publications of the Ministry
Stolen Works - Regrettably Turkey has suffered with many items being stolen. Learn all about these items in this section, maybe you can help to get them recovered?
Virtual Tour - Click this to see 39 virtual tours, providing a vast array of information about Turkey and its treasured tourist attractions
Photograph Gallery - Literally hundreds of photographs, such as this photo of Aydin
News and Announcements - General news and announcements, which are broken down and analysed by year
Useful Links - Some links to the most important Tourist websites, relating to Turkey


Also contained towards the bottom of the home page are links to:
- The European Culture Portal
- Culture and Tourism TV
- Tourism Development Regions
- Culture Music
- Promotional Films of Turkey
- T.E.D.A. Translation Subvention Project
- Frankfurt Book Fair
- Tourism Strategy of Turkey
- TTN Tim Trade Net
- Foreign Economic Relations Board
- Tourism Statistics


This website is very heavily recommended for all visitors to Turkey. Certainly give this website a visit in preparation for your next trip to Turkey.

Turkey/Turkish Flag and Country Information - http://www.flagsinformation.com/turkish-country-flag.html

Welcome to my review for today, this is the site - FlagsInformation.com and their Turkey page. First of all a confession, I run this site! I know this is a bit of shameless promotion but I think this site does offer value to the traveller to Turkey.

The site offers information for over 240 countries, so you can also look-up other destinations too.

Here is a summary of what you will find on the Turkey page:
- The formal name of Turkey
- The local name
- The local formal name
- The region / continent
- Associations / Memberships
- Capital City
- Main Cities
- ISO Code
- Population
- Area (size in km²)
- Currency
- Languages
- Religions

You can download a small version of the Turkish flag:


Or if you prefer something larger, you could try downloading a large flag:


The page finishes with some information about the Turkish flag itself, you can find:
- Date flag first adopted
- Description - Explaining what the flag looks like


I definitely think this page will be of interest to the traveller to Turkey. Why not take a look and decide for yourself?

> There are also links to main menu items, you can find flags and country information from 240+ countries through these links-
A-Z - An A (Abkhazia) - Z (Zimbabwe) listing of all the countries in the world,
Area & Region - The size in km² and continent of each country,
Blog & News - A link to the FlagsInformation.com Blog and latest flag news,
Capital Cities and Populations - A list of all the capital cities in the world and country populations,
Currencies - Listing of all the currencies in use by country,
Flag Terms - Explaining flag terms used throughout the site,
Home Page - A link to the home page,
ISO Codes - A list of all the ISO country codes,
Languages - a list of common languages in use by country and
Religions - a list of popular religions by country.

HomeAway Holiday Rentals - Turkey Website review - http://www.holiday-rentals.co.uk/Turkey/r66.htm

The HomeAway Holiday Rentals site is a great place to visit to find villas and self-catering accommodation in Turkey. The website can be found at - http://www.holiday-rentals.co.uk/Turkey/r66.htm

Villas Dream and Star Villa in Kalkan

The site is operated by HomeAway, who are a global leading villa and accommodation rental organisation, with over 220,000 villa listed worldwide. The villas aren't owned by HomeAway, instead they are an agent and they list villas privately owned.

Duggan Holiday Apartment in Oba

For the country of Turkey, they have a large selection of 868 (as at 29/03/2011) villas, these are available all across Turkey. For individual locations, click these links:
> Akbuk - 8
> Alanya - 47
> Altinkum - 9
> Aydin - 14
> Antalya - 46
> Ayvalik - 1
> Belek - 30
> Black Sea Coast - 1
> Bodrum - 146
> Bursa - 2
> Calis Beach - 6
> Central Anatolia - 3
> Cesme - 1
> Dalaman - 25
> Dalyan - 32
> Datca - 8
> Fethiye - 74
> Gocek - 21
> Hisaronu - 12
> Istanbul - 71
> Izmir - 18
> Kalkan - 137
> Karaburun - 1
> Kas - 53
> Kayakoy - 19
> Koycegiz - 1
> Kusadasi - 15
> Manavgat - 8
> Marmaris - 24
> Mugla - 7
> Oludeniz - 11
> Olympos - 1
> Ovacik - 20
> Turunc - 3
> Uzumlu - 15


For each property you can see details such as property id#, rental rate, location, property type, number of bedrooms, bathrooms, number of people the property sleeps, size of property in m². Also you can view facilities such as whether the apartment has a private pool, communal pool, garden, terrace, is it suitable for children, are pets allowed?, air-conditioning, satellite, cable, internet access, dishwasher.

When you are viewing multiple properties there is a useful compare option, where you can see summary detail of each property, side by side.

You can view images of the property (the quality and number varies per property), there is also a map of how to find the property too. Travel details to each property are provided (e.g. nearest airport, nearest ferry, nearest beach and whether a car is necessary).

There is an overview description of each property, explaining its charms and also you can see a calendar so you can see, which weeks are still available to book. A list of rental rates are provided, these tend to vary by week, so make sure you read the prices for the week you are interested in.

There are contact details of the owner, normally phone/e-mail. You will for most properties find a full itinerary of what is included in the property - try clicking http://www.holiday-rentals.co.uk/Turkey/holiday-villa-Turkish-Aegean-Region/p14600.htm?uni_id=43193 as an example and view the contents.

There is a lot to read, so if you want to know more, it is advisable to view the site.

The Hisar Holiday Villa in Ovacik

About this site - http://turkeytravelsites.blogspot.com

Hi,

I've created this blog, to bring you a range of interesting websites all relating to travelling in Turkey.

Each day the aim is to bring you a new site. I will review the site, tell you what is good (and maybe what is bad!) about the site. You can use these reviews to fast track your research ahead of your next trip to Turkey.

We will be featuring all of the major destinations such as Marmaris, Istanbul, Cappadocia, Fethiye, etc We will also be featuring attractions, places to go/visit, etc

The key to this site though will be that we will feature a different site each day, so this could be about a specific location (e.g. Altinkum), about a specific activity (e.g. diving) or about an aid to tourists (e.g. a Vacation Rentals, Hotels or Car Rental site, maybe).

If you have any comments i'd be delighted to read them, but please no spam, I will only delete it! If you want your site listed, please contact me and I will review the site and there are no guarantees but it might get included at some future date.

Above all enjoy Turkey!