Many people confuse Turkey’s Bosphorus for a river. It is a 32-kilometer strait that connects the Black Sea on the north to the Sea of Marmara on the south. It is also the geographical boundary between Asia and Europe, making Turkey the only country that belongs to two continents. The Bosphorus is also the world’s narrowest strait used for navigation.
A visit to Istanbul will never be complete if a Bosphorus Cruise is omitted, thus, my group, composed of family and friends, decided to rent a private yacht to take us on a 90-minute sail up and down the strait, while being served unlimited champagne and canapes along the way.
Furthermore, it was nice to have our tour guide cruise along with us because he identified the important landmarks we saw on both sides of the waterway.
For starters, I learned from him a very important fact – 97 percent of Turkey’s land area belongs to Asia and only 3 percent belongs to the European continent.
Why is the Bosphorus important to Turkey? Through the Black Sea, vessels can sail to the Mediterranean Sea, then on to the Atlantic Ocean via Gibraltar, and to the Indian Ocean via the Suez Canal. Moreover, it is a precious route for the passage of goods from Russia.
What are the important landmarks along the Bosphorus? As we started to sail, we right away saw the medieval Ottoman Rumeli Fortress, which can be seen on a series of hills on the European banks of the strait. It is located on the narrowest portion of the Bosphorus and was built to create a military-financial control point for passing ships.
On the Asian banks of the strait, we saw the Kuleli Military High School, the oldest in Turkey. Built by an Ottoman Sultan, this is where Florence Nightingale served because, during the Crimean War, this was converted into a British military hospital. She brought with her a team of 38 volunteer nurses to care for the British soldiers. The nurses discovered that the hospital lacked medicines and other essentials.
Hygiene was neglected and infections were rampant. So, Nightingale took it upon herself to purchase towels, basins, soaps, and shirts for the soldiers. She would personally check on each wounded soldier’s condition, going around at night with a lamp. This led to her having gained worldwide recognition as “The Lady With A Lamp.” Now, the Kuleli Military High School is a museum.
We saw another exquisite structure, the Beylerbeyi Palace, also known as the Second Palace. It used to be the residence of the sultans of the Ottoman Empire. Now it is where visiting foreign heads of state and other dignitaries stay when they are in Turkey. Many people notice the similarity of this palace with that in Versailles, France.
One of the visiting dignitaries who stayed at the Beylerbeyi was Empress Eugenie who was so captivated by the palace’s windows that she ordered the same ones to be built at the Tuileries Palace in Paris.
We then proceeded to see the Museum of Sabanci Olgunlasma Enstitusu, a pink edifice on the Asian banks of the strait. It has more than 700 original pieces on display, all collected from the 18th and 19th centuries. These items are mostly embroidered materials ornamented with traditional gold wires and silk threads. Entrance to the museum is free.
Another popular landmark along the Bosphorus is the Maiden’s Tower, found on a small islet at its southern entrance, and it has a beautiful story attached to it. An oracle prophesied that the Emperor’s much-beloved daughter would be killed by a snake bite on her 18th birthday. So, the Emperor had the tower built on the Bosphorus and had his daughter locked up there to protect her from snakes. He was the only one who could visit his daughter.
Finally, on her 18th birthday, the emperor gifted her with a basket of fruits, very happy that he had succeeded in protecting his daughter from snakes. Unfortunately, an asp has been hiding among the fruits and it bit the daughter who died in her father’s arms, just as it was prophesied.
One sees many other beautiful landmarks along this important Turkish strait, but describing them thoroughly here would still not be as good as when one sees it for himself. So, embrace the beauty of a land that offers awesome culture and rich history…a land that brings the best of two continents. Add a Bosphorus Cruise to your bucket list.
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YOUR MONDAY CHUCKLE:
A naked woman robbed a bank filled with men. She ran away scot-free with her loot of millions…nobody could remember her face!
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