Ferry Cruise on the Bosporus

In this video, we pass under the Bosporus Bridge (the first intercontinental bridge, built in 1973) on the ride back to Istanbul. With over 20 million people in its metropolitan area, Istanbul straddles the Bosporus. The historic old town and modern business district occupy the European side, while more residential and modern neighborhoods sit on the Asian side. The 20-mile-long Bosporus gives Turkey tremendous control over maritime traffic. It provides the only ocean access for Georgia, Ukraine, Romania, and Bulgaria (plus several other nations using the Danube like Moldova, Hungary, and Serbia) as well as Russia's access to the Mediterranean. Since signing the Montreux Convention in 1936, Turkey maintained open navigation through the Dardanelles and Bosporus. The republic knows what conflagration might ensue if it deviated from that agreement. As a result, many adversarial ships could pass within meters of one another on the Bosporus. The strait has a strong surface current flowing south from the Black Sea to the Ægean. A deep, saltier current runs along the bottom towards the north. Ancient mariners devised a method of lowering jars off their boats to let the deep current pull them north. With a dozen sharp turns in the Bosporus, a number of maritime accidents occurred before Turkey began requiring local pilots to steer vessels in recent decades. Various collisions caused fires and oil spills. In one case, a lady living along the Bosporus in Istanbul found the bow of a disabled ship in her living room! On the recommendation of Rick Steves' book, I took the ferry cruise up and down the Bosporus. It goes from Istanbul's Sirkeci ferry terminal to Anadolu Kavağı near the entrance to the Black Sea. At Anadolu Kavağı, you can tour a ruined Byzantine castle up on the hill. The idea of this little cruise sounded both relaxing and interesting (a three-triangle rating in the book). I felt disappointed in both regards. It takes a long time to go a short distance up and down the strait. The 2.5 hours spent in Anadolu Kavağı entailed dodging aggressive restauranteurs in town and trudging uphill to see fragments of a castle. One could argue that I needed an "off-day" after the exhausting week I had endured thus far. But for those of you going to Istanbul, I would not recommend taking the Bosporus cruise unless you have at least five days in the city to spend. Otherwise, you can find better uses for your time in a city with so much to see.