Annabelle Thorpe writes her travelogue of our April 2026 Lycian Coast tour: Day six of my first ever Esplora Travel tour along the beautiful, history-rich coast of Lycian Türkiye, and I didn’t think there was anything that could impress me more than what I had already seen. I’d stood at the top of the spectacular…
In search of Ferhad and Şirin – Turkey’s most well-known love story Written after a visit to Amasya by Damian Croft in 1999. First published in: ANATOLIAN ARCHAEOLOGY Research Reports of the British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara Volume 6 (2000). Published again on www.florencestudios.com and reproduced here by the original author, Damian Croft “You…
The north east of Turkey was once part of the Georgian Kingdom of Iberia and there are still some interesting Georgian churches to be found in the area. In the 9th and 10th centuries the Çoruh river valley was part of the Tao-Klarjeti region ruled by the Bagrationi dynasty – the founder of which had…
One of the great differences between the Ancient Greek and Roman civilisations is that whilst the former were predominantly seafarers (the exception of course, was Alexander the Great), the Romans preferred to travel by land. The Ancient Greek civilisation was therefore largely confined to the Mediterranean, whilst Roman civilisation extended throughout Europe, Asia Minor, into…
Two episodes in my life had spurred my interest to go to Mardin – the first was reading William Dalrymple’s splendid “From the Holy Mountain” in which he describes his visits to a handful of Syrian Orthodox monasteries in the South East of Turkey. The second has been a long-standing fascination and admiration for all…
Our first thoughts of Turkish cooking are of a late-night doner kebab grabbed on the way home after and evening’s drinking, but closer reflection will remind us that Turkish cuisine is widely regarded as one of the great cuisines of the world. As well as sharing much in common with other cuisines of the Mediterranean…
