Access Istanbul Editorial Team 
The M11 metro is cheaper and runs on a fixed schedule to Gayrettepe, where most city-bound travellers change onto the M2 line. The Havaist coach costs more but stops directly at named locations across the city, with no transfer at all. Which one actually gets you to your hotel faster depends on where you’re going, … Read more
Balık ekmek is grilled or fried fish in half a loaf of bread, sold from boats moored along the Eminönü waterfront on the Golden Horn, just west of the Galata Bridge. You order at a window on the boat, hand over cash, and walk away with a sandwich. The trap starts after that: a table … Read more
Marmaray is the rail tunnel that runs under the Bosphorus itself, linking the European and Asian sides of Istanbul by train rather than by boat or bridge. It opened in October 2013, takes the same İstanbulkart as every bus, tram and ferry in the city, and moves commuters and long-distance rail traffic through a tube … Read more
Istanbul runs on cards for the metro, the trams and most restaurants and shops. Cash still rules two corners of the city: small vendors and market stalls, and a handful of museum ticket booths where card machines are not installed at all. State museums also charge two different prices for the same ticket — one … Read more
Why the market closes The Grand Bazaar closes every Sunday. Its shopkeepers treat it as their one full day off in a six-day working week. The closure is not religious. It is a labour pattern, set by the market’s own tradesmen, and it applies on public holidays too. The bazaar traces back to a covered … Read more
Dress covers shoulders, knees and hair for women; shoes come off at the door. That part is easy and every guide says it. The part that actually ruins visits is timing: mosques in Istanbul close to sightseers around each of the five daily prayers, those times move every single day, and Friday closes them for … Read more
The straight answer The Bosphorus ferry is a scheduled municipal boat. It happens to sail past some of the best views in Istanbul. It runs on a timetable, stops at fixed piers, and takes the İstanbulkart, the same card used on the bus and the tram. The boats moored beside it selling “Bosphorus cruises” are … Read more
İstanbulkart is a single rechargeable card that pays for almost every form of public transport in Istanbul: the trams, the metro lines, city buses, the funiculars up the steep hills, Marmaray under the Bosphorus, and the public ferries across it. You tap it on a reader at entry (and on some lines at exit too), … Read more