The Rough Guide to Turkey, 5th Edition [Paperback]

Rough Guides (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 28, 2003

This fully revised and thoroughly updated fifth edition of "The Rough Guide to Turkey" provides an insider's handbook to the country. A full colour section introduces Turkey's highlights, from the markets of Istanbul to the rock churches of Cappadocia. There are informed accounts of the country's wide-ranging sights and incisive reviews of the best places to eat, sleep and drink in every price range. Throughout the guide there is practical advice on everything from bazaar shopping to chartering a yacht. The authors also provide expert background on Turkish history, literature, music and film.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Marc Dubin has coached, trained, hiked, flown, driven, dived or floated his way through most regions of Turkey since his first trip in 1982. Rosie Ayliffe first went to Turkey in 1985 to teach English. On discovering the taste of fresh figs, she decided to stay for three years, working as a teacher and travel guide. John Gawthrop hast travelled thropughout Turkey, from Istanbul to the moutains of the remote south-east.

Product Details

• Paperback: 1088 pages
• Publisher: Rough Guides; 5th edition (July 28, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1843530716
• ISBN-13: 978-1843530718
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.1 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,103,946 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars I won't buy Rough Guide again..., January 24, 2004

By 

fredekr (on the road) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Rough Guide to Turkey, 5th Edition (Paperback)

This was my wife and my second visit to Turkey. We're budget travelers/backpackers. The first time (1 month), we used the Lonely Planet, which wasn't great either. This time (6 weeks) we tried the Rough Guide. What a mistake! Here are some of the problems we had:
- Everything is written as if you have your own car. Lip service is paid to public/alternative forms of transport, but rarely is any useful information given.
- The author(s) must have had their own car, or relied heavily on taxis, because walking even a kilometer seems anathemic: the book frequently suggests that you bargain hard for a taxi if arriving someplace at odd hours, despite the fact that the city center and hotels area kilometer or less away. This pattern is repeated with sites as well: the author's favorite phrase must be: "really only practiable if you have your own transport..." Even a moderately fit person could get to many places that were described this way, even if you only walk 1km/hour.
- Consistent with the above, the author obviously zipped around on a $100+/day budget, because the budget accomidation options are poorly researched, often placed wrong on maps, or absent entirely.
- No sense of the relative merit of sites is given. If you want to wander aimlessly, and, in my opinion, waste your time, this book is fine. However, Turkey is large enough that even with plenty of time one can only hope to cover a fraction of the worthwhile places to visit: hence, we need some indication of the better places to spend our time.
- The overall tone of the book is seems to be geared towards a vacationer who wants to mix a little history with beach and booze. It seemed that the most important thing to note about a town was: where can you find liquor? What's the hip place? I would have liked to see more along the lines of interesting places to eat: for example, "this popular pastanesi is Antakya is visited for its..."
- Lack of a map for towns that many travelers will need to visit. Fortunately, many tourist office will have a town plan, assuming you can catch them during business hours. But no map for Gaziantep?? Give me a break. (The town is a transport hub, and worth visiting anyway for the stunning -- newly unearthed -- mosaics in the museum; far better than the renowned ones in Antakya.)

These are the big problems, the other minor inaccuracies and inconsistencies were so frequent that I became accustomed to them. At least now I know what to expect from Rough Guides!

12 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars worse than no guide at all, November 17, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Rough Guide to Turkey, 5th Edition (Paperback)

We were in Istanbul recently and purchased this guide to help us get around. It was worse than useless. There wasn't enough information cautioning us against using the taxis (which are notorious for ripping off tourists), and the guide didn't offer much helpful advice on using the bus, except to say that it wasn't safe. After getting really ripped off by a cab driver, we figured out the bus system on our own and found it to be clean, safe, efficient, and reliable--obviously regular Turks use this, no problem. Much nicer, in fact, than taking the bus in most U.S. cities. To make things worse, the restaurant reviews were out of date--of 2 Chinese restaurants recommended by this guide, one had gone out of business some time ago, and the other, said to be "popular with the local Chinese community," seemed to be entirely staffed by non-Chinese Turks who served lousy food. I especially disliked the guide author's tendency to use Turkish words without translating them, especially when those words were not in the glossary in the back of the book and were not in the index either. Finally, the maps were not very good and difficult to find in the book.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent guide for budget travelers, December 11, 2005

By 

H. Stevens (San Francisco) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Rough Guide to Turkey, 5th Edition (Paperback)

We travel extensively all over the world and have consistently found the Rough Guide series to be the most in-depth, accurate, an useful. The guide to Turkey is no exception. On our trip last year, we used the Rough Guide to find many exceptional and cheap restaurants, often eating for less than $5 a meal for two. When we did not use the book to locate a place to eat, we were disappointed with overpriced, unimpressive fare. Likewise, the hotel we selected in Instanbul using the Rough Guide was exactly as the book described: well located (half-mile from Aya Sofia), incredible value, friendly staff, free Turkish tea, nice free breakfast, and very friendly staff. Venturing out of Instanbul without a car I think would be difficult, as the book points out. I think that is a fair warning, and the authors of the book should not be criticized for cautioning travelers that public transport outside of the cities is somewhat lacking. Another benefit of the Rough Guide is that it often includes interesting sites a little off the beaten path that other travelers often miss and complete enough descriptions to help you appreciate them.