Turkey Hotels

Other Reviews from VirtualTourist Members

2 star or 4 star?: What do those stars tell you?

by TheWanderingCamel

Having recently travelled around Turkey - Istanbul, the Aegean coast and Eastern Anatolia - and stayed in a wide variety of hotels along the way, it's been an interesting exercise to look at the reviews others have written about some of these hotels. What is very noticeable is how often people question the star rating of the places they have stayed, the most common complaint being 4 star hotels that fail to live up to their expectations.

Photo: One of these has 4 stars

Four star to most people means very high standards of cleanliness, comfort and efficiency as well as decor, food and service. A good location is also part of the equation. It doesn't quite work that way in Turkey where hotel star ratings are based on the facilities and amenities provided. The more amenities a hotel provides, the higher the star rating. How they are delivered doesn't come into it - so a run-down place with shabby decor and surly staff that has a mini-bar and hair-dryer in every room, wifi (even if it doesn't work), airconditioning (maybe noisy and stuck on freezing), a swimming pool (full of leaves), fitness room (2 bent bycycles and an ancient weights machine) and a lift that fits 1 person and half a suitcase will get more stars than a spotlessly clean hotel run with smiling efficiency by a staff who will cheerfully carry your bags up the stairs for you and squeeze fresh orange juice every morning rather than set out dispensers of reconstituted powdered juice but can't give you a hairdryer or an provide overpriced can of Coke from a fridge in the corner.

So how do you choose? The website shows photos that look great, you've read the reviews on Trip Advisor, booking.com and perhaps a whole host of other booking sites. Can you believe them? Not always.

Word of mouth and recommendations from people you have a connection with is always best but if that's not possible, I'd check out guide books and VT first, then take a look at Trip Advisor and maybe a hotel booking site.

This is not critique of hotel prices per se but more a note about how the hotel rating system works in Turkey (and some other countries), just one example of how we shouldn't assume that what we take as the norm is going to be the norm in another country.

This review compares two Istabul hotels we stayed in during the first week of our Turkey tour. We booked ourselves into the 3* Sebnem and paid 90 euro a night for a standard double room for the days we spent in the city prior to the start of our tour.. Our stay at the 4* Arcadia was part of the organised tour and I have no doubt there was a discount for a group booking but had we booked ourselves the rate would have been 140 euro. Read the review and decide for yourself which hotel gave the best value and whether the star rating system is a reliable guide.

A private home in Orselli: No Trip Advisor or booking.com here

by TheWanderingCamel

Photo:
1. Orselli night
2. Making new friends
3. Dinner's over
4. Orselli dawn
5. Breakfast

Hotels come in all styles and sizes, offering a whole range of experiences, but one thing never changes - the guest is always on one side of the reception desk, the staff are on the other. A real highlight of our Turkey trip was the chance to step around that desk and spend a night with a Turkish village family. The village was Orselli, way off the well beaten tourist track between Behramkale and Bergama (Hellenic Assos and Pergamon) in Western Anatolia, and we were there as guests of the village's carpet weavers of the DOBAG project.

Our tour was organized by the Australian representatives of the project, a great couple who have been travelling to Turkey for 15 years now, during which time they have become real friends with the Orselli weavers and time spent in this village (and others) is always an integral part of their annual tours.

We arrived in the late afternoon, with time for tea, to meet family and friends and take a stroll around the village before dinner which we ate sitting on the ground on a terrace spread with Dobag rugs. Dinner over, the dishes washed and put away, it was time for bed - village life means early to bed and early to rise. Where were we to sleep? The options were in the house, in the rug storage room or on the terrace, under the oak trees and the stars. We all chose the last option.

Bed rolls, sheets, pillows and blankets were brought up from the rug room and spread out on the rugs. One by one we made our way down the path to the little wash-house and then it was time to crawl in between the sheets and snuggle down for the night. We all slept the sleep of the dead, only waking as dawn began to break, filling the sky with a gorgeous peachy light. Much wriggling and twisting ensued as we dressed, staying under our bedding to do so to preserve the sensibilities of our hosts as much as our own modesty.

Bedding all put away, it was time for breakfast before setting off to meet more of the village women in their homes, watching and learning about their weaving as we went. A visit to the school and then it was time to move on.

Of course we're not the only people the village plays host to in this way, but everyone who comes does so through some contact with the DOBAG project. I know there's a Norwegian company that regularly arranges a tour that visits Orselli. There may of course be others in other countries.

Orselli is the centre of one of two DOBAG cooperatives, the other is in Avyacik. It is possible to contact both groups and arrange a visit though I don't know whether an overnight stay is an option in this case.

Savon, Antakya (Hatay): Savvy Savon

by TheWanderingCamel

Photos:
1. Pretty entrance
2. Standard rooms
3. Courtyard tables
4. Love those arches
5. Street frontage

Converting a 19th century soap factory near Hatay's souk into a smart and comfortable boutique hotel has created a great addition to the city's hotel scene. The rooms are on a par with 4* hotels anywhere (and about as distinctive) but the public areas of the foyer and lounges are lovely- big, stone vaulted spaces furnished with plush seating and elegant antiques, creating a sophistcated, stylish look that is matched by the efficient service and the quality stock in the small gift shop. Most of the usual 4* amenities are available, though if, like us, you're only there for a night, the only ones you're likely to be interested in are the internet (free Wifi), television (some English language channels), airconditioning and heating (we needed neither in September so I can't say) and breakfast (room service available but we chose the courtyard).

For once we didn't eat dinner in the hotel but the bougainvillea-bedecked courtyard was a great place to take breakfast, chosen from the buffet laid out in the restaurant. No surprises in the breakfast but everything was very fresh - yoghurt, breads, fruit, cheese, tomatoes, etc with eggs cooked to order.

Our room had a window overlooking the courtyard, others in our group scored a room with only a skylight - such are the hazards of converting old buildings.

Our stay at the Savon was a Sunday, and it was blissfully quiet inside the courtyard walls. I think I would be wary of staying there on a Saturday night - something tells me this place is a favourite wedding venue - and, in Turkey that means loud and long. If you're on an itinerary that brings you to Antakya on a Saturday night - pack some earplugs.

The hotel is located in a quite interesting part of the old town, near the souk, but a fair walk from other places of interest such as the museum and the Habib-i-Neccar mosque. St Peter's church is a taxi or bus ride away.

Zeus Hotel, Kahta: As near as it gets

by TheWanderingCamel

Photos:
1.Zeus Hotel's garden setting
2. Good sized rooms
3. Anyone for a dip?
4. Can't miss that sign
5. King Antiochus and Zeus

Spectacular, unique - and very remote - the pantheon of extraordinary statues of gods and an obscure 1st century BC Anatolian king lined up on two terraces high on a mountain top (Nemrut Dag) make any journey, detour or backtracking needed to see them worth every bit of the effort. And if you want to stay as close to the mountain as possible, then Kahta is where you should head for, and the Zeus Hotel may well be where you end up.

The hotel is well geared towards the needs of visitors planning to reach the terraces at either sunset or sunrise. As ours was to be a sunset visit, we arrived at midday, stayed one night and left early next morning. During that time, the hotel provided us with a light lunch, somewhere to relax for a couple of hours before setting off for the mountain, an ample and well-cooked buffet dinner on our return, satisfactory bed- and bathrooms for a quiet night's rest and a breakfast sufficient to our needs before we went on our way. The staff were both friendly and helpful and we came away quite satisfied with the service and facilities provided.

Most people who come to Kahta come to see Mt Nemrut, they stay one night and they move on. The Zeus Hotel, with its sixty-six large, simply furnished rooms, free internet, green gardens, well-kept swimming pool, covered terrace and friendly staff, caters very well for such visitors. Needless to say, it is popular with groups and must, at times, get quite busy. Our visit, late in September 2011, was right towards the end of the season, and there was only one other small group staying there. They arrived late in the afternoon and were planning an sunrise trek up to the statues - in late September that would probably mean a 4.00am departure from the hotel ... I'm happy to say I was sound asleep at that time, some of the hotel staff wouldn't have been so lucky.

Dedeman Hotel, Sanliurfa: Ancient city, modern hotel

by TheWanderingCamel

Photos
1. Spacious room
2. Decent shower
3 & 4. Views from the 7th floor
5. Don't miss the museum

Sanliurfa's Dedeman Hotel was exactly what we expected from this Turkish chain. Big, modern, clean, efficient, comfortable .... and rather bland ... but after a couple of nights in, albeit wonderfully atmospheric, hotels fitted into the great stone walls, small rooms and idiosynchratic plumbing of mediaeval caravanserai conversions, even bland was an acceptable tradeoff for the comforts of a kingsize bed and a decent shower.

In just a two night stay, with such a lot to see and during the day, we didn't take advantage of the gym, the swimming pool, the sauna, the hammam, the barber or the babysitting service, but the wifi worked, the laundry came back on time, our room provided the wherewithal to make tea and coffee, the TV had a good range of English language channels and if there was any noise from the hospital over the road we certainly didn't hear it once our heads hit the pillows.

The hotel's location, a fair way from the city's old heart, and the tour arrangement of evening meals being taken in the hotel, meant that, yet again, once we had returned to the hotel for the evening, we stayed there. Hotel dining wasn't anything wonderful but our Sanliurfa lunches were more than satisfactory, so that was OK but anyone looking for a livelier night-time scene (other than the hotel's own nightclub) might well prefer to stay somewhere more central.

Would I stay in this hotel again, or recommend it to others? Probably not, not because there was anything wrong with it, and I have no idea of what other hotels Sanliurfa has to offer, but I'm sure anyone travelling independently would prefer to stay in a more interesting part of the city. If you're on a tour, unless you're the organiser, you're not going to have any choice anyhow.

If this hotel has one thing to recommend it over any other in Sanliurfa, it's its proximity to the city's museum, just 5 minute's walk down the hill. Nicely laid out, and with a charming garden lapidarium, it's not a huge museum, and variations of most of its artifacts can be seen in provincial museums all over the country but it holds one of the most extraordinary finds that have been made in all Turkey. We chanced upon it while taking a late afternoon stroll around the neighborhood; had we stayed in a more central hotel, I'm quite sure we would have missed it - everybody else on our tour did, and I would think that's the case with most tour groups.

Otel Artuklu Kervanserayi, Mardin: What a wonderful building!

by TheWanderingCamel

Photos:
1. Restored and refurbished
2. A bed fit for a King
3. Somewhere to sit
4. Some rooms are small
5. Ancient stones

800 years old in parts, built of golden stone carved and decorated with the skill that has made Mardin's stonecarvers famous all over Turkey - an absolute maze of bedrooms, sitting rooms, passageways, winding stairs, sheltered balconies and terraces - you could easily get lost in this fantastic building. Anything less like a modern hotel with scores, if not hundreds of identical rooms leading off long straight corridors would be hard to imagine.

So what if our room was small, the bathroom even smaller, the bedroom decor looked like something dreamed up by a dotty maiden aunt with designer delusions. The bed was comfortable, the sheets crisp and clean, the bathroom produced enough hot water for a shower and a decent towel to dry off with - for a single night, that was all we needed.

The half-board arrangement of our tour booking included a multi-course dinner of lots of the old favourites we'd encountered pretty well all the way around Turkey and the by-now-standard breakfast buffet, both served in the cavernous vaulted dining room. A large , well-furnished balcony was the ideal spot for after-dinner tea and chat on a balmy evening.

As is so often the case with conversions of buildings such as this, the constraints of hugely thick stone walls and mediaeval building techniques mean the finished hotel is most unlikely to rival modern, purpose-built hotels in comfort and convenience. The newly-opened Hilton on the outskirts of Mardin will probably suit some travellers far more than the idiosynchratic Kervanserai but if I should ever return to Mardin, it's the Kervanserai that would get my booking.

The hotel's location, next to a Shi'ite shrine, means no alcohol may be served in the public areas of the hotel but one of our group was celebrating a significant birthday the night we were in Mardin, and we wanted to celebrate with him. On hearing of this, the hotel moved him and his wife into one of their best rooms - known as the King's Room in honour of a visit the Prince of Wales paid to Mardin in 2004. It's a lovely room - quite grand, very spacious, furnished with antiques and with a large Turkish-style seating alcove (like a very big day bed) - just the place for a party. They also produced a spectacular birthday cake to round the evening off.

Mardin is a small, provincial city in the far south-eastern reaches of the country. Tourists are only recently beginning to return to the area after many years of terrorist activity turned this part of Turkey into a no-go zone and some tourist facilities here and throughout Eastern Anatolia may lag behind the standards on offer elsewhere in Turkey as a result. This will change but for now, visitors may find some aspects of their tour through the region not as polished as they might have expected. By my reckoning, any such niggles are more than compensated for by the fabulous sites and sights the region has to offer and anyone travelling there now, with all the pleasures unspoilt and uncrowded places have to offer, can count themselves very fortunate.

Kervanseray Hotel, Diyarbakir: Not quite a han from home

by TheWanderingCamel

Photo:
1. Welcome to the Grand Kervanseray
2. Some rooms are small ...
3. ...some are quite big
4. Somewhere to sit and relax
5. Coming down for breakfast?

The huge wooden doors in the humbug-striped portal of Diyarbakir's Buyuk (Grand) Kervanseray Hotel first opened for business way back in 1572. Back then, the travellers passing through were pilgrims on the Haj and Silk and Spice Road traders arriving via camel train. These days the old caravanserai's guests are mostly tourists and oil field workers come to town for a bit of R&R. The more modern hotels in Diyarbakir may offer bigger and more comfortable rooms but, if history and local colour count for you when choosing a hotel, then the Kervanseray should be your choice.

The rooms open off a large greenery-filled courtyard that serves as gathering place, restaurant and breakfast terrace. Low doorways open into mostly small and fairly spartan rooms, those along the long arms of the court made smaller by the necessity of fitting in en suite bathrooms with modern plumbing. Corner rooms are larger - independent travellers may prefer to pay the extra money and book one of these, those on a tour will have to cross their fingers and hope they'll be the lucky ones when rooms are allocated and the keys handed out. Alcoves along the long arched galleries overlooking the courtyard are furnished with chairs and sofas to provide seating space outside each room.

The hotel 's position, a 10-15 minute walk from the city centre, and a warning that the streets outside the walls are not particularly safe places at night will probably influence most guests choice of spending the evening within the compound - the courtyard and the gallery alcoves are a comfortable enough alternative to staying in your room to read or watch Turkish television, you'll need to come outside to connect to the hotel's wi-fi though - ancient stone walls and modern telecommunications aren't the best of matches.

Once again, there are no real surprises at dinner, a typical Turkish meal of soup, salads, vegetable dishes, grilled meat and fruit. Breakfast was the usual plentiful spread of breads, yoghurt, cheeses, tomatoes, cucumber, olives, eggs, etc served in the fresh air of the morning-scrubbed courtyard - a nice way to start the day.

Known for centuries as the Deliller Han (delil means guest), the largest han in Diyarbakir and one of the largest in Turkey, when it was first built the complex included a mosque, a medresse, private rooms for important guests (servants slept in the open galleries), storehouses for the silks, spices and other goods they were carrying, shops and stabling for 800 camels. When trucks replaced camels and one or two men could move the goods that had once need a whole entourage, the han became more and more a bazaar with large areas in a ruinous state until, in 1988, it was restored, refurbished and given new life as a hotel.

It is also a popular venue for big local weddings and celebrations. The wedding taking place around the swimming pool in the inner courtyard the night we were there finished fairly early and didn't keep us awake but MrL's geophysicist friend working in the area tells us they can be both longer and louder. Just a bit more local colour.

Merit Sahmaran Hotel, Van: Time for a sundowner anyone?

by TheWanderingCamel

Photos:
1. Perfect end to a pretty good day
2. Hotel entrance
3. A rather brown bedroom...
4. ...but a great view
5. Pass the kayma, please

Another town, another hotel - that's the way of touring holidays - some are really good; not many are really bad (as long as the organizers have done their homework). Hopefully, there'll be a good number that have an extra little something about them - a setting on the edge of Lake Van put the Hotel Sahmaran, some 12 kilometres outside Van itself, into that category.

Our lakeside room was rather brown but it was spacious enough, clean and comfortable, with an acceptable bathroom. What it lacked in contemporary style and charm, it more than made up for with the view from the window - red umbrellas on the hotel terrace marking the line between the blues of the pool and lake and a hammock-edged jetty leading out to an alfresco bar set up with white wicker chairs and sofas under a flotilla of white sails - the perfect place for a sundowner. Five minutes to put our bags down and we were sitting those wicker chairs with an ice cold gin and tonic for me, a long, cooling ayran for MrL and a big bowl of fresh pistachios.

We had it all to ourselves - other guests were swimming in the soapy waters of the lake but as the sun started to set they pulled themselves out and pattered off to their rooms to dress for dinner. We stayed out there until the last rays of the blazing sunset were no more than a fiery glow behind the hills surrounding the lake and then we too went off to see what was for dinner.

Staying a second night at the hotel meant the exercise could be repeated.

It was certainly the lakeside setting that gave this hotel its edge. Evening drinks under the sails, morning breakfast on the terrace between the pool and the lake - the light was beautiful at whatever time of day it was and the view of the lake and the surrounding hills was lovely.

We gave swimming in the lake a miss - the water has a high sodium carbonate content and apparently it's a bit like swimming in a soapy bath - and a dredging operation right by the hotel combined with the busy highway out the front discouraged us from taking a walk anywhere but out along the little jetty. Neither did we go back in to Van once we had finished sightseeing for the day, but the evenings passed pleasantly enough, eating in two of the hotel's three restaurants - a buffet one nighttas set meal the next - both very enjoyable with some interesting local variations of typical Turkish dishes.

Breakfast gave us a chance to try another local speciality - a traditional Van breakfast -, the essential parts of which are otlu penir (a firm cheese made with local herbs) and a plate of flat bread served with kayma( rich, clotted cream), local honey and chopped walnuts.

Simer Hotel, Dogubayazit: Simply stunning (the view, that is)

by TheWanderingCamel

Photos:
1. A walk before breakfast
2. View from the balcony
3. Such a pretty garden
4. Time to go
5. Where's the Ark?

What tips the balance when you are travelling? Does comfort always win when it comes to where you spend the night or are you prepared to sacrifice a bit of comfort for something special? I'm really glad our tour organizer did just that when it came to deciding where we would stay in Dogubayazit. Instead of opting for one of the "better" hotels in the centre of town, we stayed at the Simer Hotel a few kilometres outside the centre.

Our room was OK, ensuite bathroom, bed a bit soft, towels a bit hard, shower a bit tricky. Dinner, a buffet - again - served in a rather bare and basic seperate building from the main hotel, but nice food. Nothing to do and nowhere really to go but back to our rooms after dinner - it was all very dark outside and we were too far from town to venture out to find the bright lights of Dogubayazit. Breakfast, another buffet, served in the first floor dining room of the hotel main building this time, fairly ordinary. Staff did their job with a friendly smile.

Would we stay there again? Yes, I certainly would.

So what tipped the balance for that decision?

The hotel is set well back from the main road, with a belt of trees between us and the tarmac, which made for a quiet night so, despite the soft bed, we slept well.

Nice - but not enough.

Morning light had us out for an early walk in the very pretty garden surrounding the hotel.

Also nice - but still not enough.

It was the view - from the road, from our room, from the balcony off the dining room - uninterrupted and clear, Mt Ararat, right in front of us. Fabulous.

Star ratings aren't the only things that matter when deciding if something is value for money. If the cost of waking to that view is a night in a less-than-luxurious hotel, that's fine by me.

Sim-er Hotel, Kars: A choice of 1

by TheWanderingCamel

Photos:
1. Sim-er at sunset
2-3. 4*?

Tourism is still in its infancy in Kars, one of Turkey's poorest cities and a long way off most tourist trails. There are excellent reasons for going there, not least the ghostly ruins of the mediaeval city of Ani, 35 or so kilometres down the road, and no doubt as more and more tour groups and intrepid individuals make the journey the tourist infrastructure will improve. For now though, there are very limited choices when it comes to accommodation and anyone travelling with a tour group will almost certainly find themselves checking in to the Sim-er Hotel, the city's only hotel of sufficient size and standards to meet most tour groups requirements.

Whilst nothing to rave about, and certainly not most people's idea of the 4* establishment the facilities found there allow it to claim to be, the Sim-er provided us with a comfortable overnight stay. The room was of an adequate size, we slept well in our beds, the bathroom was clean, the staff were friendly - all in all, no better and no worse than dozens of provincial town hotels I've stayed in all over the world. As with many of the hotels along the way on this tour, the food was standard Turkish fare served as a buffet, once again nothing about it stands out as being either particularly good or particularly bad.

Room rates are a mystery - we paid an all-inclusive price for our tour. I would suggest they are probably not the best value for money but it all comes back to supply and demand - both of which are in short supply in Kars.

Although the hotel is a little way out of the town centre, we found a very pleasant walk, over the river, through a park and past several of the city's Russian houses and on to a tea garden at the foot of the citadel.

Independent travellers have more choice anywhere they go. In Kars, they have the option of staying at the Kars Otel - a beautifully restored Russian house-turned-boutique hotel. With just eight rooms and a decent restaurant, it was my sister's choice when she visited Kars on a tour she organised for a small group of friends and she tells me she would certainly recommend it and would definitely stay there again.

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Turkey Hotels

3912 Hotels

Other Reviews from VirtualTourist Members

2 star or 4 star?: What do those stars tell you?

A private home in Orselli: No Trip Advisor or booking.com here

Savon, Antakya (Hatay): Savvy Savon

Zeus Hotel, Kahta: As near as it gets

Dedeman Hotel, Sanliurfa: Ancient city, modern hotel

Otel Artuklu Kervanserayi, Mardin: What a wonderful building!

Kervanseray Hotel, Diyarbakir: Not quite a han from home

Merit Sahmaran Hotel, Van: Time for a sundowner anyone?

Simer Hotel, Dogubayazit: Simply stunning (the view, that is)

Sim-er Hotel, Kars: A choice of 1

Explore the World

Questions and Answers