Photo by Henri Bergius

Istanbul is a city not only along the sea but it is a city that lives with the sea. She’s surrounded by Marmara Sea, Black Sea and Bosphorus Strait that connects Marmara and Black Sea. If you take a dolmus (shared taxi) to Anatolian side, after 40 minutes ride from Taksim, you could swim at the beaches that are along Suadiye, Goztepe, Caddebostan within the city borders! Also Princes Islands offer some beach options. If you would do a bit more effort then you could reach Silivri, Celaliye, Kumburgaz beaches that are around 50-60 kms away from the city center. But transportation is a bit tricky and taxi would be an expensive option.

So, now my top recommendation for Istanbul beach comes. If you’d like to have a superb beach experience with fine natural sand and clean blue water then forget about the places we mentioned above. You should head to Kilyos which is located at the European part of Black Sea. You can sail, windsurf and Kitesurf there as well. It is possible to find rental equipment for these sports. In fact, Turkish legs of the Kiteboard Professional World Tour have been done in Kilyos many times in the past. Also there are quite a few beach clubs in Kilyos if you are after good food, drinks and some music as well as sun and sand.

Kilyos is around 40 kms from Taksim. If you take the underground from Taksim to the last stop (Ataturk Oto Sanayi) and then take a taxi, you can reach there easily within 40-50 minutes time. The journey will cost you around 60 Lira one way. It’s possible to reach there by public transport and this would be much cheaper but it would mean many changes of buses or mini-buses.

It sounds like a big challenge but not really. If you can swim for around one hour (or 3 kms) in a swimming pool then you can do it! I’m telling this because I did it some years ago!

You can try to do this when you are in Istanbul but considering strong currents and heavy ship traffic it might be wise to join the Bosphorus cross-continental swimming race that is organised by “National Olympic Committee of Turkey” every year in July. During this event, the whole ship traffic is stopped and also there are quite a few fast boats monitoring the swimmers. So, the chances of getting to the other side is higher!

The race course follows the direction of the channel current except for the portions at the start and finish (I guess nobody could finish this race otherwise!). The race starts at the Anatolian side of the city, in Kanlica and ends on the European side, in Kurucesme (near Ortakoy), the total distance is 6.5 kms. Bosphorus currents are very strong and run in different directions but if you use them wisely they help you a great deal (the speed of channel currents varies between 2.5km – 7km/hour).

If you don’t want to win the competition -luckily I didn’t and please don’t ask my ranking!-, you can take it easy and leave yourself to the channel current. Then watch the beauties of Bosphorus. You even pass under Fatih Sultan Mehmet bridge! But you should be powerful at the beginning to enter the channel current and especially more powerful at the end to swim across the opposite current after you exit the channel current. Strongly recommended, go for it! More information is on the official website: http://www.bosphorus.cc/