Eastern Karadeniz Voyage Tips and guide

Splendid forest scenery, stunning river gorges, misty alpine meadows, lush tea plantations, magnificent hillside monasteries, colossal cathedral ruins, forgotten mountain hamlets, lonely fishermen villages, ancient harbour towns, and fairy-tale castles all abound in Eastern Karadeniz (Turkish: Doğu Karadeniz), home to a local culture as rich as its biodiversity. Forming the easternmost third of the Turkish Black Sea coast, the region may feel remote, but is in fact efficiently accessible.

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Map of Eastern Karadeniz

• 41.00539.72251 Trabzon is the biggest city and hub of the region.
• 41.01739.552 Akçaabat is a smaller resort just west.
• 40.938.4166673 Giresun has a Byzantine citadel, an old town, and boat trips to its nearby island.
• 40.91277240.1134814 Sürmene
• 41.02482540.5199145 Rize is a good base for exploring the northeast.
• 40.9525241.1020516 Ayder is a summer village in the mountains, closed up in winter.
• 41.18308141.8287457 Artvin has a 10th-century fortress.
• 40.88555639.2922228 Tonya is a dairy-farming town in the mountains, a base for hiking.
• 40.4639.489 Gümüşhane is a hill town beyond Zigana Pass.

• 41.47833341.8983331 Camili (Macahel). — a valley surrounded by steep mountains with six villages inhabited by Muslim Georgians, who decided in a 1921 referandum to join Turkey instead of then-Soviet Georgia. Due to the extreme biodiversity, the valley is a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. In winter, when the local roads are regularly closed due to blizzards, the only access is from Georgia, practically making the area a Turkish exclave.  
• 40.6939.6583332 Sümela Monastery perched high on a cliff is the best of the abandoned monasteries dotted in the mountains. It's within a day-trip from Trabzon. Others, more tumbledown, include Kuştul and Vazelon.

A humid and verdant region as a consequence of the very high precipitation distributed evenly throughout the year, the biodiversity of Eastern Karadeniz reaches the levels of tropical rainforests in some areas, despite being located solidly in the temperate zone.

Eastern Karadeniz is the part of the region which Turks mostly think of when they hear Karadeniz, i.e. Black Sea. It includes the Artvin, Giresun, Gümüşhane, Rize, and Trabzon provinces.

Although all locals are colloquially, incorrectly, and somewhat derogatorily called "Laz" collectively by the Turks from elsewhere, Eastern Karadeniz, though overwhelmingly ethnically Turkish, has indeed a rich blend of ethnic make-up despite its relatively small size, like a microcosm of much larger multi-national former Ottoman Empire. In addition to the majority Turks, a number of towns east, west, and south of Trabzon are inhabited by Muslim Turks with a Pontic Greek background, though calling them "Greeks" outright may offend some of them (Muslim Greeks use the terms Rum or Romioi, meaning "Roman" or "Byzantine", to indicate their identity. Research has shown they are, however, very proud of their language and are happy to use it to converse with (Greek) tourists. Pontic Greek speakers live mostly in the districts of Çaykara, Sürmene, Tonya and İkizdere.

The Hemşin people, Muslimized brethren of Armenians, are present in the region, too, living in inland valleys south of Rize (however, most of the Hemshin people in Rize do not speak Armenian and do not regard themselves as Armenians). Around Hopa there is also a community of Hemşin who do speak Armenian and who have started teaching the Armenian alphabet to their children. Then there are the actual Laz people, distant cousins of Georgians, living in coastal towns east of Rize up to the Georgian border.

The inland far east of the region, i.e. Artvin and its surrounding area south of the Turkish-Georgian border, is inhabited by Georgians of Muslim background.

Most ethnic Turks in the central and eastern Karadeniz region belong to the Çepni boyu (clan), which is a distinct group from Anatolian Turks. The Çepni used to have their own states, which they established in the western Karadeniz region in former Pontic Greek cities after the battle of Manzikert, but eventually became part of the Ottoman Empire. Çepni culture thus has more influences by Pontic Greek, Caucasian and Persian culture, somewhat like that of the Azeri Turks.

As aforementioned, there are very few pockets of people speaking Pontic Greek (locally known as Romeika, and which is not completely mutually intelligible with modern Greek as Pontic variant retains more of medieval/Byzantine Greek characteristics), Hemşin dialect of Armenian, Laz which is distantly related to Georgian spoken in the neighbouring country, and Georgian proper, although Turkish is sufficient to communicate whomever you are speaking to in the region. Locals speak Turkish in an accent that non-local Turks usually find "funny" and like to chaff at—indeed Eastern Karadeniz Turkish is a major theme in Turkish jokes folklore, but the local Turks dislike this stereotyping and find it offensive. Foreign languages spoken by minorities in the area are German, Russian, Dutch and Italian by elderly men, and English by the youth (English language courses are extremely popular in the coastal cities of the Eastern Black Sea region).

This region borders Georgia, with a highway crossing at Hopa / Sarp. There are sometimes long tailbacks for border inspection.

Airports are at Trabzon (TZX ^IATA), between Ordu and Giresun (OGU  ^IATA) and between Rize and Artvin (RZV  ^IATA). They all have daily flights from Istanbul (both IST and SAW), less often from Ankara or Izmir, and only occasional international flights. You might also fly into Samsun to the west or Batumi in Georgia.

D010 is the six-lane highway almost the length of Turkey's Black Sea coast. From Istanbul or Ankara your decision is where to branch off E80 to cross the mountains and join it: D795 to Samsun is a good bet. At Hopa D010 turns inland towards Kars. These roads are priority for snowploughs in winter.

Buses from Istanbul run every couple of hours to the coastal cities: to Trabzon is 18 hours. One or two per day continue across the border to Batumi. Buses from Ankara are much less frequent, maybe only once a day.

There are nowadays no Black Sea ferries, and there has never been a railway.

Anywhere along the coast and spine highway D010 has buses for inter-city travel and dolmuşes to get around the sprawling cities. You need your own wheels to explore up in the mountains, such as the isolated former monasteries.

• Museums depict the millennia of cultures that have flourished then disappeared here, from prehistoric times to the Republic. They're mostly free.
• Old churches and monasteries were variously Georgian, Armenian or Greek Orthodox, but all of those communities were driven out or slain over a century ago. Some have been converted into mosques or other use, others are gaunt ruins. There are plenty in the cities, but the most striking are in remote spots in the mountains, too isolated for anyone to recycle their stone into farm buildings.
• Atatürk House: every self-respecting Turkish city has a mansion where Atatürk stayed awhile during the War of Independence or early days of the Republic. They're typically 19th century merchant residences made over into ethnography museums. Rize and Trabzon have good examples.

• Beaches are few, as Highway D010 was built by reclaiming land, so the sea comes right up to the embankment. Akçaabat is a small beach resort west of Trabzon, but Giresun has a better stretch.
• Hiking and trekking: many trails thread through the mountains, with multiple access points.

There are no winter sports resorts - the snow can be heavy but it doesn't last long, and this region is too far from the big cities for ski lifts to be commercially viable. Those above Trabzon folded during Covid and never restarted.

• Hamams are traditional Turkish baths, found in the major cities. This region has no geothermal springs.
• Football: Trabzon and Rize have top-tier soccer teams.
• Kafkasör is a Caucasian Bullfighting Fiesta in July near Artvin. The bulls fight each other.

Meat meat meat: this is Turkey. So everywhere serves trad cuisine, veggies may struggle, and there isn't the demand from foreign tourists for other styles.

Anchovies (hamsi) are popular - if you encounter them Oct-Feb they're fresh from the Black Sea, at other times they'll be frozen. Hamsi böreği is rice surrounded by anchovies and baked in the oven, hamsi tatlısı is a cake filled with anchovies and topped by fruits and sweet syrup.

Corn is the main grain, as the climate doesn't suit wheat. It's made into breads, and muhlama which is corn flour, butter, cheese and salt.

Honey is produced from mountain wildflowers. Beware "mad honey" (deli bal) from toxic rhododendron flowers, it's hallucinogenic and worse.

Water from the tap is safe to drink, as it's from mountain catchments free of pollution.

Tea is drunk in great volumes, and the slopes above Rize grow lots of it.

You're seldom far from a beer, but this is a conservative region lacking pubs and clubs.

Beware traffic, safeguard valuables and steer clear of low-life, same as anywhere else.

The mountains deserve your respect. They rise to 3000-4000 m, and even at low altitude can be hazardous with slippy rocks, strong winds, and fog-bound. And no mobile signal to call for help.

• Central Karadeniz west has lower mountains and more plains and beaches. Samsun is the main city.
• Eastern Anatolia beyond the mountains is at high altitude and sparsely populated. Ani is the standout, an abandoned Armenian city reached via Kars.
• Georgia is entered via Sarpi border gate. Batumi is the nearby beach resort, but the must-see is Tbilisi.