Two Continents in One Day: Istanbul's Asian Side

Duration: 8 hours, door to door
Group: Private — only your party
From: €150 per group per day
Ferry crossing: About 20 minutes, Eminönü to Kadıköy, on the public commuter ferry
Best day for it: Tuesday, for the Kadıköy street market — every other day is a quieter, still worthwhile version
Walking: About 5 km, flat and easy — no hills or cobbles like the Old City

This tour from €150 per group, per day

Licensed local guide, private car and driver, and skip-the-line priority entrance. The day runs at your pace, and the plan stays yours to change.

Get my free quote

TÜRSAB-licensed agency No. 15746 · nothing to pay to ask · a real person replies within 24 hours

What it costs, in full

From €150 per group, per day — not per person

Licensed local guide for the whole day included
Private car and driver, hotel or port pick-up and drop-off included
Planning, timed entries and the priority-entrance tickets included
Museum and palace entrance tickets at the gate price, no markup
Lunch, drinks and anything you choose to buy not included
Tips for your guide and driver customary, entirely up to you

Two people or six, the tour price is the same — it is the day you are hiring, not a seat. Entrance tickets are the only thing quoted separately, because museum prices change and because some parties add the Harem or the Cistern and others do not; we buy them in advance at the price on the gate and add them to your quote before you decide anything. Everything is quoted in euros, and nothing is paid until the day is agreed.

How the day runs

Timings below are the ones we actually use, not a brochure. Everything here is movable — it is your day, and your guide will happily rebuild it over breakfast.

08:30
Pick-up
We collect you from your hotel or the ship. This is a fuller day than most of ours, so an on-time start matters more than usual.
09:00
Eminönü and the Spice Bazaar
The working harbour side of the Old City rather than the monuments — fishermen mending nets, the smell of the Spice Bazaar, boats loading for the Bosphorus. Twenty minutes here sets up the whole day.
09:45
Across the Galata Bridge on foot
The fishermen on the upper deck, the fish restaurants tucked underneath, and the first proper look at the Golden Horn opening into the Bosphorus.
10:15
The ferry crossing
This is the best twenty minutes of the day and we mean that. A window seat, a glass of tea from the boat's samovar if the trolley comes round, and Istanbul splitting into two continents on either side of you. No tour bus does this.
10:45
Kadıköy market streets
On a Tuesday this is the big street market — stalls the length of several blocks, mostly local shoppers, not tourists. On any other day it's the fish market and the permanent grocery lanes around Güneşlibahçe Sokak, which are worth the visit on their own.
12:15
Lunch in Kadıköy
Your choice, at your pace. We'll point you toward a proper esnaf lokantası or the fish market's own restaurants, or eat with you if you'd like the company.
13:30
Moda
A slower half hour on the seafront promenade — tea on the water, the old cinema, a look at why this neighbourhood has become the one Istanbullus themselves talk about moving to.
14:30
Üsküdar
A short drive up the coast to the Ottoman waterfront: the Mihrimah Sultan Mosque, the view across to Maiden's Tower, and a shoreline that has changed far less than the European side's.
16:00
Back across the Bosphorus Bridge
We drive back rather than ferry a second time, so you see the strait once more from above before we drop you at your hotel, or back at the ship with time to spare.

What's included

A licensed, English-speaking local guide for the whole day
Private air-conditioned car and driver for the Old City morning and the drive back
The public ferry crossing of the Bosphorus, guide included, standing at the rail with you
Hotel or cruise-port pick-up and drop-off
Skip-the-line priority entrance wherever the morning includes a ticketed sight
All the planning — ferry timings, market days and the order of the afternoon worked out in advance

Not included

Any museum or sight entrance tickets — we buy them in advance at the gate price, with no markup, and add them to your quote
The ferry ticket itself — a few Turkish lira each way, paid with the guide's transport card, refunded to us later or added to your quote
Lunch and drinks
Tips for your guide and driver — customary, but entirely up to you
Anything you decide to buy

Skip the line. Every time.

Gezginol is a licensed TÜRSAB travel agency, and that gives us something you cannot buy at the door: a priority pass at the major sites. We obtain your tickets before the day starts, so you do not queue at a ticket office and you do not queue to get in — you walk to the priority entrance and your guide takes you through.

Skip-the-line tickets bought in advance, at the gate price, with nothing added on top
Fast-track priority entrance at the sites that operate one
No ticket-office queue — the tickets are in your guide's hand when you arrive
Timed entries booked for you, in the right order for the day

At Hagia Sophia and Topkapı in high season this routinely saves an hour or more — often longer than the queue for the sight itself. It applies to every tour we run, in Istanbul and everywhere else we operate.

Where we meet, and what happens if plans change

Meeting point: Your hotel, or the cruise terminal at Galataport. Your guide is there before the time on the ticket, not after it.
Starts: around 08:30 — earlier if you want the sights before the crowds, later if you would rather sleep.
Ends: about 16:00, back at your hotel or wherever you would like to be dropped.
Group size: private — only your party, never a shared minibus.
Language: English. Ask us and we will find you a licensed guide in Türkçe, Русский, Deutsch, Français, Español or العربية.
Cancellation: you pay nothing to book, so there is nothing to lose. Tell us as early as you can and we will move the day or cancel it, at no cost.

Staying in a hotel? Then the meeting point is your lobby and there is nothing to find — this map is for guests arriving by ship.

Galataport cruise terminal, Karaköy, Istanbul — the pick-up point for cruise guests. Open this map in Google Maps

Shopping, if you would like to

Türkiye’s crafts are one of the pleasures of being here, and many guests ask to see a carpet, leather or jewellery atelier while they are in Istanbul. If you would like to, we are glad to include one — we use only established, fully insured workshops of the kind the cruise lines recommend, where you are welcome to watch the craft, enjoy the tea and take as long as you like. Nobody will hurry you and nobody will press you to buy. And if you would rather give the whole day to the sights, simply say so and we will. Read our guide to shopping in Istanbul.

Two Continents in One Day — frequently asked questions

We've already done your Best of Istanbul tour — is this different enough?

Yes, genuinely. There's no overlap beyond the Old City pick-up. This day trades Topkapı and the Grand Bazaar for a ferry ride and a part of the city almost no cruise-ship itinerary reaches. If you've already seen Hagia Sophia and the Blue Mosque, this is the natural second day.

What is the Bosphorus ferry crossing actually like?

It's the ordinary Şehir Hatları commuter ferry that Istanbullus use every day to get to work — no tour boat, no commentary, just a twenty-minute ride with tea and seagulls. That's exactly why it's worth doing: you're crossing the strait the way the city actually crosses it.

What can we see on the Asian side that we can't see from the European side?

The point isn't a single monument — Üsküdar's mosques and Maiden's Tower are lovely but modest next to Topkapı. It's the texture: a market that's for locals, not tour groups; a waterfront neighbourhood that never became a cruise stop; and the simple fact of standing on a different continent for an afternoon.

What if our day here isn't a Tuesday — do we miss out?

You miss the big weekly street market, and we'll say so honestly. Kadıköy is still worth the crossing on any day of the week — the fish market, the permanent food streets and Moda are there every day — but if the Tuesday market matters to you specifically, tell us when you book and we'll try to place this tour on a Tuesday.

Is this more tiring than your other tours?

It's a fuller day, yes — more moving between places, one ferry crossing and one bridge crossing, about 5 km of walking. It's not a hard day physically (the ground is flatter than the Old City's cobbles), but it does ask for a full day rather than a half day.

Can we start or end this tour from a cruise ship?

Yes, if your call is a long one. This is one of our fuller days, so it needs a ship in port from early morning to early evening to work comfortably — ask us for your specific ship's schedule and we'll tell you honestly whether there's enough time.

What you'll see

Maiden's Tower standing in the Bosphorus between the two continents — Maiden's Tower — the marker between the two shores

A wooden Ottoman-era yalı mansion on the Bosphorus waterfront — One of the old wooden yalıs along the Asian shore

Ortaköy Mosque on the Bosphorus with the bridge overhead — The Bosphorus Bridge, seen from the water on the crossing

A small boat crossing the Bosphorus with the Süleymaniye Mosque skyline behind — Boat traffic on the strait, Old City skyline behind

About the reviews you see here. Every quote on this website is a message a guest actually sent us, printed word for word. We do not write them, we do not edit them, and we do not have a TripAdvisor, Viator or GetYourGuide page to send you to, because we have never sold through those platforms — so there is no star rating for us to show you. We would rather tell you that than put stars on a page and hope you do not check.

Ask us about this day

Tell us your dates and what you would like to see. We reply personally, usually within 24 hours — and if this itinerary is not quite right for you, we will say so and suggest a better one.

Get my free quote

From €150 per group · TÜRSAB-licensed agency No. 15746 · skip-the-line entrance · no prepayment to enquire