What's happening in Istanbul this week?

Plan the old city around its closing days, because the opening hours matter less. Topkapı Palace is closed every Tuesday, so spend that day on the Asian side: the Salı Pazarı (Tuesday market) in Hasanpaşa is a 15-minute walk from Kadıköy pier, and its covered lanes are piled with quince, roasted chestnuts and cheap knitwear. Dolmabahçe Palace, Istanbul Modern and the Pera Museum close on Mondays, which makes Monday the best day for Topkapı and the Süleymaniye Mosque. The Grand Bazaar keeps its gates locked on Sunday. The Spice Bazaar in Eminönü still opens that day, and you can smell its cinnamon and sumac from the tram stop outside.

Both Hagia Sophia and the Sultan Ahmed Mosque are working mosques, and the five daily prayers set the clock for visitors. On Fridays both close to sightseers for roughly 90 minutes from about 12:45, the courtyards filling with men carrying prayer mats while the call to prayer echoes across Sultanahmet Square. Queues at Hagia Sophia tend to be shortest before 10:00 from Tuesday to Thursday. Since 2024, foreign visitors have paid €25 to enter and see the interior from the upper gallery alone, which is worth knowing before you join the line. The Süleymaniye is free and much calmer, and its back terrace looks straight down onto the Golden Horn.

From Thursday to Saturday, the evenings move uphill to Beyoğlu. The meyhanes on Nevizade Sokak and in Asmalımescit serve rakı, white cheese and fried mussels until after midnight, and you can hear the glasses clinking from the alleys. In Kadıköy, Kadife Sokak in Moda draws a younger crowd paying lower prices on the same nights. The three nearest listings this week are Turkish-language stand-up and theatre in Koşuyolu and Beyoğlu, so check the language before you buy a ticket. Sunday is for breakfast: by 10:00 families are queuing for serpme kahvaltı (a spread breakfast) in the breakfast streets near Beşiktaş Çarşı, and İstiklal Avenue is packed shoulder to shoulder by 15:00. For a first-timer, the Feriköy Antique Market in Bomonti is the better Sunday morning. It runs every week under a covered car park.

In autumn, daytime highs in Istanbul sit around 15 to 18°C, and evenings by the water turn cold and damp. Watch for the lodos, a warm southwesterly wind that smells of salt and can cancel the Kadıköy and Üsküdar ferries within an hour. When it blows, take the Marmaray rail tunnel under the Bosphorus instead. Rain usually comes in short, heavy bursts that make the cobbles in Sultanahmet slippery, so bring shoes with good grip. Turkey stays on UTC+3 all year, so autumn sunrises come around 07:40 and it is dark shortly before 18:00. At 49.84 lira to the US dollar, a ferry crossing on an Istanbulkart likely costs under a dollar: the cheapest view of the Bosphorus Bridge in Istanbul.