4

I am planning a trip that will involve changing planes in Istanbul (IST) airport. This is a routing that a travel agent chose to save my client money, and I've agreed to it because I've never been there before, and even if I don't leave the airport, it should be cool.

What would be even cooler is if I could slip out and see something - and the number one something everyone says to see is The Blue Mosque. In order to evaluate whether a given layover would work for such a purpose, I need to know:

  • the minimum connecting time (coming from North America and headed into Europe, or vice versa). There will be a terminal change apparently.
  • how long it takes to get to The Blue Mosque by train or taxi or whatever else is quick
  • how long the lineups typically are to enter it
  • how long to spend inside to feel that you at least saw it. I'm guessing 30 minutes for this though it would be nice to have longer.

Add all those up and I can evaluate whether any itinerary being proposed to me would be able to include such a side trip or not.

hippietrail
  • 80,147
  • 56
  • 281
  • 643
Kate Gregory
  • 82,075
  • 14
  • 237
  • 340

1 Answers1

5

You will need an hour with the public transportation, a taxi will do it in 30-40 minutes. VOA line in IST is long sometimes (last time it took 30 minutes for me). Your arrival times (3:40pm-7:35 pm or 2:45pm-6:50pm) is in the rush hours and even if you obtain visa in time and run to the mosque right away it will be time for Asr prayer (around 5:20 pm these days) and the mosque will be closed for 90 minutes for prayers. The best time to visit the mosque is in the morning because the time between the first prayer (early morning) and second prayer (noon time) is quite long and gives you a better chance. You also will need another trip (1 hour?) to be back to the airport before the boarding time. I do not think you can do it with your current arrival times.

Here is a map for Istanbul public transportation just in case, you will ride starting from the airport (red line) and then change to the dark blue line to reach Sultan Ahmet area at the end of the line where the mosque is located.

Nean Der Thal
  • 1
  • 40
  • 337
  • 437