Canoe tours around the Sunken Minaret on the Kızılırmak River in Türkiye’s Samsun province continue to attract visitors as winter approaches.

Organized by the Bafra Extreme Outdoor Sports Group around the Sunken Minaret in the Boğazkaya neighborhood, the tours contribute to local tourism and the area’s economy.

Volkan Karaman, head of the Bafra Extreme Outdoor Sports Group, told Anadolu Agency (AA) that the group also organizes nature hikes and camping activities in the area, alongside canoe tours.

Karaman said the group aims to offer visitors unique experiences by bringing sports and nature together and contribute to local tourism through its activities. The canoe tours around the Sunken Minaret also give people a chance to socialize, he said, adding that water sports should become more widespread on the Kızılırmak, Türkiye’s longest river.

He said the group hopes visitors will enjoy their time in the area and help promote Bafra by sharing photos of their experiences. Noting that the district attracts both domestic and international tourists, Karaman said the group also aims to support the local economy through spending on accommodation, food and outdoor activities.

“Bafra is a beautiful place, and our tourism activities will continue without interruption. We invite everyone to visit,” he said.

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Minister of Transport and Infrastructure Abdulkadir Uraloğlu announced that tickets for the new season of the Touristic Eastern Express will go on sale for individual travelers at 1:55 p.m. local time on Monday.

“The Touristic Eastern Express will operate a total of 70 trips during the 2026-2027 winter season, with 35 trips in each direction. Services from Ankara to Kars will run from Dec. 21, 2026, to March 10, 2027, while trains traveling from Kars to Ankara will operate from Dec. 23, 2026, to March 12, 2027,” he said.

Uraloğlu said trains departing from Ankara for Kars will run on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, while trains from Kars to Ankara will operate on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays.

Providing details on ticket sales, Uraloğlu said individual tickets would go on sale at 1:55 p.m. tomorrow, Oct. 26, and could be purchased through TCDD Taşımacılık’s sales channels.

With scheduled sightseeing stops along the route, the Touristic Eastern Express gives passengers the opportunity to explore the cities it passes through, he noted.

“Trains traveling from Ankara to Kars will make sightseeing stops at Erzincan and Erzurum stations, while those traveling from Kars to Ankara will stop at İliç, Divriği and Sivas stations. Passengers will have the opportunity to experience Anatolia’s historical and cultural heritage firsthand,” he said.

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Türkiye’s place in the yachting industry extends beyond its coastline. The country builds vessels for international buyers, maintains a network of marinas and shipyards, and draws visitors to sailing destinations along the Aegean and Mediterranean. Bringing these elements closer together could open a further avenue for growth in both tourism and maritime services.

The opportunity was on display at the Bodrum Boat Show, held from Oct. 14 to 18, as boatbuilders, brokers and prospective buyers gathered in a town long associated with sailing holidays and traditional wooden gulets. The event offered a glimpse of an industry that links Türkiye’s established maritime traditions with a modern manufacturing sector and an international market for yacht ownership and chartering.

For Beril Hasdemir, regional manager of Sunreef Yachts, which specializes in customized luxury catamarans, demand is also shaped by changing ideas about how people spend time on the water.

“People want more space on the sea,” she said. Some customers view a yacht as more than a leisure purchase, she added. “Wherever you park, you have a home.” Some of the company’s international customers live aboard their boats, treating them as mobile residences rather than occasional holiday retreats.

While this remains a specialized market, it illustrates the range of activity that yachting can generate, from charter holidays and marina services to maintenance and provisioning. For Türkiye, the opportunity is to capture a larger share of that activity by connecting its manufacturing capabilities with its appeal as a destination.

From shipyards to sailing routes

Türkiye’s western and southern coastlines offer a network of ports, sheltered bays and sailing routes linking destinations such as Bodrum, Datça, Marmaris, Göcek, Fethiye, Kaş and Antalya. Bodrum, with its established blue-cruise tradition and proximity to the Greek islands, is well placed to serve as a gateway to the eastern Aegean.

Yet the country’s position in yachting is not based on tourism alone. According to a 2024 yacht-market report, Türkiye ranked second globally in superyacht production, behind Italy. The report put exports of yachts, boats and vessels at $442.4 million in 2024, an increase of 8.52% from the previous year.

That industrial base creates opportunities beyond the sale of vessels. Maintenance, repair, refitting, equipment supply and brokerage can all benefit when more yachts are based in the country. Charter operations can provide another link, bringing visitors to Turkish ports while creating demand for local businesses.

Hasdemir said Sunreef’s charter department receives inquiries from customers interested in Türkiye, although the company does not currently have a charter vessel based in the country. She said she would like to see a local fleet established.

Her experience offers one indication of potential interest, rather than a measure of the market as a whole. Still, the connection between yacht production and tourism is worth considering: A country that builds vessels for international customers can also seek to attract their owners and charter clients to its own marinas.

A wider maritime economy

The economic effects of yachting can extend beyond the marina. Visitors traveling between ports may use restaurants, shops and local services in several coastal communities, while vessel owners and charter operators create demand for skilled workers and specialist suppliers.

Hasdemir said Türkiye could raise its international profile by promoting maritime tourism alongside its established tourism campaigns. She also pointed to the value of coordination among public institutions responsible for tourism, transport, trade and taxation.

The opportunity is not confined to luxury yachts. Charter holidays, sailing schools and smaller boats offer ways to experience the coast without the expense of ownership. Hasdemir said she sees growing interest among Turkish customers, including some who might previously have chosen a hotel holiday.

A broader range of boating experiences could help diversify coastal tourism and bring more visitors into contact with the businesses and communities that support it. For destinations such as Bodrum, the ambition is to complement the traditional holiday season with activity connected to yacht services, sailing and maritime events.

That development also depends on preserving the coastline itself. Waste management, responsible anchoring and protection of marine habitats will remain important as boating activity expands. Hasdemir said some of Sunreef’s catamarans use electric motors, solar panels and battery systems to reduce reliance on conventional engines or generators in certain conditions. Such technologies can help limit some environmental impacts, alongside effective oversight of vessels and marina facilities.

The Bodrum Boat Show provided a platform for bringing manufacturers, buyers and maritime businesses together. Its longer-term contribution will depend on the commercial relationships it helps establish and the extent to which those connections continue beyond the event.

Türkiye already has two important components of a larger yachting economy: the capacity to build vessels for international markets and a coastline that attracts visitors from abroad. Developing closer links between the two could help extend the value of each, giving yacht manufacturing, tourism and maritime services a more connected role in the country’s coastal economy, Hasdemir said.

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Bayam’s Red Badlands in Kağızman, located in eastern Türkiye’s Kars province, are attracting nature lovers and photography enthusiasts with their reddish rocks and unusual geological formations.

Resembling Arizona’s canyons in the United States, the area has the potential to become a new destination for hiking and photography enthusiasts.

Located between the villages of Kötek and Bayam, the Bayam Red Badlands offer visitors a striking landscape shaped by natural erosion, with distinctive rock formations and reddish hues.

The area is gaining recognition through hiking trips organized by nature groups, emerging as a potential destination for nature tourism.

Hikers exploring the region have the opportunity to take a closer look at natural rock formations believed to be millions of years old.

Mushroom-shaped rocks

Rising above layers of fine sand, mushroom-shaped rocks and formations sculpted into unusual shapes also make the area an appealing destination for photography enthusiasts.

Adem Süleyman Güzel, head of the Kağızman Teachers’ House Sports Club, told Anadolu Agency (AA) that they organize activities to promote Kağızman’s natural and historical heritage to visitors. He said wind and floodwaters had eroded the rocks, creating striking mushroom-shaped formations and other unusual structures.

“We want to introduce the natural beauty and history of our hometown to those visiting the district,” he said.

Haşim Kaya, who joined a hike in the area, said the group organizes hiking trips every week.

Haşim Kaya described the Bayam Red Badlands as a magnificent natural landscape, comparing parts of the area to Arizona’s canyons and highlighting its mushroom-shaped rock formations.

“We welcome all nature lovers to Kağızman,” he said.

Derya Bektaş, one of the hikers, said the group had added the Bayam Red Badlands to its hiking route, describing it as a must-see destination with beautiful natural scenery.

“We get to discover the natural beauty of our hometown during our hikes, which also include various activities,” she said.

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After travelling more than 20 hours by air from Australia, Anne Boland arrived to find the Louvre shut behind barricades, prompting her to offer a piece of advice to tourists planning a trip to Paris.

“Stay home!” the 73-year-old pensioner told Agence France-Presse (AFP) on Monday outside the world’s most visited museum, after a weekend of unrest that rocked some of the French capital’s most iconic streets and squares.

She was one of thousands of visitors scrambling to navigate the City of Light as marches, traffic delays and wafting tear gas snarl the capital’s 14-billion-euro ($16-billion) tourism industry.

A small group of protesters was blocking the entrance to the Louvre’s famous glass pyramid, following days of mass protests that also spilled into some of the worst street violence France has seen in recent years.

Cycling through the city the day before, expecting charming Haussmann buildings, mansard roofs and corner cafes, Peter, a Dutch tourist, found himself touring a “war zone”.

“It was terrible – debris from fires everywhere, glass on the pavement,” the 63-year-old, who declined to give his last name, said.

Some shrugged off the disruptions. But almost all seemed caught off guard upon arriving at the Louvre, their plans suddenly cancelled.

Turned away, many resorted to selfies and photos in front of the former palace.

Roughly half a million people turned out across France on Saturday to denounce the surging cost of living, a culmination of earlier protests led by high school students demanding better conditions at their schools.

The Yellow Vests movement, which organized the weekend’s rallies, has called for more protests this coming Saturday, as the government mulls partial, targeted curfews.

‘A disaster’

The closure of the Louvre meant just one more detour for Anne and her husband Pat Boland, also 73, whose airline lost their luggage during the voyage.

“It’s just a disaster,” said Pat with a laugh.

“We were here at this exact spot seven years ago, and the queues were too long,” said Anne.

Having visited the museum twice, she’s yet to go inside.

“We don’t want to get involved. We want to stand back and get away from them,” Pat said of the protests.

“But we don’t want to go against them either,” Anne hastened to add, noting a trend of cost-of-living protests cropping up across the world recently, including in Ireland and Australia.

At the weekend, taxi drivers at Charles de Gaulle airport warned arriving passengers that they might not be able to make it to their destination if protesters blocked their routes.

A headline in a newspaper in Wales, in the U.K., wondered if France would be safe for families to visit for the upcoming school holiday, and the U.S. embassy called on its nationals to exercise caution.

But many in the city carried on in typical Parisian style: a video broadcast by America’s CBS news showed a couple drinking on a city terrace, unfazed by a nearby fire in the road.

“We haven’t seen anything concerning,” said Glenda Manna, 62, a university professor in town from the U.S.

But as the protests capture the attention of news channels – and politicians – around the world, there are incessant messages from family members back home pleading with them to “tell me you’re safe,” added her mother, Dorothy Hill, 82.

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The 2,000-year-old Basilica Therma Roman Bath in the Sarıkaya district of Yozgat, central Türkiye, is welcoming visitors in the evening following upgrades to its lighting and the opening of a cafe where guests can relax.

Listed on UNESCO’s Tentative List of World Heritage Sites, the historic bath draws attention for its Roman-era architecture and thermal waters, which reach temperatures of around 50 degrees Celsius (122 degrees Fahrenheit).

According to local legend, the site became known as “Kral Kızı,” or “King’s Daughter,” after the ailing daughter of a king who lived in Kayseri during the Roman period recovered her health in its thermal waters. Today, the structure is among the district’s major tourist attractions.

As part of a project supported by the Culture and Tourism Ministry and the Yozgat Governor’s Office, Sarıkaya Municipality took over the operation of the cafes located next to the Roman bath.

Additional lighting has also been installed, allowing visitors to explore the historic site in the evening.

Efforts are continuing to secure a place for the Roman bath on UNESCO’s permanent World Heritage List after it was added to the tentative list in 2018. Improvements are also underway in the surrounding area.

Plans include developing a shopping center in front of the bath where visitors can shop and purchase locally made souvenirs. Facade renovation work is also continuing along Marangoz Street in the district.

Mustafa Savran, who visited the Roman bath after traveling from Adana, told Anadolu Agency (AA) that he was impressed by the site’s nighttime atmosphere and lighting.

Savran said he was surprised to discover such an attraction in the district.

“When we arrived, we learned that there was a Roman bath here. They have set up a tea garden, and they have provided a wonderful service. We had tea, and the view is beautiful. It is also nice to be surrounded by historical monuments,” he said.

“We did not expect to find something like this in Sarıkaya, but we really liked it. It is a lovely setting. The nighttime atmosphere is especially beautiful, although it has a different charm during the day,” he added.

Akın Çiftçi, a lawyer who practices in the district, said the new lighting and cafe had made it possible for him to spend time at the site with friends and visitors. He thanked those involved in the improvements.

Mustafa Dalkıran, a Turkish expatriate who returned to his hometown from Bochum, Germany, also praised the site.

“It is an excellent place. It is a source of pride that such a historic monument, dating back around 2,000 years, is located in our country,” he said, adding that he was interested in historical sites and regularly watched documentaries about them.

“The place has turned out beautifully. The lighting and the view created by the water are particularly peaceful,” he said.

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