swpeter Posted June 26, 2007 #1 Share Posted June 26, 2007 We are a group of eight visting Istanbul on the 21st of July looking for a private tour guide with van for the day. Has anyone used such a guide they could recommend? We used a private guide to meet us in Civitivechia last year and he literally made the visit to Rome and are hoping to find a similar enthusiastic, friendly and professional Turk.:confused: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
martyap Posted June 26, 2007 #2 Share Posted June 26, 2007 We are a group of eight visting Istanbul on the 21st of July looking for a private tour guide with van for the day. Has anyone used such a guide they could recommend? We used a private guide to meet us in Civitivechia last year and he literally made the visit to Rome and are hoping to find a similar enthusiastic, friendly and professional Turk.:confused: Try Lale or Kagan Kosagan. Do a google search for their site. They are reasonable and very professional but quite in demand. Marty Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
No clever name Posted June 27, 2007 #3 Share Posted June 27, 2007 I can offer no insight into your question (we will make our own first visit in Oct 07), but I would like to have contact information for your guide in Civitavecchia Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
toothpilot2005 Posted June 27, 2007 #4 Share Posted June 27, 2007 We are a group of eight visting Istanbul on the 21st of July looking for a private tour guide with van for the day. Has anyone used such a guide they could recommend? We used a private guide to meet us in Civitivechia last year and he literally made the visit to Rome and are hoping to find a similar enthusiastic, friendly and professional Turk.:confused: We just returned on Galaxy and had booked Nejat Incedogan for two half days in Istanbul and a full day in Kusadasi. He provided a van that seats 12, and asked our permission before adding anyone else to our trip. He is knowledgable and entrance fees are included. You might consider just a half day tour to Ephesus (if he provides that) unless you really want to see and buy a hand made turkish carpet! Try a google search for him. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
teach2travel Posted June 28, 2007 #5 Share Posted June 28, 2007 We will be there in July and have booked Ekol tours. They have recieved many good references on the boards and were prompt about answering my emails. Maybe try them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bunnyette Posted June 28, 2007 #6 Share Posted June 28, 2007 I've booked a tour for 12 with CTCTurkey. They have an office in the USA and Mary has been absolutely fantastic to deal with! Their prices are very reasonable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
friend of Eeyore Posted June 28, 2007 #7 Share Posted June 28, 2007 We are a group of eight visting Istanbul on the 21st of July looking for a private tour guide with van for the day. Has anyone used such a guide they could recommend? We used a private guide to meet us in Civitivechia last year and he literally made the visit to Rome and are hoping to find a similar enthusiastic, friendly and professional Turk.:confused: I don't have an answer for you, but are you on the Royal Princess? We're in Istanbul on the 21st also. If so, we'd love to have you join our roll call thread - click here for the link. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
212cruiser Posted June 29, 2007 #8 Share Posted June 29, 2007 We were fortunate enough to be able to book Mr. Levent Solmaz. You can contact him at info@leventsolmaz.com Levent was our guide for 3 days in both Istanbul and Izmir. He was, without question, the best private guide we had anywhere in Europe. He is not only thoroughly knowledgeable and a complete gentleman, he is a consummate professional. My group still comments about the memories they have of us with Levent in Turkey. Try placing a value on that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DebNJoe Posted June 29, 2007 #9 Share Posted June 29, 2007 We were fortunate enough to be able to book Mr. Levent Solmaz. You can contact him at info@leventsolmaz.comLevent was our guide for 3 days in both Istanbul and Izmir. He was, without question, the best private guide we had anywhere in Europe. He is not only thoroughly knowledgeable and a complete gentleman, he is a consummate professional. My group still comments about the memories they have of us with Levent in Turkey. Try placing a value on that! So glad to hear that - we are booked for 2 days B2B, with Levent in Sept in Izmir and Istanbul :D Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ilovemed Posted June 29, 2007 #10 Share Posted June 29, 2007 There is an official website for tour guides who offer private tours within Turkey. It is an unbiased website, it is not launched by one or two guides, it is run by tour guides association of Turkey: www.turkishguides.org Or our friends used Murat Gurer this year and they are raving about him. He has a website: www.privateguideforturkey.com Also CTC USA or DANYTUR are great, you can google both and find their e-mails. Good luck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bdwyer Posted June 29, 2007 #11 Share Posted June 29, 2007 We just returned from our cruise. Many from our CruiseCritic group used Ekol - they were excellent in both Kusadasi and Istanbul. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
virgenia Posted June 29, 2007 #12 Share Posted June 29, 2007 no clever name-- In 2005 we used claudio caponera of limoinrome dot com for a full day tour of Rome. He picked us up at the port, toured all day in Rome with us, and dropped our party off at two separate hotels. He was excellent--he is a driver, not a licensed tour guide, but his knowledge and English is impeccable. We have hired him for a full day tour of Florence in September when we sail again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Denverite Posted June 30, 2007 #13 Share Posted June 30, 2007 I second the recommendation by ilovemed for Murat Gurer. There were 4 of us and we booked an entire day with Murat Gurer in Istanbul. What a delight he is--perfect English, very flexible, great tour. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Summertimescallingme Posted June 30, 2007 #14 Share Posted June 30, 2007 We just returned from NCL Jewel two weeks ago. We had the best guide we have used in 7 years of cruising and over 40 ports. He was recommended by Kogan (who was booked). His name is Can Gunay, he is a registerd Professional Tour Guide. A wonderful young man in his late 20's, very knowledgable and polite. Worked hard to ensure we saw what we were interested in, not taking us places to have friends sell us items we did not want. We used him for two days in Istanbul. I can not recommend him highly enough. His email is cangunay@mail.com. If you contact him, tell him Virginia and the boys from Atlanta say hello. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swpeter Posted July 1, 2007 Author #15 Share Posted July 1, 2007 I can offer no insight into your question (we will make our own first visit in Oct 07), but I would like to have contact information for your guide in Civitavecchia Thanks The email for the guide we used is: ***************@yahoo.com Our guide was Nick who runs the company. I can't say enough good things about him. He ran us all over Rome for eight hours - we only stopped for a bite of the best pizza in the world...i.e., no lunch just more touring! We recommended him to some friends who were in Italy last month and they too raved about him (one of our friends is battling cancer and Nick drove him to the front door of every attraction)....he fast tracked us at the Collesium and the Vatican and that alone was worth his fee. His English is perfect (years of working for PanAm) and his has a wealth of knowledge of Rome and Italian history. He also does tours of Naples and I think Sorrento. We have booked Nick for our tour of Rome again this year when we visit in July with my sister and her family. Have a great cruise, if you want any pointers on any other ports please feel free to ask we have done the Med now six times and you will have a ball! Hope this helps, have a great cruise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cdragon Posted July 2, 2007 #16 Share Posted July 2, 2007 We just returned from a cruise on the Carnival Freedom. We booked both our Izmir and Istanbul tours with Meander Travel. They were great! We had no complaints and both guides were very knowledgeable about the sites. In Izmir we visited Ephesus and in Istanbul we visited the Blue Mosque, Hagia Sophia, The Topkapi Palace and the Grand Bazaar. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
petlover Posted August 7, 2007 #17 Share Posted August 7, 2007 We too have used Mr. Levent Solmaz in Turkey. He is fantastic, wonderful air conditioned van, perfect English and soooooo knowledgeable! He is in high demand but if you can book him....you will be in for a wonderful day! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Almagetty Posted August 7, 2007 #18 Share Posted August 7, 2007 I second the recommendation for Lale or Kagan Kosagan. We toured with them last month and they were unbelievably wonderful! You can contact them at their e-mail address, which is their last name at yahoo dot com. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
itsjb1 Posted August 7, 2007 #19 Share Posted August 7, 2007 We used Kagan Kosagan for our day in Istanbul in July 2007 and he was teriffic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hermes37 Posted September 9, 2007 #20 Share Posted September 9, 2007 All your input is amazing, thanks... You made my job easier in selecting my guide for Istanbul... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caribbeansun Posted September 9, 2007 #21 Share Posted September 9, 2007 My DW and I just returned from Istanbul a couple days ago. We had Kagan Kosagan as our guide for two days. We thoroughly enjoyed our time with Kagan and found him to be quite knowledgeable and passionate about the work he does. He was very flexible with respect to the length of our tours as well as the sites we visited - going so far as to identify sites we were better off visiting on our own time rather than with him. I would not hesitate to recommend Kagan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chelledun Posted September 9, 2007 #22 Share Posted September 9, 2007 We had Nil with Ekol Travel in Istanbul. LOVED, LOVED, LOVED her. Probably the best guide I've ever had in my life. I actually reviewed my experience with Ekol here, we used the company for Ephesus as well and can't rave enough about them. Michelle Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eh2zed Posted September 9, 2007 #23 Share Posted September 9, 2007 We had Nil with Ekol Travel in Istanbul. LOVED, LOVED, LOVED her. Probably the best guide I've ever had in my life. I actually reviewed my experience with Ekol here, we used the company for Ephesus as well and can't rave enough about them. Michelle Michelle, we had Nazli as our guide from Ekol in Istanbul. What a great day we had as well. Also had them in Kusadasi. Great price, great guides. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bunnyette Posted September 11, 2007 #24 Share Posted September 11, 2007 I booked with CTC Turkey/Danyatours. We had a great young guide Hassan who was not only knowledgeable but took us to places that the shore excursions didn't go - i.e. UPSTAIRS at St. Sophia. He also went out of his way to ensure that some of us were able to visit the spice market. I highly recommend them. They have an office in the USA as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
X-ring Posted September 16, 2007 #25 Share Posted September 16, 2007 We booked both our Izmir and Istanbul tours with Meander Travel. They were great! We had no complaints and both guides were very knowledgeable about the sites. In Izmir we visited Ephesus and in Istanbul we visited the Blue Mosque, Hagia Sophia, The Topkapi Palace and the Grand Bazaar. We used them for both Istanbul and Ephesus. Only complaint was that the included lunch on the Ephesus tour turned out to be at a carpet co-op and served accompanied by a sales pitch. P.S. - our group's evening at the Orient House in Istanbul was a hi-lite (among many). As I recall it, was cheaper going there with Meander than booking directly with the OH itself! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.