Çeşme is a coastal town and the administrative centre of the district of the same name in Turkey’s westernmost end, on a promontory on the tip of the peninsula which also carries the same name and which extends inland to form a whole with the wider Karaburun Peninsula. It is a popular holiday resort and the district center, where two thirds of the district population is concentrated. Çeşme is located 85 km west of İzmir, the largest metropolitan center in Turkey’s Aegean Region. There is a six-lane highway connecting the two cities (Otoyol 32). Çeşme district has two neighboring districts, Karaburun to the north and Urla to the east, both of which are also part of İzmir Province. The name “Çeşme” means “fountain” and possibly draws reference from the many Ottoman fountains scattered across the city. read more…
İzmir is a large metropolis in the western extremity of Anatolia and the third most populous city in Turkey, after Istanbul and Ankara. İzmir’s metropolitan area extends along the outlying waters of the Gulf of İzmir and inland to the north across Gediz River‘s delta, to the east along an alluvial plain created by several small streams and to a slightly more rugged terrain in the south. The ancient city was known as Smyrna, and the city was generally referred to as Smyrna in English, until the Turkish Postal Service Law of 28 March 1930 made “İzmir” the internationally recognized name. İzmir has almost 3,500 years of recorded urban history and possibly even longer as an advanced human settlement. Lying on an advantageous location at the head of a gulf running down in a deep indentation midway on the western Anatolian coast, the city has been one of the principal mercantile cities of the Mediterranean Sea for much of its history. Its port is Turkey’s primary port for exports in terms of the freight handled and its free zone, a Turkish-U.S. joint-venture established in 1990, is the leader among the twenty in Turkey. read more…
