Things to Do in Samsun: The Bandirma Ferry, Amazon Village and the Kizilirmak Delta

--- title: "Samsun travel guide: the Bandırma ship, the 19 May route, Amisos and the Kızılırmak Delta" description: "An honest guide to Samsun: the Bandırma ship replica and the 19 May route, the Gazi Museum, Amisos Hill and the Amisos Treasure, the Kızılırmak Delta bird wetland, Havza, Ladik and Şahinkaya Canyon. Who it suits, when to go, what to eat." city: "Samsun" lang: "en" ---

Samsun: the port where the Republic started

On the morning of 19 May 1919, Mustafa Kemal stepped off a small steamer called the Bandırma onto the quay at Samsun. His official job was inspector of the Ninth Army, sent to keep order in the region and oversee the disbanding of Ottoman units. What he actually did was something else. That date is treated as the start of the Turkish War of Independence, and it is a national holiday in Turkey. Almost everything Samsun means to the country rests on that single day.

The city itself does not hide what it is. This is a working port: cargo ships, docks, the residue of the tobacco and fertiliser industries, wide boulevards, apartment blocks. Samsun is not a resort. It is a large provincial capital that gets up and goes to work. The Black Sea coast that people picture, the green mountains and misty highland pastures and wooden houses above a stream, is not here. That coast begins east of Ordu and keeps improving all the way to Rize. Samsun sits on a plain: flat, broad and windy.

So who should come? Anyone interested in how the Turkish Republic began. Turkish visitors on 19 May, and tens of thousands make that trip every year. Birdwatchers, because the Kızılırmak Delta is one of the country's most important wetlands. Beyond those three groups, a foreign traveller may not have a strong reason to come, and it is more useful to say that than to pretend otherwise. The common mistake happens right here: people book a Black Sea trip, fly into Samsun expecting Ayder or Uzungöl, and find an industrial harbour instead. Samsun is not that city. Samsun is a place you go to for history.

Quick answer

Samsun works as a walking day around the 19 May sites, with the province's other draws split into separate day trips by car. One full day for the centre, three days for the province.

• The centre: the Bandırma ship, the Gazi Museum, the Onur Monument, the Panorama and the archaeology museum. Everything but the ship is within walking distance and fits into one day.
• Nature: the Kızılırmak Delta deserves a day of its own. It is a serious bird site, not a picnic spot.
• Inland: Havza, Ladik and Vezirköprü make one long day by car. Şahinkaya Canyon is the best scenery in the province.
• The sea: Atakum has a long promenade and public beaches. The water is cold and usually choppy. Do not come for a beach holiday.
• 19 May: the busiest day of the year and also the entire point. Come on the day if you want the ceremony, avoid the week if you do not.

1. The Bandırma ship and the National Struggle Park

The most important site in the province, and know one thing first: the ship is a replica, not the original. The real Bandırma was scrapped in 1925. A project to build an exact copy began in 1999, construction finished in 2001, and the museum opened on 18 May 2003. Knowing this does not spoil the visit. It makes it honest.

The ship sits on the shore in the Canik district, at the centre of the museum park. Six spaces inside are open: dining room, bedroom, exhibition saloon, bridge, captain's cabin and galley. Wax figures represent Mustafa Kemal and the eighteen officers who travelled with him. The thing that actually lands is the size. Standing on a deck this small and picturing it crossing the Black Sea moves 19 May out of the textbook.

The park holds more than the ship: a ten-panel relief sequence on the National Struggle, a monument with seven figures, a long ceramic relief wall on the liberation of İzmir, and an inscription naming 1,200 dead. Check admission and hours from an official source.

2. The Onur Monument and Cumhuriyet Square

In the middle of the city, a bronze Atatürk rears up on horseback. The Onur Monument is Samsun's emblem and the gathering point for the ceremonies every 19 May. It was raised in 1932 by the Austrian sculptor Heinrich Krippel and belongs to the early Republican tradition of public monuments that shaped how the new state pictured itself.

On an ordinary day, Cumhuriyet Square is an ordinary square. Banks, shops, people crossing it on the way somewhere. Nobody stops to look, because for the people who live here the statue is just where you agree to meet. That ordinariness is quietly interesting. The object representing a nation's founding moment has dissolved into daily life.

On 19 May the square is unrecognisable. Flags, processions, schoolchildren, a formal parade. The city's whole traffic plan bends around it for the day. Choose your date according to which of the two you want to see. The square is a few minutes on foot from both the Gazi Museum and the Panorama, which makes it the natural start of the 19 May route.

3. The Gazi Museum

The building went up in 1902 as a hotel called the Mıntıka Palas. When Mustafa Kemal landed at Samsun on 19 May 1919 he stayed here, using it as his headquarters until 25 May, roughly six days. Samsun municipality turned it into a museum and opened it to the public on 5 October 1940.

It is a two-storey brick building of 509 square metres. The interior reconstructs those six days: the working room, the bedroom, period furniture, documents. Around 100,000 people visit each year, a substantial figure for a provincial house museum, and on its own it explains why anyone comes to Samsun at all.

The value is not in the collection. It is in the room. This is where the decisions were made. Standing in these rooms and thinking about what a general does with his first few days ashore, and how he answers the telegrams arriving from Istanbul, hits differently from standing on the ship's deck. It is small, and forty minutes covers it. Check current hours from an official source.

4. Panorama Samsun Digital Exhibition Centre

Opened on 15 May 2018 under the name Panorama 1919 Museum, this centre tells the story of the National Struggle two ways: through digital projection and through dioramas. Wax figures stage the events in sequence. A large oil painting known as the Kızılca Gün diorama is the piece most people remember.

Places like this divide visitors. For some it is the most accessible way to tell history; for others it is closer to a show than a museum. Both readings are fair. If you are travelling with children, this is easier going than the Gazi Museum, because the narrative arrives pre-assembled and visual. If you prefer to build the history yourself, the ship and the hotel will give you more.

The centre is just north of Cumhuriyet Square, within walking distance, which makes it easy to slot into the 19 May route. Admission and hours change over time, so check them from an official source rather than trusting a blog.

5. Samsun Archaeology and Ethnography Museum

This is the most substantial museum in the city, and the reason to come is the Amisos Treasure. The gold jewellery, worked objects and Hellenistic finds recovered during rescue excavations at Amisos Hill are displayed here. They are thought to have belonged to a senior family of the Pontic Kingdom, and they are a reminder that Samsun has a layer far older than 1919.

The ethnography section is the second draw: clothing, household objects and textiles from the coastal Black Sea. Together they show what this place looked like before it became an industrial harbour.

The museum is small and central, right beside Cumhuriyet Square. Ninety minutes is enough. It is not one of Turkey's great archaeological collections, and there is no point inflating it. But without seeing the Amisos Treasure, the city's ancient past stays an abstraction you read about rather than something you looked at. Coming here after the ship and the Gazi Museum stops the trip from collapsing into a single date.

6. Amisos Hill

Amisos was the Greek colony that preceded the city. Colonists settled this coast around 670 BC, and the town they founded was known as Amisos; it saw major construction under Mithridates VI. Its most tangible surviving trace is Amisos Hill.

The hill is a tumulus site, which means burial chambers concealed under mounded earth. It is also called Baruthane Hill. It was discovered on 28 November 1995, dates to the third century BC, and is believed to belong to a family from the Pontic ruling class. Systematic excavation took place in 2004 to 2005 and again in 2008, and the Amisos Treasure came out of the ground here.

The site lies 4 km west of the centre on the Samsun to Sinop road, within the İlkadım district. From the top, the city and the port drop away below and the sea opens out. It is the best view in Samsun, though it should be said that the competition is not fierce. The hill reopened to visitors after conservation work finished in 2008.

7. Batıpark, the Amazon Village and the cable car

The easiest way up Amisos Hill starts here. A 323-metre cable car runs between Batıpark and the hill. It is a short line, but it lifts you from the shore to the tumulus with the city spread out underneath.

Batıpark itself is a large seafront park of 825,000 square metres in İlkadım. It contains an artificial island, and on that island the municipality built an Amazon Village. The Amazons were the legendary women warriors that ancient writers placed on this coast, at Themiskira near modern Terme. The village is entirely modern: built on roughly 2.5 dönüm and filled with wax figures, reliefs and household objects representing Amazon life.

Do not mistake it for an archaeological site, and to be fair it makes no such claim. It is a municipal attempt to turn a myth into tourism. It works for families with children and does little for anyone interested in the ancient world. The rest of the park has picnic areas, viewing terraces, a 730-metre water channel and kayaking, and it is a good stretch of shoreline to walk.

8. Saathane Square and the clock tower

This is Samsun's Ottoman layer, and honestly it is a thin one. Industrial and port growth took most of the old fabric with it. What survives is Saathane Square and a handful of buildings around it.

The clock tower stands in the middle. Nearby are the Büyük Mosque, the Pazar Mosque, the Kale Mosque and the Samsun bedesten, all close together and walkable in half an hour. What remains of Samsun Castle is in this area too, and remains is the right word, since most of it is gone.

The appeal here is not the monuments. It is the street. This is the part of town where the city genuinely shops, drinks tea and does business. Coming down here after finishing the 19 May route and sitting with a glass of tea is the simplest way to see Samsun as a place rather than as a ceremony. It gets busiest in the afternoon. Do not expect a tourist bazaar, because it is not one.

9. Atakum beach

A long seafront strip runs west of the city through Atakum: a promenade, a cycle lane, public beaches and tea gardens. This is where people come in the late afternoon to walk, and it is the liveliest the city gets.

Set your expectations. The Black Sea here is cold, choppy most days, and has currents. Even in midsummer the water temperature is nowhere near the Aegean or the Mediterranean. The sand is dark and coarse. Swimming is possible, but Samsun is not a beach destination and does not market itself as one. Take the currents seriously: read the flags and warning signs, and do not swim alone on an empty stretch.

The real value here is the walk. You can start at Batıpark and continue for kilometres along Atakum with the sea on your left and the city on your right. There is no better way to see how a port city spends its evening. The sunsets are good, because this shoreline faces west.

10. Tekkeköy Caves Archaeological Valley

East of the city, in the Tekkeköy district, is the oldest known human settlement in the Black Sea region. Finds from the caves date to between 60,000 and 15,000 BC, which puts them in the Palaeolithic. It is a useful corrective: the story that begins in 1919 is a very late chapter here.

The valley is now a protected archaeological site arranged as an open-air museum, with rock shelters, cave mouths and walking paths. There is a museum house on site displaying some of the finds, and an ecological toy museum aimed at children in the same complex.

The expectation problem applies here too. This is not Göbeklitepe. The caves are modest, the presentation is municipal, and in places it leans more park than site. But it is a concrete place where you can see that people lived on this coast sixty thousand years ago, and there are not many of those in Turkey. An hour if you are interested. About half an hour from the centre, easy by car.

11. Kızılırmak Delta bird wetland

This is Samsun's strongest card on the nature side, and that is not an exaggeration. Where the Kızılırmak empties into the Black Sea, its alluvium has built the Bafra plain, and the delta formed there is one of Turkey's most important wetlands. It spreads across the Bafra, Ondokuzmayıs and Alaçam districts.

The numbers make the case. The delta was designated a Ramsar site on 15 April 1998, with 21,700 hectares under that protection and around 56,000 hectares in total. Some 352 bird species have been recorded here, roughly three quarters of the 465 recorded in Turkey as a whole. Between 50,000 and 100,000 waterbirds winter in the delta.

On UNESCO, be precise: the delta was added to the World Heritage Tentative List in 2016 and has not been inscribed. Local institutions are still working on the nomination. Treat any source calling it a World Heritage Site as wrong.

If you watch birds, this alone justifies the trip to Samsun. If you do not, you will see a wide flat wetland. Bring binoculars, go early, prefer winter or migration season.

12. Havza: the thermal springs and the Atatürk House

Havza sits 84 km south of Samsun and only 44 km from Amasya. The district was taken from Amasya and attached to Samsun in 1925, so it is firmly in Samsun province today, though geography puts it closer to its old capital.

There are two reasons to come. The first is history. After Samsun, Mustafa Kemal reached Havza on 25 May 1919 and stayed until 13 June, close to three weeks. In that time the Havza Circular was issued on 28 May, the first Defence of Rights Society was founded, and the Youth March was sung. The building he used was the old Mesudiye Hotel, a museum since 1994 and redesigned in 2002 as Mustafa Kemal Pasha's Havza Headquarters.

The second is the springs. Havza's hot water has been used for roughly two thousand years; Strabo calls them the hot springs of Phazemonitis. The water carries arsenic, iron and bicarbonate. Five main bathhouses operate, and the Büyük Hamam is attributed to the Seljuk sultan Mesud II in 1256. Be sceptical of health claims; verify facilities and prices officially.

13. Lake Ladik

South of Samsun, east of the town of Ladik and below the slopes of Akdağ, lies a lake of 870 hectares. It is tectonic, formed when water filled a depression created by earth movement, so it is natural rather than a reservoir. It measures roughly 7 km by 2 km.

The lake counts as an Important Bird Area for its waterfowl. It is nowhere near as rich as the Kızılırmak Delta, but if you have come as far as Ladik it is worth taking the binoculars out. Mountains and forest surround it, and Akdağ rising behind the northern shore gives the view some depth.

What separates this from the Samsun shoreline is climate and terrain. Ladik is inland and higher, with cold, foggy winters. In summer people come up here to escape the humidity on the coast. You can walk around the lake, and there are tea gardens and fish restaurants. It is quiet, uncrowded and modest. Come as part of an inland loop with Ambarköy and Havza rather than as a destination in itself.

14. Ambarköy Open Air Museum

West of the lake at Ladik is an odd and rather good idea. Ambarköy is an open-air museum built to display examples of Ottoman-period timber architecture. The project began in 2010 under Ladik municipality, opened in 2013, and is now run by Samsun Metropolitan Municipality.

The construction method is the interesting part. The village was assembled from timber building elements donated by around 150 people and institutions. The houses here are not models. They are real structures brought from elsewhere and rebuilt on site, the oldest dating to the 17th century. The village includes houses, shops, a school, storehouses, a mill, a clock tower and a mosque. There is a separate museum devoted to the painter Hüseyin Avni Lifij, who came from Ladik.

Sources claim this is the first wooden open-air museum in the world. We are not in a position to confirm that, and a little scepticism is reasonable. Claim aside, gathering a disappearing building tradition into one place makes Ambarköy one of the more original stops in the province.

15. Şahinkaya Canyon

The best scenery in Samsun province is nowhere near the coast. Şahinkaya Canyon is at Vezirköprü, roughly 1,500 metres long and 324 metres high, and sources describe it as the second largest canyon in Turkey.

There is no river running along the bottom. What fills it is the reservoir of the Altınkaya Dam. So the view is a combination of natural rock walls and a man-made water level. That does not make it less impressive, but it is better to look at it knowing what it is. The canyon was declared a tourism area in 2012 and a nature park in 2015.

You see it from a boat. A tour vessel called the Samsunum-3 takes visitors into the canyon with the walls rising overhead. Sailings vary by season and water level, so check departure times and fares from an official source. There are viewpoints from above as well. The area also hosts Falcon Fest, an extreme sports festival. Vezirköprü is a long way from the city, so give this a full day.

16. Oymaağaç Höyük (Nerik)

This last stop is not for everyone, and it is fair to say so up front. Oymaağaç Höyük near Vezirköprü is an excavation identified as Nerik, the Hittite holy city. Nerik appears in Hittite texts as a major religious centre dedicated to the storm god, and its location was disputed for a long time; the digs here largely settled the question.

What you actually see is a mound. Excavation trenches, exposed wall footings, marked sectors. No pyramid, no temple columns. If you do not follow Hittite archaeology, this will look like a pile of earth. If you do, you are standing on one of the firmest pieces of evidence for Hittite presence at the northern edge of Anatolia.

Excavation areas may be open or closed depending on the season, so check visiting conditions from an official source. It makes sense to combine this with Şahinkaya Canyon on the same day and the same route, since both are at Vezirköprü and close to each other.

The 19 May route

If you have one day in Samsun, this route is enough. It can be done in order and on foot, with the ship as the single exception.

Start the morning at the Bandırma ship. It is in Canik, a few kilometres from the centre, reachable by taxi or public transport. Go up on deck knowing the vessel is small and that it is a replica. Walk the National Struggle Park too, since the reliefs and the monument are there.

Then head back to the centre and stand in front of the Onur Monument on Cumhuriyet Square. From here on, everything is walkable. The Gazi Museum is a few hundred metres west, the hotel where Mustafa Kemal stayed between 19 and 25 May 1919. The Panorama is just north of the square. The Samsun Archaeology and Ethnography Museum is beside it, and it is where the route leaves 1919 behind and picks up Amisos.

The sequence carries the meaning: the ship is the arrival, the hotel is the decision, the monument is the result. Walked in that order, 19 May stops being a holiday on the calendar and becomes a chronology. If you have the afternoon left, take the cable car up Amisos Hill and look down at the city. Adding Havza means another day, because the story does not end in Samsun. It continues at Havza on 25 May.

Getting there

Flying is the practical option. Samsun-Çarşamba Airport is about 25 km east of the centre, with scheduled services from Istanbul and Ankara and seasonal routes elsewhere. Shuttle buses, taxis and public transport connect it to town. Check current schedules and fares from an official source.

By road it is roughly 420 km from Ankara and around 730 km from Istanbul. From Amasya it is about 130 km and the road runs through Havza, which makes combining the two provinces obvious. Sinop lies west and Ordu east, both on the coast road. The intercity bus network is extensive and every major city has services.

Within the city, a light rail line runs along the shore linking the centre with Atakum, which is genuinely useful for a day's sightseeing. For the province, though, a car is close to essential. Reaching the Kızılırmak Delta, Havza, Ladik or Vezirköprü by public transport is theoretically possible and will eat your day. Vezirköprü is over 100 km out on mountain roads, so check the weather in winter.

When to go

19 May is both the busiest day of the year in Samsun and the entire reason to come. The city fills with flags, the ceremonies run, accommodation sells out and prices climb. If you want to see it, come on the day and book far ahead. If you do not, avoid that week, because the museums are packed and the centre may be closed to traffic.

Otherwise the best window runs from late May to the end of September. The Black Sea climate here is mild but humid, summer can turn hot and heavy, and the sea stays cold regardless. Rain is possible in any season, so bring something for it.

For birdwatching the calendar inverts completely. The action in the Kızılırmak Delta is in winter and during the migration seasons, meaning autumn and spring. More than 50,000 waterbirds are there in winter. If you are taking the delta seriously, summer is your worst choice.

Winter is dead season in the centre. The city keeps working, but there is little left to see, and the weather is grey and windy. Inland, at Ladik and Vezirköprü, winter is hard and the roads can cause problems.

What to eat

Samsun pidesi is an institution here. It is rolled thin and long into a boat shape and filled with minced meat or cheese. It is thinner and longer than the pide of other Black Sea towns, the city has a serious number of places making it, and locals hold firm opinions on the subject. It is hard to visit and not eat one.

Hamsi, the Black Sea anchovy, is seasonal. From November to February it is the fish of this coast, and that holds in Samsun. It is fried, steamed, cooked into pilaf and even baked into bread. If you go looking for hamsi in summer, what you find will have been frozen. Come in season or eat something else.

Terme is a district in the east of the province whose name turns up in regional cooking, and the vegetable and herb culture of the area draws on it. Black cabbage soup, cornbread and rice pudding with clotted cream are the local extensions of Black Sea cooking.

One more thing worth saying: Samsun is a big city and its food scene was built for the people who live here, not for visitors. That is a good thing. Prices are reasonable, portions are large, and there is very little performance. We are not naming places, because those lists go stale fast. Walk into whichever spot in the market district is full.

Frequently asked questions

**Is the Bandırma ship the original?** No, it is a replica. The original steamer was broken up in 1925. What you see in Samsun is an exact copy built from the original plans; construction finished in 2001 and the museum opened on 18 May 2003. Knowing this before you board makes the visit more interesting rather than less.

**Is the Kızılırmak Delta a UNESCO World Heritage Site?** Not yet. The delta was placed on the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List in 2016 and has not been inscribed on the main list. Local institutions are still working to move it across. The delta has also been protected under the Ramsar Convention since 1998, which is a separate and real designation.

**How many days does Samsun need?** One full day for the centre and the 19 May route. A separate day for the Kızılırmak Delta. One day for Havza, Ladik and Ambarköy. One more for Vezirköprü, meaning Şahinkaya Canyon and Oymaağaç. So four days to see everything. For most visitors two days is a realistic ceiling.

**Is Samsun worth visiting for a beach holiday?** No. Samsun is a working port and industrial city. Atakum has a promenade and public beaches, but the sea is cold, rough and has currents, and the sand is dark. The green mountains and highland pastures of the Black Sea are not here either; they start further east. Come for the history, for the birds, or for work.

**Which province is Havza in?** Samsun. Havza was transferred from Amasya to Samsun in 1925, which is why it still sits closer to Amasya: 84 km to central Samsun, 44 km to Amasya. That is where the confusion comes from. Since the road from Amasya to Samsun runs through Havza anyway, it is a natural stop on a trip that links the two provinces.