Talk:Aegean Turkey

Sub-regions

I tried to divide Aegean Turkey into (somewhat arbitrary, but sensible from a travelling point of view) sub-regions, to keep the cities list on this article tidier. Here is a short summary on where is where:

• Central Aegean – a circle with a radius of about 100 km centred in Izmir. Everything between Foça in the north, Manisa (or somewhere nearby lying further east) in the east, Kuşadası in the south, Çeşme in the west
• Northern Aegean – everywhere north of Dikili up to the Marmara (region) border.
• Southern Aegean – everywhere south of Kuşadası. Doesn’t include Kuşadası, however (it’s in Central Aegean).

Both Northern and Southern Aegean are common names in daily speech by the way.

Opinions on borders, names, etc are always welcome. – (WT-en) Vidimian 13:37, 21 March 2009 (EDT)

The problem is that this schema doesn't take into account the fact that Aegean Turkey also includes a large inland area with areas like Afyon, Kütahya, Uşak and Denizli, which are currently classified as Central Anatolia. My suggestion:

• Northern Aegean – the Aegean portion of Balikesir province.
• Central Aegean – Izmir and Manisa provinces.
• Southern Aegean – Aydin and Muğla provinces.
• Inland Aegean – the other four provinces.

Obviously this isn't an even division, but it essentially divides things into 1. the Aegean part of the Turkish Riviera and their hinterlands, 2. the greater Izmir metropolitan area (less Aydin province, since it includes many resort towns) and pretty much everything that's an easy day trip from Izmir (again, excluding Adyin), 3. the small portion of Balikesir not included in Marmara region (another resort area, though one mainly targeting Turks), and 4. everything else, which except for Pamukkale goes largely unvisited by tourists. —Quintucket (talk) 20:27, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Whenever possible, the regional divisions at Wikivoyage are considered with a firm focus on the needs of the traveller. As such, I'm afraid I can't agree with an "Inland Aegean" region, as the trio of Kütahya, Afyon, and Uşak Provinces are as much unrelated as it could be to the Aegean, culturally, geographically, climatically or travel-scene-wise. (Pamukkale and Denizli are in the Southern Aegean region in the current set-up, though.) I'm all for an Inner Western Anatolia (İç Batı Anadolu) article (which I think of start writing as soon as I have more free time) for these three provinces (plus Eskişehir), but I'd say that should really be a sub-region of Central Anatolia. Vidimian (talk) 21:00, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

I understand the point about the needs of the traveler, however when we're talking about the broader regions, I think that the traditional Turkish geoscheme serves this purpose as well as anything. Most sources follow it, and it's unlikely that anybody will try to see the whole of a macro-region, no matter how we divide things. So while we could start from scratch, this doesn't seem to offer much benefit for macro-regions, and arguably grounds for contention, since regions can overlap, depending on what kind of travel you're trying to do, and the hierarchal set-up doesn't account for this. (I sincerely hope that at some point we'll have the capacity to create overlapping regions, but that's likely to be a way off.)

Aydin and Muğla for example could be treated as part of the Turkish Riviera, but also as Aegean Turkey, and Aydin and even part of Mugla and Denizli fall under the "places you can day-trip from Izmir if you have a car" region, while also overlapping with the "places you can daytrip from Antalya" region. Thus I would still propose to stick with the Turkish geoscheme for larger regions for easy reference. Smaller regions are of course a different matter, and those are where we should try to nitpick and fine-tune things for ease of planning. As such, I can see that Denizli, as the only one of those provinces often visited by foreigners, might merit its own region. —Quintucket (talk) 21:42, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

I still cannot see a reason to group Afyon together with Izmir, or Kütahya together with Muğla. I'm not saying we should follow their lead here, but for what it's worth, Lonely Planet guide to Turkey, 2007 edition, puts everything from Bursa to Denizli in a region named "Western Anatolia" (distinct from the Marmara, Aegean, Mediterranean, or Central Anatolia regions), while Rough Guide to Turkey, 2010 edition, puts Kütahya into "North Central Anatolia", and Afyon into "South Central Anatolia". Denizli Area could be its own region, but currently that wouldn't have much content (please consider viewing this policy page for the optimum size expected from the regional divisions of Wikivoyage).

From what I understand, Turkish Riviera (Wikipedia article) is an extra-hierarchical region covering parts of Aegean Turkey and Mediterranean Turkey. Currently the border of these two regions (which was discussed here) is defined as to leave Marmaris on the Mediterranean, while Datça and Bodrum to the north of it in the Aegean, which is in sync with the general idea in Turkey that the Datça Peninsula forms the border between the Aegean Sea and the Mediterranean proper. To delimitate these two regions clearly, I could recommend looking for these while you are around:

• Olive trees, and Greek/Roman ruins: you are likely in the Aegean
• Pine trees, and (mostly) Lycian ruins: you are likely in the Mediterranean

Of course there should be places that are exceptions, but these could be the basis of a general idea on where to put into which region, I guess.

In any rate, this discussion might be more appropriate to take place at Talk:Turkey, as it is more about a general regional division of Turkey rather than the Aegean Region. Vidimian (talk) 22:15, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

OK, I've brought the topic to the Turkey discussion. I started a new topic, since the initial discussion is quite old.

While from a traveler's perspective there's no particular reason to group Afyon, Kütahya, and Uşak with Izmir, there's also no reason to group them with Ankara, Konya, and Sivas. They're simply not often visited by tourists. Even I haven't visited them, though I would like to some day (just because I've found that places people tell you not to visit here are nonetheless often worth visiting). I'm fine with including Denizli in the Southern Aegean, though I'd note that I think the Datça penninsula, while forming the border, is still considered part of the Aegean.

Also, I realized that I forgot that a small part of Çanakkale province (basically, most of Ayvacik) is considered part of Aegean Turkey, though by including Assos in the "North Aegean," the guide already reflects this. — Quintucket (talk) 23:01, 15 January 2013 (UTC)

Seven Churches of Asia

Swept in from the pub

So I'm thinking that there are several package tours that seem to be popular in Turkey (that is, I've seen very similar packages sold from multiple companies), that travelers might be interested in attempting to do on their own. However these are usually a group of geographically close destinations, often with extra ones thrown in, and don't necessarily have a specific order. The ones I'm thinking of specifically are the Seven Churches of Asia, and the popular attractions of the Southeast (this one already has an itinerary of sorts, though it seems to be a personal itinerary, covering a couple sites that aren't necessarily the main ones people see, and sticking to a somewhat odd timetable).

I'm wondering if there's a good way to cover a group of sites, commonly visited together, without setting a specific order or time table? I'm interested in the Seven Churches of Asia for now (I've visited six of them, and plan to visit the seventh when I eventually get to Denizli), but not sure how to go about it. Itineraries seem to require at least some suggestion of the order, while topics seem to need to be more general. And of course while all the sites are mentioned in their respective sub-region articles, (and I'm trying to make it clear how to get between them in site-specific articles) they're not all in the same sub region, and one would currently need at least seven pages to plan the one trip, should they choose to do it. Thoughts? —Quintucket (talk) 18:57, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

You can create a travel topic. AHeneen (talk) 21:57, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

The nearest precedent that comes to my mind is New Mexico Pueblos, which might be helpful to draw inspiration from. You could also write about it, perhaps in its own subsection, at Aegean Turkey#See until when you decided in what shape the full blown article would be. Vidimian (talk) 00:03, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Thanks guys. The New Mexico Pueblos article looks especially helpful in terms of layout, but I think I'll take Vidimian's suggestion and put it in the "see" part of the Aegean for now, until I get it to the length where it needs to be split. —Quintucket (talk) 19:42, 19 January 2013 (UTC)