Istanbul to Bursa

You are at the mouth of the gulf now, some sixty metres above the water. This is among the longest suspension bridges in the world, and it was built to solve one problem: going around the gulf meant fifty kilometres and an hour. Look east and the water narrows into a corridor running inland towards İzmit; to the west the Marmara opens out, and on a clear day you can make out the ridge of the Armutlu peninsula on the far shore. The toll is included in your price; nothing is asked of you on the road.

Coming off the bridge the view softens abruptly: the factories give way to rows of greenhouses, orchards and fields of ornamental plants. This plain is the centre of Turkey's cut-flower production. Yalova, off to your west, is known for thermal springs used since Roman times; the hot water is another consequence of the fault line, so the restlessness underground here explains both the spa and the lake. From here the road bends south and begins to climb.

Here the road runs along the ridge between two bodies of water: Lake İznik to your east, the Gulf of Gemlik to your west. İznik, off to the east, was ancient Nicaea, where two great councils of Christianity met; the text of the creed still in use was written on this lakeshore in 325. Centuries later the same town became the centre of tile production: the blue and white tiles lining the mosques of Istanbul came from here. The lake is not on the route, but if you want to see it the detour is roughly forty minutes.

Bursa is built not on the plain but against the foot of the mountain; the wall rising behind it as you approach is Uludağ, 2,543 metres. In antiquity this mountain was called Mysian Olympus. Bursa was the first capital of the Ottoman state, and what shaped the city's character was the silk trade: the Koza Han, where the caravans unloaded, still stands and silk is still sold there. Because the city spreads in a long east-west strip, moving between points can take half an hour; that is why your destination is settled at booking.