Istanbul Airport to the Historic Peninsula

As the road bends south, water appears suddenly on your right: this is the Golden Horn. A natural harbour seven kilometres long, and the real answer to why Istanbul was founded here. In Byzantine times a vast chain was drawn across its mouth to stop enemy fleets. The tower rising on the hill opposite is the Galata Tower, built by the Genoese in the fourteenth century. From here the city thickens abruptly: the empty ground of a moment ago gives way to neighbourhoods six hundred years old.

The lines of stone and brick running for kilometres on your left are the land walls, built in the fifth century under Emperor Theodosius II. A double wall with a moat between and ninety-six towers. For a thousand years no siege broke this line; it fell only in 1453, after the invention of cannon. If you look closely some sections have been restored and others left as they were. The difference is the colour of the brick: the new is lighter.

Where the walls reach the sea, the Fortress of Yedikule rises. The Golden Gate, Byzantium's ceremonial entrance, stood here; emperors returning from victory entered the city through it. Under the Ottomans the structure served as treasury and prison. Past this point the car comes out onto the Marmara shore and the sea opens on your right. On a calm day you can pick out the silhouette of the Princes' Islands; in clear weather, the snow on Uludağ further off.

In the last few minutes the skyline changes: first the six minarets of the Blue Mosque, then the broad dome of Hagia Sophia. The space between them was the Hippodrome in Roman times, where chariot races and political uprisings took place. The obelisk on the square came from Egypt, from the reign of Thutmose III: at three and a half thousand years old it is the oldest object in Istanbul. Beyond this point the car cannot enter the narrow streets; your driver stops at the nearest legal point to your hotel.