I can't say enough about Matt and his great hospitality. We had great communication with each other leading up to our arrival.
Matt send photos illustrating how to reach the apartment across Taksim square. I have to admit without which it would have been very difficult to find.
Immediately after checking us in, he walked me over to a neighborhood shop to get a SIM card and even made dinner reservation for me for that evening.
The SIM card is absolutely necessary, we used Googlemaps to help us find every destination. BTW, I also recommend Citymapper as the best app for travelers, and Istanbul is one of the cities featured in Citymapper.
The restaurant Matt recommended had the most beautiful view of the Bosphorus at night. Thank you, dear Matt, for directing us there.
Matt's apartment is sparkling clean, charming and functional. It is close to Taksim and accessible to all the major transportation that will take you wherever one wants to go.
It is located mid-level on one of Istanbul's many hills. So there will be steep slopes to climb to get up to Taksim, and returning by tram from Sultanahmet, there will be steep slopes to climb to get to the house.
On the first day, everything looks daunting. By the next day, everything will be normal and we started walking everywhere.
We had both fallen for the charms of Istanbul.
Thank you, Matt, for organizing our transport back up the hill to the airport bus.