We had a fantastic time at Garen’s apartment. We were at this location for 2 months and found such joy in being a part of the local community(as much as we could without speaking Turkish). The neighborhood is safe, and has so many amazing local restaurants and shops.
Garen was always very quick to respond to any question or issue that we had. And he was very open to us adding a day at the end of our trip.
Some of my favorite aspects of this apartment are it’s location, the amount of bedrooms, and the amenities. Let me break each of these down.
1. location: the apartment is on the 2nd floor so there’s not too many stairs to climb up. Also, there is the BEST grocery store just down the road. Exit the building, turn left and it’s called “Alkan” (it’s right beside a barber shop that did a great job cutting our 2 boys’ hair!) also, several restaurants near here a MUST tries. Sini is right around the corner up the hill, and has a chef who was on master chef Turkey! It’s a tiny restaurant with only 12 seats, and you have to make reservations. She does a tasting menu and you won’t regret going! Also, the best Turkish pizza is down the street (turn left out of the building) called Cinaralti Lahmacun. The main shopping street is just a 12-15 minute walk up the hill, and main attractions can be reached eastbound public transportation just a few minutes from the building. Every Sunday there is a huge market right outside the building! This was one of our favorite aspects of the apartment.
2. The bedrooms/overall layout. As a family of 6 we tend to need a bigger place, and this worked well for us. The pictures are very accurate. I did miss not having an oven for 2 months, but the kitchen is very well equipped with what we needed. Also, even though we would have liked to have 1 more bed, it worked having our oldest sleep in the living room.
3. The fact that there was a washing machine was huge for me! Staying in a place for such a long time means we need to be able to wash out clothes. Some other amenities the were nice were the smart tv box so we could watch Netflix and Amazon shows, and there are plenty of electrical outlets.
Now I’m going to share some downfalls of this apartment, but I want to make it clear that these are common to Istanbul, so unless you stay in a nice hotel, you’ll probably experience these as well.
1. the Wi-Fi/power will go out. In the time we were there the Wi-Fi went out about 4 times for over 12 hours each time, and the power went out twice. I will say that every time this happened, we reached out to Garen and he looked into it and gave us an eta of when it would be back, and he was always very accurate.
2. You can’t flush the toilet paper, you throw it away in the trash can. There is a bidet, but as Americans this was not something we were use to. I will say, you get use to it pretty quick.
3. The beds are not the most comfortable….but I am pretty picky about my mattress!
All-in-all, this apartment was a amazing home for us! And if you need a place in Istanbul, I’d highly suggest this one!