İnciraltı Sea Museum (Museum Ships)

About this place

Tied up at İnciraltı pier on the western edge of Izmir is an American-built submarine now called TCG Pirireis, which served the Turkish Navy from 1980 to 2004 and was left inside almost exactly as her last crew walked off her: bunks folded above the torpedoes, a galley too small for one cook, passageways two people cannot pass in. The submarine is the real reason to come. Alongside her sit the frigate TCG Ege (USS Ainsworth until she passed to Turkey in 1994), the fast attack craft TCG Kasırga, which joined the group in 2015, and a naval helicopter perched on the frigate's flight deck since 2014. The Turkish Navy has run the museum since it opened on 1 July 2007, which explains a lot: you go round in a group led by one of the sailors, the tour takes 45 minutes to an hour, and the commentary is mostly in Turkish, though the spaces speak for themselves. You climb to the frigate's bridge, look down into the engine room, then squeeze through a hatch into the submarine and wonder how eighty-odd men slept here for weeks. Children adore it; this is one of Izmir's most reliable family outings. Some plain warnings. Pushchairs cannot go aboard: the ladders are near-vertical steel and the hatches make you stoop, so a baby travels in a carrier. The submarine bakes in July and August and turns into a stifling metal tube, so in summer go first thing. And it is small: an hour to ninety minutes covers everything, and anyone indifferent to warships can skip it without regret. Getting there is easy: about fifteen minutes by taxi from Konak along the seafront road, or the metro to Fahrettin Altay and a short bus ride; the museum faces the Özdilek shopping centre. Pair it with the Balçova thermal baths or the seafront cafés at İnciraltı, and remember it closes on Mondays and for lunch between 12:00 and 13:30, and does not take the Turkish Müzekart.