Pigeon Island

Güvercinada - pigeon island - sits just off Kuşadası, joined to the town by a causeway some 350 metres long, and the fortress on it is what gave the town its name and its harbour. The fortress is Ottoman: the walls were built by İlyas Ağa and the citadel was commissioned by the admiral Hayreddin Barbarossa in the sixteenth century, with outer walls added in 1770, and a ring of walls about three metres high runs right round the island. It is small: a walled enclosure with towers, a path round the rock, gardens, a café and benches facing the water. The walk out along the causeway and round the island takes half an hour or so, and the point of it is the view back at the town, the harbour and the cruise ships that dock here in numbers - Kuşadası is one of the busiest cruise ports in the eastern Mediterranean, and the town's character follows from that. Sunset from the seaward side is the best moment.

Highlights

• The causeway - the walk out from the town waterfront.
• The fortress walls - Barbarossa's sixteenth-century citadel and its ring wall.
• The island path - the circuit round the gardens and shore.
• The harbour view - Kuşadası and the cruise berths behind.

When to go

April to June and September to October. Late afternoon for the light; the island is exposed and hot at midday and busiest when ships are in port.

Before you go

It is small - an hour at most - and the fortress interior is modest with little interpretation. Kuşadası itself is a heavily developed cruise-and-package resort, which colours the whole visit.

Nearby

Ephesus and Selçuk are about twenty kilometres inland; Dilek Peninsula national park is south.