Turkey
Lake Van
A vast soda sea where you float without trying, ringed by snow-capped volcanoes.
The water is not quite blue, not quite green, a mineral turquoise that shifts with the light and the volcanic sediment stirred by the wind. Snowy peaks rim every horizon. A lone boat crosses toward Akdamar Island, where the silhouette of a tenth-century Armenian church rises from the rock like a hallucination.
Lake Van is Turkey's largest lake and the largest soda lake in the world, spanning 3,755 square kilometres at 1,640 metres in the far east. Its alkaline water, too salty to drink and soft enough to wash clothes without soap, supports one fish, the pearl mullet, which fights its way up freshwater streams to spawn each spring. On Akdamar Island, the carved Armenian church of 921 CE wears extraordinary biblical reliefs on its outer walls. Volcanoes ring the basin, Nemrut's caldera to the west and Süphan to the north, and Van city is famous across Turkey for its breakfast culture, a ritual of dozens of small plates anchored by herbed otlu peynir cheese.
Solo
Lake Van rewards the curious traveller willing to go deep into eastern Turkey. The breakfast ritual alone justifies the journey, and the solitude around the lakeshore is immense.
Couple
A boat trip to Akdamar Island followed by a Van kahvaltısı spread of forty-plus dishes balances wonder with indulgence.
Family
The alkaline water is gentle on skin and buoyant enough to float easily; children love the novelty, and the pearl mullet migration is a natural storytelling moment.
- Lake Van is the world's largest soda lake, its alkaline water supporting almost nothing but one endemic fish.
- The lake covers 3,755 square kilometres at 1,640 metres; the water warms just enough for a bracing swim in high summer.
- The pearl mullet, unique to Lake Van's waters, makes a spawning migration up the inflowing streams each spring.
- The boat from Gevaş takes about twenty minutes to reach Akdamar Island and its 10th-century Armenian church.
Van kahvaltısı, Turkey's most extravagant breakfast: dozens of small plates of honey, cheeses, herbs and eggs.
Otlu peynir, Van's cheese aged with wild mountain herbs, the anchor of every table.
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