Getting from Sabiha Gokcen to Istanbul

A large share of flights into Sabiha Gökçen land late at night, when public transport thins out. With children in tow, a pre-arranged pickup becomes the easiest part of the trip. Getting the driver's name and plate number in advance is the detail that helps most while waiting at midnight in an unfamiliar city.

There is a practical reason too: the metro and the airport buses run to a timetable, and after midnight the gaps stretch. A family with luggage and sleeping children changing vehicles twice at one in the morning is the part of the trip people remember, and not fondly.

We track the flight by its number. If the plane is late the driver waits and there is no extra charge for it — this is written down because at that hour it is the question guests worry about most.

Getting out after the plane lands takes time too, and that time is missing from most plans. Passport control can reach twenty minutes at busy hours, and bags another fifteen to twenty on the belt. So you reach the exit about forty minutes after landing; an hour at a busy time.

Sabiha Gökçen has an advantage here: the terminal is small and there is a single exit. At Istanbul Airport the exits are far apart and which one you use depends on your baggage belt; there is no such confusion here. You collect your bag and walk out of the one door in front of you.

Because we track the flight by its number the driver is there before you. If the plane is late there is no waiting charge. And it does not matter if your own line is not working: we wait with a name board, so finding each other does not depend on the internet.

If we are landing at Sabiha Gökçen, staying on the Asian side comes to mind, and for some guests it is genuinely the right answer. Kadıköy and Üsküdar give a larger room for the same budget than the European side, their streets are less touristic and food is cheaper. Kadıköy's market and shore road are worth wandering in their own right.

But the historic sights are on the other bank. Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, Topkapı, the Grand Bazaar — all on the European side, and you cross every day. The ferry takes twenty minutes and is a pleasure; but done twice a day it adds an hour.

The practical split: on a three-day trip, stay on the European side, because every hour on the move is a large percentage of the total. For a week or more the Asian side makes sense; it is cheaper and you see the city as a resident rather than a tourist. When you decide, just tell us the hotel address and we plan the transfer around it.