Bolu sits in the forested mountains of the western Black Sea region, and most people come for its lakes. Abant, Yedigöller, Gölcük and Karagöl each lie in thick woods of pine, beech and fir. The province also holds two early Ottoman foundations of Bayezid I from 1382, the tomb of the teacher of Mehmed II at Göynük, and a ski resort on the Köroğlu mountains.
Abant Lake
Abant is a crater lake partly filled by sediment, set at 1,328 metres in the Abant mountains south-west of Bolu, with hills of 1,400 to 1,700 metres around it. It covers 127 hectares, reaches eighteen metres at its deepest and is fed from underground. Water lilies line its edges, and on the slopes above grows a crocus named after it, Crocus abantensis. Its surroundings, a nature park from 21 October 1988, were raised to national park status on 9 June 2022. The road in is a 22-kilometre surfaced branch that leaves the Ankara-İstanbul D-100 at the Ömerler village turning; from the park it is 225 kilometres to Ankara and 258 to İstanbul. People come for a day or stay overnight, and it is worth the trip in any month.
Yedigöller
The lakes of Yedigöller were made by landslides. On serpentine and volcanic ground, slipping masses dammed the mouths of valleys and water collected behind them, and some of the lakes still connect to each other by seepage underground. The forest around them is dense enough to be called a sea of forest: oriental beech, hornbeam, alder, aspen and sycamore maple, with rhododendron below. Türkiye's first farmed-trout station opened here in 1969, and anglers have come ever since; the trout they carried in from Abant ate the eggs of the native fish and nearly wiped them out. Go to the Kapankaya viewpoint for the view over the lakes, and look out for the signposted monumental tree on the way.
Gölcük and Karagöl
Gölcük, thirteen kilometres out of Bolu to the south along the Seben road, is a small artificial lake of 4.5 hectares at 1,217 metres, ringed by pine, beech, fir and hornbeam. The track around the lake, 1,300 metres long, is closed to cars and is used for walking and cycling, and municipal buses run out from the centre.
Karagöl is further and quieter: a deep lake of one hectare in Kıbrıscık district, high in the Köroğlu range at over 1,400 metres, about 80 kilometres from Bolu by asphalt road. Black pine makes up three quarters of its woods, and the frogs in its fresh water feed a good number of reptiles and birds. Bungalows on the shore and glamping units allow an overnight stay.
Mudurnu and Bolu: Bayezid I's buildings of 1382
In 1382, while still a prince, Bayezid I built a mosque, a bath and a medrese at Mudurnu. The mosque's dome is just under twenty metres across, a large span for its date, and the provincial directorate counts it among the first big-domed buildings of Ottoman architecture and among the earliest mosques carried on eight supports. Its walls are almost all rubble stone, with few windows. The bath, built the same year near the mosque by the architect Ömer bin İbrahim, is a double bath with separate men's and women's sections; muqarnas decorates its entrance, it is counted among the finest baths of its period, and it is still in use as a bath.
Bayezid I founded a complex in Bolu in the same year, but only its mosque remains, and in a later form. The original building burned in 1891 and was rebuilt with a single dome in 1899, damaged in the earthquake of 1944 and restored after that of 1999. It stands over a lower level of shops in the Buyukcami quarter of the centre, and locals call it Büyük Cami; look inside for the painted decoration.
Göynük: Akşemseddin's tomb
Akşemseddin, the teacher of Mehmed II, died in 1459, and five years later the sultan had his tomb raised at Göynük, in the courtyard of a mosque founded by Gazi Süleyman Paşa. It is a domed hexagon of cut küfeki limestone, and inside it his walnut cenotaph, carved with inscriptions, is a fine piece of Ottoman woodwork. Born in Damascus in 1390, he was a scholar and physician whom the ministry calls the spiritual conqueror of İstanbul, and the tomb is visited as a place of pilgrimage.
Kartalkaya in winter
The provincial culture and tourism directorate calls Kartalkaya, 38 km to the south-east of the city, the most important winter-sports centre in Türkiye. The season runs from December to April. Nine lifts serve fifteen runs of around 30 km in all, equipment can be hired on the mountain, and the directorate credits the resort with the largest snowpark in Türkiye.
Each of these places has its own guide on this site with directions and visiting details.
