Istanbul is a great place to eat during the day. Get into the back streets or residential neighbourhoods. There are cafés and takeaways everywhere, get a pide or a kebab and you won't go wrong. Out past the university in Laleli there are tons of ethnic restaurants, Uygur and central Asian food seemed really popular although it's not a place I'd hang around at night from what I heard. There were some good little cafés in Fener and in the streets headed down the hill towards the Golden Horn from the Grand Bazaar.

Personally, I was disappointed by eating out at night. I put that down to staying in Sultanahmet more than anything. Restaurants there are pitched at tourists and not that exciting. Basically, you've got kebab shops and what you're paying for is the quality of the furniture. Plastic chairs and tables with paper tablecloths? Cheap dinner. Cushions and couches and linen? Same food, you just pay more for not having a numb arse.

I ate mostly in the area behind the Blue Mosque. Mainly it was because it was near to where I was staying, the restaurants got less touristy the further down the hill you got and none of them had an old lady in the window rolling out dough. I avoided the streets from Sultanahmet Square to the west of the Haghia Sophia which were filled with dismal looking, pack 'em in tourist joints. If it's got an old woman making bread in the window then it is not for me.

The exception is maybe Ticarethane Sokak, a lane which is the closest thing to nightlife in central Sultanahmet. From the outside anyway, some of the restaurants and bars looked okay. The Rumeli Cafe seems to get good reviews.

The places I ate:

The Arasta Bazaar. This is a craft bazaar near the Blue Mosque which I believe had been the stables of the Imperial palace at one point. The mosaic museum is here, the entrance is cleverly disguised as a disused shop. Right at the end is an open air restaurant complete with whirling dervishes and folk singers. It's as touristy as it comes but on my first night there I got overwhelmed by the sentimentality of it all.

Food, standard kebab selection. I can't remember what I ordered but it was some meze stuff, kebab with rice and pita and some mint tea. It was good and it was cheap and even though it was a tourist joint it had some atmosphere. Seemed to attract a lot of Turkish families on a night out. Service was fast and no-one pestered you. It also has the most ferocious electric heaters I've ever experienced. I think these are salvaged off a Bulgarian nuclear power plant, at one point I thought my head was on fire.

The newspaper kiosk in Sultanahmet Gardens. Opens late, sells cold Coke and chocolate.

There are lots of street hawkers as well, selling a variety of stuff. Most common are the simit sellers flogging crusty bread rings. Some are better/fresher than others but, again, the price is peanuts. I don't know if it was a winter thing but there were a lot of chestnut hawkers when I was there. Around the Golden Horn were mussel carts. If you want excitement, eat shellfish from a street vendor.

A good lunch option is the Egyptian Spice Bazaar. It's not just spice, there are all sorts of foods for sale. Cheese, cured meats, nuts, fruit, bread and cakes are all in there. A few little cafes in it, too.

One place I'd like to go next time is Asithane in the square next to the Kariye Museum (St Saviour in Chora church). Food is based on the mediaeval recipes of the Ottoman court.

What I'd also do next time is eat better during the day. I kept coming across places that looked good but by evening time I was back in the centre of town. If I hadn't made such a pig of myself at breakfast then it would have made more sense to have a decent lunch somewhere local to where I was visiting. There is a great selection of restaurants all over the city but by night I'd walked so far and was so tired that all I could think of was eating near the hotel and going to bed.

I hate taxis. I don't trust them and I especially don't trust them where no-one speaks English and the streets are a maze. I try to avoid taxis except as a last resort. If you need to take a taxi then you've failed on your adventure.

I also hate buses. If you are going right to the end of the line or to a bus station then great. If not, I hate the whole not knowing where you are or where to get off thing. I know, "ask the driver to tell you" is what the guide books say. But I grew up in Glasgow, home of the less than enthusiastic bus driver. Bus drivers really love being unpaid tour guides...

I like trams and trains. If I can get a tram or a train, even where it means a bit of a walk to do so, then I will. You know where you are with them. Literally. In most places trains and trams run to a fairly predictable schedule, you don't get stuck in traffic and you don't get the crazies. For some reason, buses always seem to attract crazies.

Istanbul's public transport system is a joy. They spent a ton of money on it and it shows. Trams & trains are regular and reliable. The network is decent, they're still extending it and it's clean and modern. Whenever I go abroad it generally puts the British transport system to shame. When you watch old 1970's TV comedies, a common joke is the state of the railways. After 40 years it is as shit now as it has always been.

Back to Istanbul. The whole network runs off either tokens or pre-paid passes. The easiest way to get round is to use tokens. A token is called a jeton and a jeton is bought from a jetonmatik machine. Stick 4 lira into the machine and it spits out one jeton. One jeton buys you one tram or train ride. It's simple and it's predictable but it is not necessarily the cheapest option. If you're only planning a couple of trips they are OK but if you are planning a lot of journeys then pre-paid cards are better.

Next up is the Biletmatik. This is a prepaid paper ticket you buy from Biletmatik machines. You can buy anything from a 1 journey up to 10 ride card and the price reduces the bigger you go, down to about 3TL a ride.

The cheapest option is an Istanbulkart. This is an electronic pass which you refill from a machine. Like Istanbul's equivalent to an Oyster card. The downside is you have to buy an empty card up front and load credit on to it. It's something else to lose, too, which is a pisser if you've just loaded it up. The advantage is you are paying only 2.30TL a ride, almost half of what a jeton costs, and transfers are even cheaper. Upfront cost for the card is 6TL which is nothing.

I went for the simple option of just buying jetons whenever I needed a tram. Really this was because I am shit at planning stuff out. I never really thought about how many journeys I'd be doing and just wanted to get from the airport to Sultanahmet as painlessly as possible. Next time I'll probably go for the Istanbulkart.

GETTING TO/FROM THE AIRPORT

Make sure you have some cash, that's the first step. As far as I know the automated jeton machines don't take cards in the metro station. All the ATM's are in the airport concourse, get some money before you leave the terminal. Buy a coffee and get some change. If you leave the airport then you need to pass through security again which is a ballache if you just want a cash machine.

It takes two rides to get to central Istanbul. Buy four jetons, you'll use two on the way into town. Save the other two so that you can use them on the way back without any dicking about finding cash or a working ticket machine. One of the things that I always do whenever I can when I am travelling is make sure I have my return ticket to the airport. If I can't find a ticket machine, if I lose my money, if my wallet gets stolen, whatever, I can make it back to the airport when I need to. Those two spare jetons are going to cost you about £2, they could be a lifesaver.

The easiest way to Sultanahmet is to get the Metro to Zeytinburnu. There is only one line from the airport and any train will take you there. Get off in Zeytinburnu, cross over to the tram platform and use your second jeton. If you miss your stop then you can stay on to Aksaray and change there. It's a long walk between Metro and tram stops, though, so aim to switch at Zeytinburnu.

From there, you want trams marked Kabatas or Sirkeci. Bagcilar is the wrong direction. Get on the tram, sit down and enjoy the ride as it follows the old Roman road into town and goes past some of the main mosques and the Grand Bazaar. It takes around 45 minutes to an hour from the airport to Sultanahmet.

Getting back to the airport is just as easy. In central Istanbul, find a stop on the T1 tram line. This time you want the tram marked Bagcilar. Ride the tram to Zeytinburnu, change to the Metro, get off at the airport. You don't want the tram marked Cevizlibag-AOY or just C-AOY. If you are riding the tram and it turns around after Topkapi station and starts heading backwards then you know you got on the wrong one.

Don't panic, you have two options. Easiest, get off at Topkapi and wait for the Bagcilar tram. Or, less good, stay on and get off at Yusufpasa or Aksaray and walk to the Metro station. It's a long walk from either and I've heard at night it is not the greatest of areas.

Istanbul has tons of hotels, from shitty little dives to Ottoman luxury. The main places are Sultanahmet, across the Golden Horn in Beyoglu or past the university in Laleli. You don't want to stay in Laleli. It's a shithole. My guidebook describes it euphemistically as "catering to Eastern European businessmen". Or, basically, Russians looking for hookers.

The choice is really Sultanahmet or Beyoglu. Beyoglu is modern, has lots of nightlife and restaurants and shops. But... Beyoglu is a long way from the main sights in Sultanahmet and Fener. It's going to add either a long walk or a tram journey to the start and finish of your day.

Sultanahmet is the opposite. You are right on top of everything but there's nothing to do at night. Restaurants are nothing special, I don't remember seeing a bar anywhere (I suppose the big chain hotels will have one) and shopping is limited to either tourist shit or pressure cookers and lawnmowers. Sultanahmet is also quieter, Beyoglu, especially Taksim Square, has a reputation for tourist crime at night. Pickpocketing, scams, Russian hookers, etc.

It's a tough decision. I was bored out of my mind at night but equally, I'd done so much walking during the day that I really could not be bothered making the trip to Beyoglu and would probably have been too dead to enjoy any nightlife. Getting up in the morning and being five minutes from the Haghia Sophia is a big plus.

I stayed at the Sultan's Inn. It was a nice place, really friendly staff and a good breakfast. Rooms were nice but the view was nothing special (the building opposite). I've also never seen a TV with so many channels, either. Being able to watch live coverage of Iranian clerics debating some point of law at prime time reminds you that even though you are in Europe, you are closer to Tehran or Baghdad than you are to Paris or London.

If you stay in Sultanahmet then the area at the back of the Blue Mosque is best. It's quiet, there's some nice looking hotels, especially on the street leading to the Arasta bazaar, and there's no hustle, no bustle.

A word of warning, if you book a hotel near a mosque then be prepared to be woken up at dawn by the muezzin. On day one it is really atmospheric and exotic, by day four it is not so funny.

A couple of weeks after I'd been there a bomb went off in the Hippodrome and killed a bunch of tourists. In 2016 there was a massacre in the airport, a bombing in Beyoglu and an attempted coup. I think there has been at least one attack in 2017 so far. There have been regular bombs and shootings in Ankara, too.

Take a look at a map. The Syrian border is only a few hundred miles away and it's a porous frontier. Elsewhere you've got Kurds with a pretty serious axe to grind. It's naive to say that there is not, at the time of writing, a security risk in Turkey. But you also have to be realistic, it's no more a risk than visiting Paris or London or Berlin.

The Turks like to make a show of security in Istanbul. All the major sights have security posts at the entrance. Armed guards, bag scanners, metal detectors. As the Hippodrome bombing showed, you can protect what's inside, you can't protect outside. My advice, get through security as quickly as possible. Don't hang around outside where people congregate. If you are visiting mosques then get a feel for prayer times. The end of prayers is when you are going to get crowds. Crowds are vulnerable. Let them disperse, give it 10 or 15 minutes then visit the mosque.

Away from the main sights, security depends on where you go. On the main streets around the university, Laleli and Aksaray there were military patrols. They obviously were not cops, they were heavily armed and wearing greens. There was even an armoured vehicle with a water cannon outside the Metro station in Aksaray. I don't know why they were on the streets there but these areas feel rougher. Big immigrant communities, all a bit low rent, feels run down.

Fener was much quieter. Okay, it's a bit scruffy in places but felt really safe. You're probably going to be one of the few westerners wandering around and that feels weird at first but no-one bothered me. Once I got my head round that, that this wasn't Baghdad and people were just getting on with their lives then it seemed safe.

The airport is where they make the biggest show of security. You need to go through a checkpoint and scanners just to get into the building but it didn't look particularly effective. I saw stuff getting passed back and forwards across the barriers, kids were running in and out without getting checked. That kind of thing. The checkpoints weren't heavily manned, either, which I guess is how the airport attackers got through. My advice, check in online and stick to hand luggage so you don't have to hang around in the concourse. Get through the real security point as quickly as possible.

Overall, Istanbul seems as safe as any other major European city. Sure there are people trying to scam you. Some of it is innocuous like hooky tour guides, some of it less so. But it's not hard to avoid. It's a big, modern city like any big, modern city. And sure, there are other risks: it's also a big, modern city parked next to a mediaeval war zone.

I enjoyed it, take a few basic precautions, stay aware and it was fine. I never really felt threatened anywhere. Laleli and Aksaray felt like places I wouldn't want to hang around in but other than that, it was fine. I feel more nervous visiting London.

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