Bodrum and the Greek Islands: Kos Ferry and Hippocrates Birthplace, Symi Day Trip, Rhodes Connection, the Dodecanese from Bodrum, and the Turkey-Greece Aegean Island Hopping Circuit
The Bodrum and Greek islands route covers the Bodrum to Kos daily ferry and the Hippocrates birthplace and Asklepion on Kos, the Symi day trip with the neoclassical harbour, the Rhodes historical connection, and the complete Turkey-Greece Aegean island hopping circuit that uses Bodrum as the Turkish mainland base.
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Bodrum to Kos: The Daily Ferry Crossing
The Bodrum to Kos ferry, operating daily in the summer season in 45 minutes to 1 hour between the Bodrum harbour and the Kos town harbour, is the shortest and most frequently used Turkey-Greece ferry crossing in the Aegean and the most convenient connection between the Turkish archaeological circuit and the Greek island experience. The day trip from Bodrum to Kos and back, allowing the morning on Kos and the afternoon return, covers the Kos castle, the Hippocrates tree in the main square, and the ancient Asklepion in the available time.
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Kos: The Hippocrates Birthplace and the Asklepion
Kos island, 8 kilometers across the Aegean from Bodrum, is the birthplace of Hippocrates of Cos, the physician who established the rational foundation of Western medicine in the 5th century BC, and the site of the Asklepion sanctuary that the Hippocratic school of medicine operated from the 4th century BC as the most important medical teaching institution in the ancient world. The Asklepion of Kos, the 3-terraced healing sanctuary above the town with the Temple of Apollo and the Healing Spring, is the most important single medical heritage site in the world.
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Symi Day Trip: The Neoclassical Harbour Village
Symi island, accessible from Bodrum by the boat excursion in 2 to 2.5 hours to the most beautifully architecturally preserved harbour village in the Dodecanese, with the neoclassical painted houses climbing the hillside above the harbour in the ochre and terracotta and yellow that the 19th century sponge diving wealth created, provides the most scenically complete Aegean village experience accessible from Bodrum. The Symi day trip is the single most recommended excursion from the Bodrum base by the visitors who have already made the Kos crossing.
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Rhodes Connection: The Crusader Heritage Link
Rhodes island, 65 kilometers southwest of Bodrum and 2.5 hours by the fast catamaran service, provides the closest complete medieval Crusader city experience accessible from Bodrum with the Rhodes Old Town walls that the Knights Hospitaller built using the same organizational structure that produced the Bodrum castle. The Bodrum-Rhodes comparison, seeing the two major Hospitaller defensive positions in the eastern Aegean in the same circuit, is the most historically informative single excursion pair available to the Bodrum visitor.
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Aegean Island Hopping Circuit: Turkey and Greece
The Aegean island hopping circuit from Bodrum via the Kos, Symi, and Rhodes ferries in Turkey and the Greek Dodecanese, combining the Turkish mainland Ephesus and Bodrum archaeological sites with the Greek island history and landscape in the same circuit, is the most geographically complete single western Turkey and Dodecanese travel experience available without a private yacht. The circuit requires the advance booking of the ferry connections and the Greek day trip visas that Turkish immigration grants to most nationalities for the Dodecanese crossings.
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Turkish Aegean Exit: The Character of Bodrum
Bodrum, the city that was the intellectual capital of the ancient Aegean world as the birthplace of Herodotus and the Mausoleum city of Mausolos, that became the Crusader fortress and the Ottoman fishing village, and that is now the most fashionable summer destination for the Istanbul social elite and the European charter tourist simultaneously, is the most socially complex and historically layered resort city in Turkey. The Bodrum that Herodotus knew and the Bodrum that the gulet captain knows are separated by 2,500 years but share the same harbour, the same Aegean light, and the same conviction that this peninsula is the most beautiful place in the ancient sea.