As two years had elapsed since my last visit, it was time to head back to Istanbul to tidy-up the ever-growing fleets of the local carriers. The other bonus here is seeing a good number of airlines banned in our part of the world (which continues to make it a very interesting place). This time I stayed at the Hampton by Hilton in Arnavutkoy which I noticed nearing completion during my last visit. Its located a couple of miles south of the airport and is recommended hotel which proved better than expected for views of the action. I had room 1431 on the 4th floor (any room between 1401 - 1437 (odd) will work. The 5th floor (top) room windows are recessed into the roof and probably have restricted views. As usual, ops were Northerly and inbounds for 34L pass just to the left of the hotel easily visible at around 1200ft. Traffic on 35R (the other main landing runway) can also be seen slightly tail on as they pass (but can be watched all the way to touchdown as there is a good view of runway 35R/L) All traffic using these runways can be seen as well as the taxiways and stands on the West side of the airport, The only issue is landing traffic on 36 (which is the most distant runway) is only visible briefly on very short finals. Fortunately, its only very occasionally used for landing traffic at busy periods. With Southerly Ops traffic should still be easily seen from the hotel (depending on the cloud base!).
Credit: Bill Robertson
