Some 420 cruise ships visit Türkiye in six months

ANKARA

Some 420 cruise ships have visited Türkiye’s ports in the first six months of 2023, according to data from the directorate general of maritime affairs.

The number of cruise passengers, including arriving, departing and transit travelers, climbed from 256,000 from January-June 2022 to 483,000 in the same period this year.

In the first six months of last year, 312 cruise liners visited the Turkish ports.

The port in the district of Kuşadası in the province of Aydın on the Aegean coast was the busiest in the January-June period with a total of 191 cruise ship calls and nearly 259,000 passengers.

Istanbul ranked second with 72 cruise visits and 116,000 passengers, followed by the Çeşme port seeing 34 ships and more than 20,000 passengers.

Some 29 cruise ships docked at the port in the popular holiday destination Bodrum, according to the data from the authority.

Last year, Turkish ports welcomed a total of 993 cruise ships, which pointed to a 12-fold increase compared to 2021, with more than 1 million passengers on board.

Experts believe that cruise tourism will experience its golden season this year as cruise trips are becoming more attractive given the soaring hotel prices and transport costs.

They expect 1.5 million tourists to come to Türkiye by cruise in 2023.

Türkiye aims to attract 60 million tourists and generate $56 billion in tourism revenues this year. The Tourism Ministry reported last month that foreign tourist arrivals in Türkiye increased by 24 percent in the January-May period from a year ago to 14.03 million.

Including Turks residing abroad, 15.6 million tourists visited the country in the first five months of 2023.

In May alone, foreign tourist visits grew by 16 percent year-on-year to 4.5 million.