Border town for Georgia Population: 23,100
If you’re heading along the Black Sea coast to Georgia there’s an outside chance you’ll need to spend a night in Hopa, a very ordinary town that lives for its border location. Otherwise this is not somewhere worth visiting with not a single building of architectural distinction.
After Hopa there’s nothing left of Turkey, just the border at Sarp.
Sleeping
The better places to stay are on the outskirts of the city centre. Avoid the shabby places in the centre.
Grand Otel Terzioğlu. Tel: 0466-351 5111
Transport info
Half-hourly minibuses leave Rize for Hopa from the town-centre terminal near the sea.
Onward dolmuşes to Borçka and Artvin leave from an unimaginably grim dolmuş stand on the edge of town – I spent my waiting time there buying biscuits for a wretched starving dog. If possible catch a through Artvin Ekspres bus from Rize or one of the Laz towns to avoid having to linger there. Unfortunately this is also where you must catch the dolmuş back to Rize.
