Ancient Pegea (Pigas) Population: 48,000
Old names: Sidene, Pegea (Pigas)
Why would you want to visit the small town of Biga on the road between the port of Bandırma and the tourist hotspot of Çanakkale? Well, probably only because it was a weekend and you hadn’t made a reservation in Çanakkale in which case the MRG Hotel in Biga might seem a good place to spend the night instead.
Don’t leave town without: trying Biga köfte, the local specialty
Around town
On the banks of the Kocabaş river, Biga obviously boasted a wealthy merchant class in Ottoman times to judge by the few fine houses that still survive in the back streets near the main mosque. One of these is now concealed inside the courtyard of a much larger hotel, while just up the street a second, the Halimbey Konağı, houses a small museum and cafe.
The museum is not one of the new generation of must-see examples (more of a hodge-podge of cast-off items really) but it does contain an impressive pair of kispet (trousers) locally made for an oil wrestler and looking more like the bottom part of a suit of armour than anything else.
The Çarşı Cami (1911) is of no great interest although the Büyük Şadırvan (Big Fountain) in front of it is a fine piece of woodwork. 
Sleeping
Transport info
There are regular buses from Biga to Çanakkale (90km), Lapseki, Gönen and Bandırma as well as to Karabiga (23km). The new bus station is on the edge of town on the Lapseki side.
Day trip destinations
Battle of Granicus. It was near Biga that Alexander the Great achieved his first great military victory over the Persians led by King Darius III in 334 BC. An army of 50,000 Macedonians engaged a slightly smaller army made up in roughly equal parts of Persians and foreign mercenaries, and during the course of the fighting Alexander himself killed Mithridates, Darius’ son-in-law, according to the historian Arrian. Afterwards his army headed south for Sardis, the Persian capital in Anatolia. The battle was named after the river, now the Çan (Kocataş) Çayı.
