A recent Forbes article discusses “museum fatigue” and ways to prevent it.

I really recommend this article (by Melissa Kravitz Hoeffner) because it gives both tourists and the guides an opportunity to rethink about our own expectations from a touristic trip. As the article underlines: “You don’t want to miss anything, but every museum feels more tedious or monotonous or just a burden on the itinerary.”

“A full day spent at the Louvre… can cause museum fatigue”, the Forbes article points out. “Visiting too many museums, or a few museums for too long, will leave visitors fatigued”.

The article recommends diversifying types of museums (such as art museum, natural history museum…) as well as diversifying trip’s itinerary. Hiring guide or booking a tour, is also recommended because such activities highlight more important things via a human experience and within a specific period of time.

As a professional licenced tourist guide, what are my recommendations to prevent “museum fatigue” in Istanbul?

For sure, a huge museum like Topkapi Palace or Dolmabahce Palace, can create a fatigue. Also visiting too many historical mosques one after the other can create similar feelings. Let’s dive into specifics:

To prevent fatigue in Topkapi Palace, I can highly recommend you to take it easy and give several breaks rather than rushing from one section to another. Topkapi Palace contains beautiful gardens, so it would be nice to sit down and appreciate its beauty. This will give you more opportunity to discover some architectural details, which you may not realise during a rushed visit. Especially in Topkapi Palace, I can highly recommend you to bring some sandwiches or snacks. Because there is no restaurant inside the Topkapi Palace, such foods will help you recharge your batteries.

In Dolmabahce Palace, visiting all of the sections (such as State Rooms, Harem Rooms and Painting Museum) may be tiring. Once again, resting between different sections can help. You may like to rest inside “Kuşluk” (Birdhouse) Garden where you can hear birds singing. Finally, you can spend the rest of your time in Besiktas District’s energetic atmosphere to make a significant shift of diversity compared to the earlier phase of your day.

In Istanbul, there are hundreds of historical mosques. Visiting too many historical mosques one after the other may create a fatigue similar to “museum fatigue” as explained in Forbes article. I think having a guide with you is a great way of preventing fatigue when visiting mosques. A visitor may initially think “all mosques in Istanbul are same”, but that’s really not the case. Almost all major mosques have their own characteristics and their own stories. Their stories often liked with cultural, political, social or economic developments of their times. So having a licenced guide explaining you these differences, will change the way you perceive them.

For sure, there are many more tips and advices specific to Istanbul. During my fully-customisable private tourist guidance service, I always think of my guests as my priority and help them discover Istanbul, without any fatigue.

If you want to read the full text of Forbes article, please click the below link to access it:

How To Beat Museum Fatigue During Your Travels in 2024 (forbes.com)

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