After Dark

Barlar Sokağı and the Adalar: the student night out

A bar street in a city of students — cheap pints, live bands, shouting over music and a crowd that is mostly under thirty.

₺an eveninga term-time Thursday to Saturday from 9pm; quieter in summer

Not yet checked by the Smileys team — prices and hours may have moved.

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Why do it?

Eskişehir is one of Turkey's best-known student cities: Anadolu, Eskişehir Osmangazi and Eskişehir Technical universities together have tens of thousands of students in a city of under a million, and they shape its nights. The centre of it is Vural Sokak in Hoşnudiye, just north of the river, which everyone calls Barlar Sokağı — 'Bars Street' — a short street and its side lanes packed with pubs, rock bars and small live-music venues, busiest from Thursday to Saturday in term. A few minutes away, the bars and terraces along the Adalar on the Porsuk are the slightly older, slightly calmer version of the same night.

The Smileys Take

Start on the river at the Adalar for a first drink outside, then walk up to Barlar Sokağı once it fills, around ten. Go with two or three people and pick a bar with live music; this is where Eskişehir's international students and the local ones mix most easily, and it's a cheap night out by any standard. Be clear-eyed about the downsides: it is loud, crowded and young, the late hours can get rowdy, and the street is a recurring political argument in the city, so the scene shifts from year to year. Leave before the last-hour crowd, keep your phone in a front pocket; if you'd rather talk than shout, the river bars are the better half of the night. Summer, when the students go home, is much quieter.