Routes DOĞU KARADENİZ

Uzungöl – Ayder Yaylası Rotası

A bend-heavy mountain road from lake to highland

DISTANCE: 207 km
DRIVING TIME: 3 h 6 min

Motorcycle
Car

A bend-heavy mountain road from Trabzon to Rize, tying a lake, a highland and the tea gardens onto one line.

The steepest and greenest face of the eastern Black Sea. Uzungöl lies at 1,090 m in Çaykara, a lake formed when a landslide dammed the Haldizen stream; above Çamlıhemşin the Fırtına valley holds more than twenty listed Ottoman stone arch bridges (the one at Şenyuva/Çinçiva dates from 1696); Zilkale stands on a crag about 100 m above the valley floor and is dated to the 14th-15th century; and Ayder sits at 1,350 m under the Kaçkars. This is also the heartland of Hemşin culture — the tulum bagpipe, the horon dance, wooden highland houses — and the tea country of Türkiye. The 55.5 °C spring water at Ayder has been known since Ottoman times and the baths are open all year.

What to eat

Muhlama (mıhlama/kuymak)
young cheese beaten into corn flour and highland butter until it pulls into threads, eaten straight from the pan
The breakfast houses of Ayder and Çamlıhemşin; what sets it apart here is kolot cheese, corn flour and highland butter — the version made with minci is called minci muhlaması
Kırmızı benekli alabalık
the red-spotted brown trout of the mountain streams — grilled, or fried in butter
The emblem of Uzungöl, served in the restaurants along the lake shore
Karalahana çorbası, karalahana sarması ve sıcak mısır ekmeği
karalahana is the local black kale: simmered into a thick soup, or rolled around a filling like a vine leaf, with hot corn bread beside it
The plain local restaurants in Çaykara and central Çamlıhemşin — markedly cheaper than the tourist places along the valley
Laz böreği
layers of paper-thin pastry around custard, baked and soaked in syrup — a dessert, despite the name
The pastry shops of Ardeşen and Çamlıhemşin; a dessert shared across the eastern Black Sea, registered in the name of Hopa (Artvin)
Hamsili pilav
rice baked under a lid of anchovies laid side by side
A classic of the Rize-Trabzon kitchen, found along the coast at Ardeşen and in the Uzungöl restaurants — though the anchovy season is really December and January

What to buy

Rize çayı
Turkish black tea, grown on the terraces above the coast and drunk from tulip glasses
The ÇAYKUR outlets in central Rize, or the shop at the Ziraat Botanik tea garden, where the small factory on the same site shows how it is processed
Anzer balı
honey from a single high meadow with an unusually rich flora — famously expensive, and the most faked product in the region
Produced on the Anzer plateau (Rize/İkizdere) and registered in 2021. Buy from the cooperative outlet only, from a sealed and numbered jar with the QR code and the indication logo; roadside “Anzer” sold well below the going price is fake
Hemşin çorabı
thick wool socks knitted by hand, each with its own pattern
Village stalls in Hemşin and Çamlıhemşin; knitted by women from sheep wool and registered in 2021
Kolot ve minci peyniri
kolot is the stretchy melting cheese muhlama is made from; minci is a sour, crumbly curd cheese
From the producers on the Hemşin highlands; the only way to make muhlama properly at home, so take fresh highland butter with it
Feretiko (Rize bezi)
a hand-woven cloth of hemp fibre — not linen — sold as towels and hammam wraps
Central Rize; registered

Road notes

Fill up in Çamlıhemşin — there is no fuel at Ayder or on the highland roads above it.
Come to Uzungöl early in the morning or on a weekday; in the summer season it takes around 20,000 visitors a day. Entry to the lake is free, but on July and August weekends there is no space left outside the paid car parks.
There is a vehicle charge for the Kaçkar Dağları national park at the Ayder entrance (around 180-195 TL for a car in 2026); the practical move is to leave the car in the 1,650-space car park at the entrance and take an electric shuttle up. Do not plan on driving into the centre in season.
The valley floor from Çamlıhemşin to Zilkale is drivable in a normal car but narrow and winding; the first part is paved and turns to gravel after Şenyuva. For the high pastures — Pokut, Sal, Gito — you need four-wheel drive or a local transfer from Çamlıhemşin.
Signal fades in the valley and on the highlands, so carry cash. Keep rain gear in the car too — the Fırtına valley is the wettest corner of the country and the rain starts without warning.
Do not assume Uzungöl to Ayder is a short hop: by the coast road (Of-Rize-Ardeşen-Çamlıhemşin) it is about 145-150 km and close to 3 hours.
From November to March winter tyres and chains are required; the high roads close and accommodation thins out, though the Ayder baths stay open all year. On the weekends of the Ayder Galer Düzü festival in late June and the snowman festival in late January the highland fills completely.

Along the way

Uzungöl
a lake at 1,090 m held in by a landslide, with a mosque and wooden houses at the water’s edge under steep spruce forest
Ayder Yaylası
a highland settlement at 1,350 m with hot springs at 55.5 °C, open the year round
Zilkale
a 14th-15th century castle on a crag about 100 m above the Fırtına valley floor, usually half-swallowed by mist

When to go

Summer / Spring

Itinerary

The route passes through 12 named stops. The line between them is the routed road geometry the map draws — and the distance was measured off that line.

Uzungöl, Çaykara / Trabzon
Çaykara
Dernekpazarı (Solaklı Vadisi, D915)
Of (D010 sahil yolu kavşağı)
İyidere
Rize merkez
Çayeli
Pazar
Ardeşen (Fırtına Vadisi sapağı)
Fırtına Vadisi (Ardeşen–Çamlıhemşin yolu)
Çamlıhemşin
Ayder Yaylası

Directions in Google Maps

Sources

8 SOURCES

This record is the counterpart of the route card on İz's Explore screen. The whole shelf, and how it was compiled, is on the route shelf. İz is not open to everyone yet; it lives inside the OtoTasdik vehicle wallet app.