Sapanca Activities

Soğucak Highland Festival


Soğucak Yaylası Şenlikleri

Soğucak Highland (Soğucak Yaylası) has a wonderful route for car and motor sports, is a meeting point for campers and scouts and is a destination for trekking and mountain walks; it is 1100 meters high from the sea; Sapanca Soğucak Highland Festival lasts for two days. During this time, horse and mountain bike races, concerts, oil wrestling and a crowded mountain picnic are organized. Soğucak Highland is located in a distance of 17 km (35 minutes) to the Sapanca centre; tourists visit it especially in the summer; the ones who are fed up with big city life and try to find a place far from stress, noise and complexity of life and rest in a silent, clean and serene place prefer this highland for camping.

You will find yourself in a green valley when you climb up to Soğucak Highland through İstanbuldere road. When you proceed, you will see the waterfalls and rivers. You will understand the flora richness of Sapanca when you begin climbing up the Soğucak hill. Chestnut, beech, poplar, linden, walnut, alder, ash, sycamore and pine trees will accompany your journey with their glory.

In the winter, a snow cover of 2.5-3 meters surrounds the highland and its vicinity. Soğucak has rich underground water resources. When snow begins melting, Sapanca Lake renews itself by the water coming from Soğucak.

Every shade of green covers the flora in the spring. Thyme odors surrounds all the region in the summer. The ones climbing up to Soğucak Highland to collect chestnuts begin collecting thyme in the summer. In Soğucak, there are bungalow and cute highland houses. One of the endemic plant species Taraxacum walther only grows in this region.