Troy

The approach to Troy, 36km from Çanakkale, is across rolling grain fields. This is the ancient Troad, all but lost to legend until German-born Californian treasure-seeker and amateur archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann (1822-90) excavated atop a promising hill in 1871. He uncovered four superimposed ancient towns, destroying three others in the process.

The window where you buy your admission ticket is just past the village of Tevfikiye, 500m before the site. Guidebooks (with maps) to the site are available at souvenir shops near the ticket box.

In Homer's Iliad, Troy was the town of Ilium. The Trojan War took place in the 13th century BC, with Agamemnon, Achilles, Odysseus (Ulysses), Patroclus and Nestor on the Achaean (Greek) side, and Priam with his sons Hector and Paris on the Trojan side. Rather than suggesting commercial rivalries as a cause for the war, Homer claimed that Paris had kidnapped the beautiful Helen from her husband Menelaus, King of Sparta (his reward for giving the golden apple for most beautiful woman to Aphrodite, goddess of love), and the king asked the Achaeans to help him get her back.

During the decade-long war, Hector killed Patroclus and Achilles killed Hector. Paris knew that Achilles' mother had dipped her son in the River Styx to make him invincible. However, to do so she had held him by his heel, the one part of his body that remained unprotected. Hence Paris shot Achilles in the heel and bequeathed a phrase to the English language.

When 10 years of carnage couldn't end the war, Odysseus came up with the idea of the wooden horse filled with soldiers, against which Cassandra warned the Trojans in vain. It was left outside the west gate for the Trojans to wheel inside the walls. At the site there is a wooden replica that children love to climb.

There are few structures here, but visitors can clearly trace the excavations and can get an idea of what the ancient town must have looked like. With a good guide, it makes a fascinating excursion. The views around the countryside and over to the Dardanelles are a bonus, too.