Погода: Ризе, февраль

Batumi-forum threads on winter travel describe the city at well under ten percent of its normal summer activity level in February - restaurants, bars and supermarkets stay open since a real year-round population lives here, but everything tied to the seaside season is shut down entirely. Posters call it genuinely quiet rather than lifeless, with the botanical garden and nearby Gonio Fortress singled out as nearly empty and pleasant to explore without a tour bus in sight. The standing advice: waterproof clothing and sturdy shoes matter more than a heavy coat, since damp, overcast conditions off the Black Sea are the norm rather than deep cold. The clearest upside is budget - accommodation runs at its lowest rates. The record: 12.3C days feeling like 10C, 5.4C nights, a notably high 137mm across 13.4 days, 25cm of snowfall in the surrounding hills, an 80 percent humidity and just 7.1 hours of sun.

Rize's own forum doesn't oversell November: it's one of the wettest stretches of the year here, with cold, rainy evenings down in town, while real snow is mostly reserved for the yaylas (highland pastures) above. Posters warned that unpaved roads up to those highland areas can turn muddy or close outright this time of year, needing 4WD if passable at all, and that a fair amount of accommodation outside the main towns shuts down for the season. The main coastal highway stays open and reliable, so the town itself and a Black Sea coastal drive remain doable even if the yaylas aren't.

Forum posters name May through October as the ideal weather window for Turkey's eastern Black Sea coast, including Rize, though posters visiting in May specifically describe conditions as still pretty cold despite sunshine, with a lot of rain and even snow still piled up along the nearby Zigana mountain pass. Posters consistently flag Rize as one of the greenest, wettest parts of the country - rainfall here is described as exceeding even notoriously rainy Singapore - so real rain on any given May day shouldn't come as a surprise. Posters note the region's tea, hazelnut and kiwi agriculture depends on exactly this wet climate, framing the rain as a defining, expected feature of a Rize visit rather than an unlucky exception.