It's an oft-repeated statistic (especially if you've stood in queue at a Post Office in Britain staring gormlessly at the monitors) that Istanbul, the ancient city once known as Constantinople, is the only city to straddle two continents – Asia and Europe. It's baffling then that so few remember about the other side to Turkey's European heritage, that small, nugget still clinging to the Balkans like a limpet.

Eastern Thrace, or Turkish Thrace, while making up only 3% of the total Turkish landmass, though apparently accounting for nearly half of its wine in vineyards on the foothills of Ganos Mountain, is nevertheless bigger than Belgium. Bordered by Bulgaria to the North and Greece to the West, it's a land of rolling green plains which turn a brilliant yellow when the sunflowers emerge in July, it's not a landscape that lends itself to an enthralling drive, compared to say the dramatic gorges of the Carpathians or the craggy coastline of the Adriatic Highway, but as diversion on a Balkan roadtrip, or the launchpad for exploring/exiting Turkey, it's a perfect introduction to the many faces of the country, from the First World War battlefields and monuments at Gallipoli, to the bustling, stately Edirne, once the second capital of the Ottoman Empire and scarred by the original Balkan Wars, the Byzantine citadel of Enez and the island of Gokceada with its hauntingly beautiful and tragically abandoned Greek villages.

Istanbul itself is versatile enough a transport hub to cater for whatever your needs, perhaps making it too easy to get out and get somewhere else, but travellers who neglect the European face of this great country in favour of the 'exotic' and 'oriental' allure of Anatolia, cheat themselves out fully understanding its place in the modern world, and why it was such a big deal to the ancient one.