Guide
Asarkaya city forest is a wooded area within the bounds of the village of Cevizdere in the Ünye district of Ordu, covering forty-four hectares. It is known for the range of its plants and wildlife and counts as a good place for birdwatching and for walking.
Within the forest lies Asarkaya Park, also called Asarkaya Nature Park, the part laid out with picnic grounds and facilities. The park is four kilometres from Ünye and is reached by a road turning off the Ünye–Fatsa highway. It stands on a commanding hill, and the view over the town, the harbour and the Black Sea is much of what draws people here.
The name comes from a rock within the area now called the city forest. It is made up of two words, of which the first, asar, means works or remains. That a saint's tomb stands at Asarkaya as a place of visit suggests there were once other buildings here and that this is where the name comes from, and the presence of more than one tomb or grave on the spot supports the guess.
One study compared Asarkaya with three other places in Ordu province — Ulugöl Nature Park, Yoroz city forest and Çınarsuyu Nature Park — and found that Asarkaya offered more than the other three. Renovation work from 2019 onwards gave the park a new look, and it now holds a café and restaurant called Panorama along with sports grounds, arbours, swings, children's play areas and parking.
According to the municipality's layout board, Asarkaya Park occupies a circular area, most of it picnic ground fitted with picnic tables and with arbours set at intervals, and fountains stand at several points. Small buildings within the circle cover food and drink and supply meat for the grill: a restaurant, a grill house, a butcher, a buffet, a tea garden and a place for barbecues and samovars.
There is a play and amusement area for children, a small zoo, and courts laid out for football, volleyball and basketball on sand. At one end of the picnic ground is a viewing terrace looking over the town of Ünye, its harbour, the whole run of coast between Ünye and Fatsa, and a wide sweep of the Black Sea.
