Rent a Car in Esentepe: Hill Starts, Golf and Getting Up to the Villa

Esentepe is a strip of coast about forty minutes east of Kyrenia with the Beşparmak mountains rising sharply behind it. Almost everything worth staying in — the villas, the golf resort, the good views — is on that slope rather than on the flat. This single fact should decide which car you rent, and it is the reason the cheapest option is not always the right one here.

For the east coast more broadly — İskele, Long Beach and the beaches beyond — see our east coast car rental guide.

The hill is the whole story

The coast road itself is fast, wide and easy. The roads that leave it and climb to the villas are not. They are narrow, steep in stretches, occasionally unsurfaced at the very top, and they frequently ask you to stop halfway up because something is coming down.

That means hill starts, repeatedly, on a gradient, in a car you have had for two days, possibly while still adjusting to driving on the left. It is entirely manageable — thousands of people do it every season — but it is the reason we push two specific recommendations when someone books car hire in Esentepe:

• Take the automatic. This is the single upgrade that matters here. It removes the hill-start problem completely.
• Consider an SUV or crossover if your villa is high up or the access road is unmade. The extra clearance is not vanity on these lanes.

An economy car is perfectly fine if you are staying at sea level and driving to restaurants and the supermarket. Ask your host how far up the property sits and how the last hundred metres are surfaced — they will know, and the answer decides it.

Free delivery to the resort, the villa or the golf club

We deliver free of charge anywhere in Esentepe — the coastal resorts, the golf development, and the hillside villas above them. Give us the address, or the complex name and block, and a time.

Most guests flying in take the car at Ercan Airport instead and drive across, which is around 55 km and roughly fifty minutes on good roads. Airport delivery and collection are free too, so this costs nothing extra and means you are not waiting on a transfer at midnight.

Drive times you will actually use

• Ercan Airport — about 55 km, roughly 50 minutes
• Kyrenia (Girne) — 40 minutes west along the coast
• Alagadi (Turtle) Beach — about 45 minutes west
• Nicosia — around an hour, over the pass
• Famagusta — about an hour and a quarter
• Kantara Castle — 45 minutes east, and the best of the three mountain castles for solitude

Why you cannot really do Esentepe without a car

There is no useful public transport along this coast. The developments are strung out over several kilometres with genuine distance between them, the supermarkets are a drive, and the restaurants worth eating at are spread between Esentepe, Çatalköy and Kyrenia. Taxis exist but need arranging each time and add up fast over a week.

This is the part of North Cyprus where renting a car shifts from convenient to structural. Without one you are dependent on your resort for every meal.

Long stays and property owners

A large share of Esentepe is second homes, and a large share of our long-term customers are their owners. Rather than leaving a car standing eleven months a year — paying insurance on it, returning to a flat battery and four soft tyres — many rent by the month for the weeks they are actually on the island.

Monthly car hire in North Cyprus includes comprehensive insurance and servicing, runs month to month, and can be started and stopped around your travel dates. It is priced well below the equivalent daily rate.

One driving note for the winter

Most of the rain here falls between December and February, and it makes the steeper villa access roads slippery — particularly the unsurfaced sections. Take the descent in a low gear, leave more room than feels necessary, and if a lane looks washed out, it probably is. Damage sustained off sealed roads is excluded from insurance across the whole North Cyprus market, so this is worth taking seriously rather than testing.