Turkey

You can spend months seeing all this massive country has to offer. We picked three places to focus on in our short amount of time. Here’s what we did:

 

  • Fly into ASR or NEV airport

    They are pretty much equidistant from the main towns of the Cappadocia region. You will most-likely have to go through Istanbul.

    Rent a car

    Everything is spread out in this area so you either have to do organized tours or rent a car. We liked having the flexibility of having our own car and would highly recommend that route. The roads are good, and it’s safe to drive there.

    Stay at Kelebek Special Cave Hotel

    There are dozens of amazing hotels in all the towns within Cappadocia but this one has a few advantages:

    -You can sleep inside actual fairy chimneys, not just in a cave

    -You have access to the connected sister property, Sultan Cave Suites, which has a good restaurant and a great balcony for watching the hot air balloons at sunrise

    -You are in a great location in the centrally located town of Goreme

    -It has a pool and traditional hammam spa with wonderful services

    -The breakfast is excellent and served on their terrace with an amazing view

    The Museum Hotel is a Relais and Chateau property but didn’t have the best reviews and you can’t sleep in a fairy chimney there. It’s also not in Goreme which is where we wanted to stay since they have the most restaurants, infrastructure, etc. However, the Museum Hotel is a short car ride away if you’d prefer that.

    Food

    Make sure to try the Testi Kebap. It’s a traditional tomato-based meat stew from this area that comes sealed inside the clay pot it was baked in. They will crack it open in front of you with a big knife. It’s not just good for a photo but actually tastes great too.

    Daily itinerary

    If you want to hike and see every site, you’ll need about five days, but you could cut out some places and still do it in two days. We had three days and felt like that was the right amount of time for us.

    Day 1

    Goreme Open Air Museum- an above-ground cave city you can walk through

    Walk around Goreme town- there are lots of shops, cafes, ice cream stands, etc

    Kocabag wine tasting- tasting room with nice views and good wines in a kind of cabin-like building on a hillside

    Uchisar Castle- old citadel on top of giant rocks you can climb

    Lover’s Hill- sunset look-out point in Goreme with great views. You park nearby and walk a few minutes uphill. There are stands where you can get beer, snacks, etc at the top.

    Day 2

    Wake up early (around 4am if you’re going to go on a balloon ride or 5am if you’re just going to watch from below). The Sultan Cave Suites rooftop has an incredible viewpoint to see all the balloons go by and is the sister hotel of Kelebek. They’re connected so you can easily walk over there in a minute. We’ve been on several hot air balloons before and never really found them worth it so we chose to just watch from the ground but we met people who enjoyed the ride.

    After breakfast, there are several valleys that have amazing rock formations to explore. You can hike through them or go to any of the many viewpoints to look down on them without hiking. We didn’t hike and still loved it. These are the essential valleys to see: Rose Valley, Love Valley, Red Valley. The Ihlara Valley is also supposed to be great but is a little farther and really only recommended for hiking so we skipped it.

    There are also several areas that have interesting natural chimney rock formations that aren’t like the big valleys you can hike through. You just pull up, take a look at the cool formations, wander around for a few minutes and then get back in your car. These are the essential areas to see:

    Devrent/Imagination Valley- animal-shaped fairy chimneys

    Pasabag/Monks Valley- mushroom-shaped fairy chimneys

    Pigeon Valley- Man-made pigeon houses carved into the rock

    Panorama Point- Crazy Ali’s lookout over the Red Valley is an excellent sunset spot. Get there well ahead of sunset as all the sitting areas fill up quickly. They have swings, benches, beanbags, etc and drinks and light food.

    Day 3

    Drive to the Avanos area that’s full of ceramic shops and studios. You can go in some to watch pottery being made and buy souvenirs.

    Head to Aravan for lunch. It’s about a 30-minute drive from Goreme but so worth it. It’s one of the best dining experiences I’ve ever had. It’s run by a family at their home. You sit outside under the grape vines looking out at the quaint town. There’s no menu and you must reserve at least the day in advance (or longer in high season). I can’t say enough good things about the food, service and overall experience.

    Kaymakli Underground City

    There are two main cave cities you can explore in the region: Derinkuyu and Kaymakli. We chose Kaymakli and were glad we did. It was absolutely fascinating and is apparently a little wider/less cramped inside. This is important as you squeeze through tiny passages underground! We hired one of the guides who works there when we arrived and were happy we did. He made it much more meaningful talking about the history there and his own personal connection to the site.

    Back at the hotel, have a hammam treatment. It was unlike any other we’ve experienced. You are washed with various soaps and waters before the massage while on a marble stone with the whole place to yourself.

  • You can fly or drive to Pamukkale. Driving is about eight hours so we thought it would be shorter to fly. But, you have to go back through Istanbul to do this and with all the drives to and from the airport, layover and check-in time, etc, it was about the same amount of time to fly. The benefit to driving is being able to stop along the way. If you do drive, stop at Tuz Lake which is a pink salt lake on the way.

    Whatever you do, plan to go to the travertine baths first thing in the morning when they open, not in the middle of the day if you happen to arrive then. The baths are so much more special when they’re empty, and they fill up quickly after the tour buses start to arrive.

    Stay at Cotton House

    It is a super basic guesthouse but clean and perfectly located under a 10-minute walk to the base of the travertine terraces. The owner and his family are also very nice and helpful, and there is great WiFi.

    Be at the South Gate entrance to the terraces at exactly 8am when they open. You can buy a ticket at the gate. The tour groups start mainly at the top of the baths and walk down. Therefore, the top part is always busier so start at the bottom and you’ll have it all to yourselves before anyone else makes their way down.

    Walk up the terraces

    It’s an easy walk and not too slippery but note that you are not allowed to wear shoes to keep the stone white. Wear sandals you can easily remove and either have a bag to put them in or attach them to. Also, bring a waterproof bag as there aren’t many dry areas to put things down when you go in the baths. It’s only about a 15-minute walk up without stopping. That said, you’ll definitely want to stop to lie in the baths and take pictures so it’ll end up taking about an hour to make it to the top.

    Go to the Cleopatra Pool

    Once at the top, walk about five minutes down a path by the parking lot and you will see the Ancient Pool entrance. This is a beautiful, warm pool that was once surrounded by a temple. The columns have collapsed and now lie in the pool. It’s unique and really beautiful. There’s a fee to swim but not to just see the pool. If you’re going to swim, get a locker key and put everything in the locker except your ticket that you will hand in as you get in the pool. There is a small deposit for the locker key that you will get back when you turn in the key when you leave. There is a restaurant with gyros, lamb skewers, ice cream, etc.

    Roman Ruins

    All around the ancient pool are other Roman ruins including a huge amphitheater and many other structures. You can walk around them, rent a small buggy to drive or take the tram. We spent around 40 minutes exploring.

  • There is so much to say about Istanbul! There are hundreds of guide books, itineraries and tour recommendations out there for it. That said, here is a list of what we did that is by no means comprehensive of what there is to do there. We were only there for a day so this is all we got to:

    Start on the Europe side of Istanbul

    Hagia Sophia- famous mosque from 537 AD

    Try simit (like flatter sesame seed bagels) from one of the street carts in the square

    Blue Mosque- another famous must-see mosque

    Basilica Cistern- old cistern with water still in the base and lit up completely red. It’s a beautiful site to visit but is currently closed for renovations. Check if it’s open when you’re there.

    Topkapi Palace- former Ottoman sultan’s home, now a massive museum complex

    Try the nuts and dried fruits in the Grand Bazaar

    Have a drink and a snack at one of the restaurants in the Cicek Pasaji

    Sample the cheeses and olives at the outdoor market stalls

    Galata Koprusu over the Bosphorus River- head to this area to walk along the water and check out the food vendors around the banks of the river

    Galata Tower- take a taxi or public transportation across the river to the Karakoy area and head to this medieval tower that has an excellent view from the top.

    Take a ferry from the Europe side of Istanbul to the Asia side of the city. The boats are cheap and make the 20-minute crossing all day and evening.

    Have dinner on this side of the river after walking around all the cute shop and bar areas. Asirlik Balik restaurant was great but anything in that area will be fun.

    There are seemingly unlimited places to stay in Istanbul. With our short stay, we chose to stay in the area near the famous mosques and the majority of the tourist attractions. The Hotel Ibrahim Pasha rooftop was perfect for this. They have a great little rooftop with a cute bar and great view over the mosques and the rest of the city. They also had a nice breakfast and very helpful staff. If we had more time, we might have stayed in the more upscale area on the side of the river with the Galata Tower.

    There is so much more to see and do in Turkey, but hopefully this gave you a good start!