15-Day Turkey Tour from Istanbul: Cappadocia, Ephesus & Antalya

Transfer included.

Our local team waits for you just outside the arrivals gate and drives you to your Istanbul hotel. The rest of the evening is yours to settle in after the flight.

Night in Istanbul.

Meal: breakfast.

After breakfast at the hotel, the day is free. One idea is to cross to Kadikoy on the Asian side and then ride a ferry along the Bosphorus. If you would like a guided outing instead, ask us and we will suggest extra tours.

Night in Istanbul.

Meals: breakfast and lunch. Transfers included.

08:30 – We collect you at your hotel and drive to Sultanahmet, where the guided walk covers four landmarks:

• Hagia Sophia – among the most visited monuments anywhere. It began as a cathedral, became an imperial mosque and is a mosque again today. The huge dome and its Byzantine and Ottoman layers sum up Istanbul's long history better than any other building.
• Blue Mosque – the Sultan Ahmed Mosque takes its nickname from more than 20,000 hand-painted Iznik tiles in blue and white floral designs. Its six minarets shape the skyline over Sultanahmet square.
• Hippodrome – for centuries the heart of social life in Byzantine Constantinople, with chariot races and celebrations watched by up to 100,000 people. The Egyptian Obelisk and the Serpent Column still stand on its old central line.
• Grand Bazaar – one of the world's oldest covered markets, with 61 streets and over 4,000 shops selling carpets, ceramics, gold, spices and much more. Wandering its lanes is an experience even if you buy nothing.

Around 12:30 – The tour finishes at the Grand Bazaar. Stay on to shop and have a traditional lunch there, then make your own way back to the hotel.

Night in Istanbul.

Meal: breakfast. Transfers included.

Enjoy breakfast and a slow morning in Istanbul for any last sightseeing of your own.

13:00 – Hotel pick-up and transfer to Sabiha Gokcen Airport or Istanbul Airport. Both the airport and the pick-up time can change.

16:30 – Flight to Cappadocia (the departure time can change).

17:50 – Landing in Cappadocia (the airport and time may change). We meet you and take you to your hotel, and the evening is free.

Night in Cappadocia.

Meals: breakfast and lunch. Transfers included.

Early morning, optional: two sunrise add-ons can be booked at the best available price when you reserve. Choose a hot air balloon flight, our most booked activity and rated the number one Cappadocia experience for its sunrise views, or a balloon watching tour that takes you to the best viewpoints for sunrise photos.

09:30 – Hotel pick-up for the Red Tour:

• Devrent Valley (Pink Valley) – an open plateau where the rock columns stand across a wide landscape instead of inside a narrow gorge, which makes the volcanic origin of Cappadocia easy to grasp.
• Pasabag Open Air Museum – the name means roughly 'the pasha's vineyard', a reminder that the ground between the chimneys was once farmed. No vines are left today.
• Avanos Pottery Workshop – pottery here is a working trade, not a show. Workshops make pieces for artisan markets all over Turkey, so the demonstration you watch on a working day is real.
• Goreme Panoramic View – a sweeping look over the fairy chimneys of Goreme valley. In winter, snow sometimes covers the chimneys under a clear sky, a scene many off-season visitors call the high point of their trip.
• Zelve Open Air Museum – a marked path runs through all three valleys, with signed optional extensions. Your guide will tell you which ones fit the time available on the Red Tour.
• Uchisar Castle (exterior view) – the tallest rock in the region, carved by people over centuries and towering above a valley shaped by both geology and settlement. It is a strong final image for the day.

17:00 – Drive back to your hotel.

Night in Cappadocia.

Meals: breakfast and lunch. Transfers included.

09:30 – Hotel pick-up for your second touring day in Cappadocia:

• Red Valley – the trail runs north to south, dropping slowly to the valley floor and climbing back to the rim at the far end. On the way you pass big natural arches and cliff bases where erosion has cut overhanging shelves.
• Rose Valley (Gulludere Valley) – narrower and more intimate than the wide canyons, and best seen on foot. Carved churches, houses and dovecotes sit right beside the path.
• Cavusin Village – the Church of Saint John the Baptist, cut into the highest reachable point of the cliff, dates to the 5th century and is among the oldest surviving rock-cut architecture in Cappadocia. A short climb through the abandoned upper village, past carved homes and store rooms, leads up to it.
• Pigeon Valley – mornings are best, when eastern light falls on the carved western cliffs. Later, as light fills the whole canyon, the shadows around the pigeon-house openings fade and the rock looks flatter.
• Underground City – a carved winery shows that people pressed grapes in stone troughs and fermented wine in carved vessels below ground. This kept an important part of social and religious life going even during long periods in hiding.

17:00 – Return to your hotel.

Night in Cappadocia.

Meals: breakfast and lunch. Transfers included.

09:00 – Hotel pick-up for the third and last guided day in Cappadocia:

• Esentepe Panorama Point – high above the plateau, with one of the widest open views of the whole volcanic landscape. A good start to a day in the region's deepest terrain.
• Underground City – the southern underground cities go deeper than the northern ones. Some drop eight storeys, with living rooms, stables, kitchens and churches cut into the soft tufa, and the air shafts, cisterns and rolling stone doors still show how they were engineered.
• Ihlara Valley – the Melendiz River carved this 30-kilometre gorge over millions of years, with walls up to 150 metres high on each side. The trail passes dozens of Byzantine rock churches with frescoes from the 9th and 10th centuries.
• Belisirma Village – a small riverside village inside the gorge, where lunch is served on shaded terraces next to the water. Stone houses and old mulberry trees line the path, and little has changed here over generations.
• Yaprakhisar Panorama – on the way out of Ihlara, a cluster of volcanic spires rises from a flat plain. Few people photograph it, which makes it a calm last view of your three Cappadocia days.

17:30 – Transfer back to your hotel.

Night in Cappadocia.

Meal: breakfast. Transfers included.

After breakfast you check out. We drive you to Kayseri or Nevsehir Airport in time for your flight, which may be direct or routed through Istanbul, depending on seats on your travel date.

At Izmir Adnan Menderes Airport our team meets you at the exit and takes you to your hotel in Kusadasi/Selcuk.

Night in Kusadasi/Selcuk.

Meals: breakfast and lunch. Transfers included.

07:15 – Hotel pick-up for the full-day trip to Pamukkale:

• Pamukkale – before the ruins, look at the hillside itself. Thermal springs carrying dissolved minerals built this white travertine slope in Denizli province over thousands of years, and each layer stands for centuries of slow growth.
• White Calcium Terraces – the travertine feels smooth and warm underfoot, the pools are at body temperature, and the view over the Denizli valley runs for miles. The terraces took around two thousand years of mineral deposits to form.
• Hierapolis Ancient City – Romans who came for the hot springs built a whole city above them. Founded in the 2nd century BC, Hierapolis became a major Greco-Roman spa town, and much of it still stands on the hilltop above the terraces.
• Cleopatra Antique Thermal Pool – no record proves Cleopatra swam here, but the pool is ancient, the thermal water was used in Roman times and the marble columns under the surface fell in an earthquake. You swim in 36-degree mineral water among pieces of a Roman building that has lain there since the 7th century. Entry and swimming are not in the tour price; pay on site if you want to go in.

16:00 – Drive back to your hotel in Kusadasi/Selcuk.

Night in Kusadasi/Selcuk.

Meals: breakfast and lunch. Transfers included.

08:45 – Hotel pick-up for the morning in Ephesus:

• Ephesus Ancient City – the Great Theatre shows the city's scale best. Built into the slope of Panayir Hill, it held 25,000 people for plays, gladiator fights and public meetings. From the top rows you can follow the old harbour road toward where the Aegean once reached, a view worth the climb.
• House of Virgin Mary – set in pine forest on a mountain above Ephesus, it feels a world away from the busy ruins. Candles burn near the altar of the small stone chapel, and many visitors find this the most moving stop of the Ephesus tour.
• Temple of Artemis – near Selcuk, the site lies on low, sometimes waterlogged ground. Archaeologists think the builders chose this marshy spot near the coast on purpose, to link the temple with the sea and with Artemis as a nature goddess. Seen that way, even the field around the single column makes sense.

16:00 – The tour ends and we drive you toward Izmir Airport for the flight to Antalya Airport.

20:00 – Transfer to Izmir Airport for the evening flight to Antalya (flight time may change).

21:15 – Landing in Antalya and transfer to your hotel (arrival time may change with availability).

Night in Antalya.

Meal: breakfast.

The whole day in Antalya is yours. Spend it on the beach, stroll the lanes of Kaleici or follow your own plans.

Night in Antalya.

Meals: breakfast and lunch. Transfers included.

08:00 – Hotel pick-up for a full day of archaeology around Antalya:

• Perge – founded in the 3rd century BC, it was one of the richest cities of ancient Pamphylia and the place where St. Paul began his first missionary journey into Anatolia. The colonnaded main street, agora and stadium still show the size of a city that once housed 100,000 people.
• Aspendos Ancient Theatre – built in the 2nd century AD and widely seen as the best-preserved Roman theatre in the world. The stage building still reaches its full original height with every tier in place. It seats 15,000 and still hosts summer opera and ballet festivals.
• Side Ancient City – on a small Mediterranean peninsula, Side mixes well-kept Roman ruins with sea views and a working harbour town. The Temple of Apollo at the water's edge frames sunsets in one of the most photographed scenes on the Turkish coast.
• Temple of Apollo – five Corinthian columns stand on a platform that juts out almost over the sea, close to the ancient agora and the remains of the Temple of Athena. It ranks among the most photogenic ancient monuments in the Mediterranean.
• Manavgat Waterfall – a short drive from Side. The Manavgat River spills over a stepped limestone ledge in a cascade that is wide rather than high, with tea gardens and shady picnic spots around it, a calm natural break after the ruins.

17:00 – Return to your Antalya hotel.

Night in Antalya.

Meals: breakfast and lunch. Transfers included.

08:00 – We pick you up at the hotel and drive you to the pier. At Kemer Marina you board for an easy day on the Mediterranean, with sea views, swimming stops and a slower pace after the cultural days.

The boat usually stops at Paradise Bay for a swim in clear water, at Phaselis Bay for lunch on board beside the ancient coastal site, and at Kiris Bay, which looks toward the Pirate Caves.

Around 18:00 – After the cruise, a vehicle takes you back to your hotel and the tour ends.

Night in Antalya.

Meal: breakfast. Transfers included.

Have breakfast and check out of your room.

12:00 – Transfer from the hotel lobby to Antalya Airport. The exact pick-up time follows your flight time.

15:00 – Flight to Istanbul (the departure time may differ).

16:15 – Landing at Istanbul Airport or Sabiha Gokcen Airport (the actual time can differ). We meet you and drive you to your hotel for check-in.

Night in Istanbul.

Meal: breakfast. Transfer included.

We take you to the airport in line with your international flight time. This is where your 15-day Turkey trip comes to an end.