Hot-air balloon flights over Cappadocia

Where to go and what to see in Cappadocia to get the most from your trip – a 3-day itinerary from destination expert and travel writer Jeremy Seal.

Surreal shaped landscapes rich in troglodytic ruins, walking trails and delightful cave hotels in the ancient heart of Anatolia.

A beautiful and undemanding 6km valley trail, with rock churches and formations galore, that offers walkers a grand glimpse of the surreal Cappadocian back country.

A remarkable natural amphitheatre of rock-hewn, fresco-filled churches and monastic dwellings dating back to Byzantine times. Cappadocia’s most visited site.

A spectacular 4km stroll through fantastical, magical landscapes. The trail links two of Cappadocia’s best-known towns – Goreme and Uchisar.

The famed dance of the Whirling Dervishes, performed in the atmospheric surroundings of an atmospheric 13th-century caravansaray.

An Aladdin’s cave of a carpet shop, a warren of rooms packed with flat-weave kilims both from the region and Turkey’s other renowned carpet regions, piled, hung and draped in picturesque profusion.

The region is famous for its sunsets, most famously over the Red and adjacent Rose Valley, so-called for the pinkish tones the soft tufa stone acquires at sunset. Watch the show from the Goreme National Park’s Panorama Viewpoint, lined with simple cafes.

This 2km walk (from the ticket office) leads you through this beautiful Cappadocian valley, inhabited until the middle of the 20th-century, taking in churches, stables, and monks’ refectories.

Huge underground ceramics museum, with impressive collections of ancient clay pieces and other archaeological artefacts displayed in illuminated halls, plus pottery demonstrations and sales.