Bucket list trip:
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.
Editor note – Jeremy has not included specific recommendations of where to stay each day. Instead, see the ‘Where to stay’ section in our Cappadocia destination guide.
Beat the crowds by starting first thing with Goreme’s Open Air Museum, the most impressive cluster of rock-cut churches and monastic buildings in the region.
Then discover Cappadocia’s weird and wonderful rock formations on a walk along the nearby Zelve Valley. For lunch, head to the simple cafes at Zelve’s valley entrance where manti (Turkish ravioli) is the speciality.
While away the afternoon with a long soak in Urgup’s historic hammam (Turkish bath) and finish the day with dinner at Ziggy’s.
Goreme, Central Anatolia, Turkey
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A remarkable natural amphitheatre of rock-hewn, fresco-filled churches and monastic dwellings dating back to Byzantine times. Cappadocia’s most visited site.
Adult price: £10
Best for ages 13+
Duration: 2 hours
Urgup , Central Anatolia, Turkey
This recently-restored hammam occupies a fine old building and is family-run, for unisex visitors, with professional, only-male attendants. (Women-only times available with female attendants). The best place in the region for the quintessential Turkish Bath experience.
Adult price: £5
Min age 10
Best for ages 13+
Duration: 2+ hours
Book a pre-dawn start for your hot-air balloon trip, the signature experience of any visit to Cappadocia.
Go easy on yourself for what remains of the morning, perhaps with a visit to a classic carpet emporium like Goreme’s Galerie Ikman.
After lunch, spend the afternoon walking the wonderful Rose Valley. Finish up at the national park’s panorama viewpoint in time for sunset.
Then take in a performance of the Whirling Dervishes at the Saruhan Caravansaray before dinner.
Goreme, Central Anatolia, Turkey
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Arguably the world’s greatest hot-air balloon flight, over Cappadocia‘s spellbinding moonscape-esque landscape of arches, honeycombed hills, striking spires and eye-popping, giant protuberances resembling gigantic mushrooms.
Adult price: £75
Min age 6
Best for ages 10+
Duration: 4 hours
Goreme, Central Anatolia, Turkey
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.
Best for ages 13+
Goreme, Central Anatolia, Turkey
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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.
Best for ages 8+
Duration: 3 hours
Avanos, Central Anatolia, Turkey
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The famed dance of the Whirling Dervishes, performed in the atmospheric surroundings of an atmospheric 13th-century caravansaray.
Adult price: £10
Best for ages 10+
Duration: 40 minutes
When: Daily
Frequency: daily
Spend the morning exploring the Keslik Monastery before taking in the amazing underground city at Derinkuyu.
Lunch at the atmospheric Old Greek House in Mustafapasa before taking to a mountain bike for more exploring of the region’s astonishing landscapes, perhaps along the lesser-known Gomeda Valley.
Dine out at Goreme’s Orient Restaurant.
Urgup, Central Anatolia, Turkey
Keslik, the Monastery of the Archangels, was hollowed out in the 10th Century, and a selection of rock-hewn dwellings – chapels, refectories, wineries – are still visible today, set among well-tended orchards. There’s a friendly caretaker offering interesting historical explanations and complimentary tea. Signposted off the main road 15 km south of Urgup.
Best for ages 18+
Derinkuyu, Central Anatolia, Turkey
This extraordinary, 85m deep, multi-level underground city, carved into the soft bedrock, is the largest underground city in Turkey. A visit entails a descent via long lamp-lit tunnels, through chambers and store rooms, into the heart of an apparently endless warren that once sheltered over 20,000 people.
Adult price: £3
Best for ages 18+
Central Anatolia, Turkey
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An extensive network of biking tracks, passing through striking and unique landscapes and moonscapes, makes Cappadocia a destination for exceptional mountain biking.
Best for ages 13+
Duration: 3+ hours
