The Turkish region of Cappadocia, a region of exceptional natural wonders, in particular characterized by fairy chimneys and a unique historical and cultural heritage, boasts one of the most dramatic sights in the world.
Visiting Cappadocia is such a change from visiting many other busy bustling sights all over Turkey. It is a great pleasure to wander in the vast open space filled with captivating natural attractions which have seen human history dated back in the Bronze Age.
While in Goreme Open Air Museum , the conical formations resulting from the volcanic eruptions that took place millions of years ago, just follow the path up to the top of one of the ridges where a spectacular view of the fairy chimneys awaits you. The natural cone formations contain caves and labyrinths. As early as the third century, those chimneys became a hiding place for early Christians who fled persecution from the Romans, and then later from raiding Muslims. In modern tourism, many caves have been turned into cave houses for tourist stays and the lunar-like setting of Goreme Valley has become popular for hot-air ballooning.
Many say the extremely unique landscape of Cappadocia resembles some scene in a Star Wars movie and yet you may be surprised to discover that no major commercial movies have been filmed there. It would be a perfect setting for movies such as Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter series.
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Fantastic geology, just beware of the "Goreme Open-Air Museum" advertised 500m before the real thing, where they charge you for parking and you have to run the gauntlet of preadtory shop keepers hungry for tourist (that's just Turkey, I guess).
One of our favorite stops in the area, partially because it lacked the crowds and tour buses we encountered at the Goreme open air museum and the underground cities. This made exploring the old cave churches much more of an adventure.
This is perhaps one of the key highlights of Turkey. There are lots of these cave dwellings located all over this region. In fact, many of them are not inhabited by anyone. As a backpacker, my friend and I had serious consideration of staying in one of these dwellings for a night or two just to experience how it must…
Really enjoyed the place, learned a lot. We hired a guide, lovely Mr Mustafa. He said he was one of the first guides there, and where it's true or not he is highly recommended. Sort of old fashioned gentleman, lovely manners, very good English, very knowledgable, happy to answer questions, made the whole tour fantastically interesting. Loved the whole thing!
I love the cave churches, such beautiful frescoes, vivid natural colors! You should spent at least 3 days wondering around!
This is a must all I can say is do not miss a visit. Wonderful to walk around with a guide or on your own.
Our host recommended we do this walk but we got lost. There are no signs telling you which direction and we ended up on the edge of the canyon. Fortunately a local man showed us the way out.
I really liked the Zelve area – more than Goreme which was very busy. When I was at Zelve (late afternoon), there were 4 other people there so it was very quiet and felt very mystical. Definitely worth the short side-trip to get there.
Great walk with lots to look at historically, thn you can climb back up at ny time. We then walked back up hill to climb Uchasar castle. Could see all the caves where people had, and still were, living.
The Monastery in jaw dropping, even after you've seen the other amazing sites in Cappadocia. Not to belittle its historical and religious significance but it is also a really fun place to visit with places to explore and tunnels. If it were in Zelve it would easily be the museum highlight. It is locked up at 5PM so plan accordingly.