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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A bit of Christian history in a Muslim country, and very interesting. Can get pretty crowded and hot, depending on the time of year, but should not be missed.
We recommend starting your hike from the Goreme Open Air Museum and walking through Sword Valley and Red Valley. However, we started from the top of Sword Valley, which made for a more difficult hike. It was worth it for the wonderful view from above. There were also caves you could explore from above. You do end up walking through…
Wonderful little churches carved out of the soft rock. Too many to visit in a single day. The boys and girls monasteries were particularly fascinating.It would be nice to visit away from a group and penetrate further down the valley.
We Western to see Pigeons Valley from a landscape point, so we didn't passed it actualy. It worths visiting it. In the past was full of Pigeons, nowadays you can see lots of Pigeons houses made in the rocks.
Lots of the locations were closed, the atmosphere was cold and the sights were less charming than the free ones all around. Beautiful fresques in some of the churches though mostly defaced. Heavy disagreeable "guide" who added to the deception. We were glad to leave and then had to pay the car park which was so bumpy we almost broke…
Really interesting view of the valley. It was rainy when we were there which I think added to the experience. I think it brought out the various colors in the rock that might not be so vivid otherwise.
We visited Goreme Open-Air Museum around 11am in August. The site was packed with tours groups, which made it rather unpleasant with queues to visit the churches. The fact that it is forbidden to take pictures inside the churches and that security personnel shouts at you rather rudely when you try to take pictures (without flash of course).
This museum is full of Byzantine era churches complete with Byzantine paintings. However, there are so many of them that it does get old. However, I highly recommend paying the extra money to see the Dark Church. It is called the Dark Church because little light has gotten in over the years, which means that the Byzantine paintings have been…
Cappadocia Red Valley
If you go to Cappadicia, this is a must to vsit. Great to see all the history. Rented a recorded guide headphonr which helped but it was ok. 1-2 hours is enough to see here and you can easily go here by yourselves. Quite a walk up and down from Goreme town. So be aware of that. We were ther…