turkeytourism – General Compartment’s Blog

Cappadocia – a little fairy land

Cappadocia was the part of our trip that we were most excited about; we were looking forward to it all along the journey. Unique landscape along with a rich history – this place is a traveler’s heaven. The landscape is all about ‘fairy chimneys’ – cone shaped structures formed due to solidification of volcanic ash and we were amazed to see how the ancient people carved their homes and religious places inside these structures.

Reaching Cappadocia

The bus from Ankara took us around 4 hours to reach Nevsehir bus stand in Cappadocia. The bus stand is around 14 kilometres from the main city – Goreme. Goreme is the most happening town in Cappadocia with pretty streets, lots of restaurants and is the base for hot air balloon adventures. There is a mini bus service from Nevsehir to Goreme from around 8 AM to 8PM. We reached past 10 PM, so the bus service to Goreme had already been stopped for the day; we were left with no choice but to take a taxi to the hostel, which cost us a little less than 100 TLs (Turkish Liras), while the mini bus would have cost us 5 TLs per person. Hence, you might want to reach before 8PM if you plan to avail the mini bus service.

Accommodation

Luxury resorts, airbnbs, backpackers hostels – you name it and Cappadocia has it all. We had already booked our accommodation for 2 nights in “Dorm cave by Travellers” hostel. Once we reached, we fell asleep as soon as we got to our beds, but not before setting an alarm for 4.30 AM the next morning.

We had 2 mornings in Cappadocia – so we wanted to spend them doing the 2 major events Cappadocia offers in the morning. The first morning, we wanted to watch the hot air balloons taking over the skies and on the second morning, we wanted to ride in a hot air balloon. The first morning, we hiked up to Lover’s Hill, a hot air balloon view point. I do not have words to describe what I saw. Check the pictures below maybe? So many balloons flying and the sun rising amidst these – truly a treat to the eyes.

Underground cities

After breakfast, we headed out to explore one of the 2 major underground cities in Cappadocia – Kaymakli. The other one is Derinkuyu.

Out of the 36 underground cities in Cappadocia, these two are the famous ones with Kaymakli being the widest of all. What’s interesting about this place is that it has 8 floors below the ground and has rooms, kitchens, a church and a winery as well – all underground. How cool is that? Kaymakli was mainly used by Christians during the Byzantine era for protection from invading Arabs. Close to 3500 people lived here.

Winery in Kaymakli (I swear I guessed it to be a toilet – I actually don’t remember seeing a toilet)

We had to take a couple of buses from Cappadocia to Kaymakli – it cost us 9TL per person in total. The entrance ticket to Kaymakli cost us 40TL. The tunnels in Kaymakli are narrow and deep and it is unsafe for people who are claustrophobic or suffering from high blood pressure, heart ailments and asthma.

Uchisar castle

We had read about Uchisar castle being one of the best spots for sunset, so that was our next destination. Uchisar castle is popular for being at the highest point in Cappadocia, for being on UNESCO world heritage sites list and for being an offbeat wedding photo-shoot destination.We took a bus from Kaymakli to Nevsehir and from Nevsehir to Pigeon valley, from where we walked all the way to the castle. Outside the castle, we found a lot of camels used for “fun rides” for people. We’d be really grateful if you would take pride in no rides and contribute in ending this cruelty towards them.

The entrance tickets to Uchisar castle cost us 10 TL per person. The castle is weirdly beautiful to look at. Once we climbed up the stairs, we found a small crowd waiting for the sun set, with their cameras. The point also offered a panoramic view of the city of Cappadocia.

After sunset, we took a bus to Goreme, roamed around the pretty streets, did some more shopping, smoked some hookah at a narghile cafe and rested well, because we had to wake up early the next day as well.

Hot air balloon ride

We had booked for a hot air balloon ride with AirCappdocia at the rate of 190 euros per person.The next day, we were picked up by the operators from our hostel at 4.45 AM and taken to their office for breakfast. We were provided with a light breakfast and after verification taken to the ground to fly. The operators were pretty rude, asking us to split into 2 different balloons so as to accommodate in the same balloon other people who had come together. After a lot of fighting, we went together in the same balloon. We also felt that the balloon was a bit overcrowded. The view of the landscape from up there was for sure surreal, but watching the sunrise from the height was definitely the highlight.

We spent the rest of the day visiting Goreme open air museum, roaming around the town, shopping and eating. The open air museum is at a walkable distance from Goreme town and it has a lot of walking involved inside. It mainly consists of remains from the ancient civilization including many places of worship. We later went to a restaurant where we met a Turkish waiter who spoke better Hindi than we did; I was almost convinced that he was lying by saying that he’s Turkish – Bollywood movies are more famous than I imagined .

Beautiful roads at Goreme (shot while walking to Goreme open air museum)

Souvenirs we bought from Cappadocia

Fridge magnets (always and forever) – a lot of them
Postcards
Balloon shaped lanterns

Expenditure breakup:

A tourist in Istanbul

Having served as an imperial capital for centuries, Istanbul is well connected via road and air to the world. The city itself has great infrastructure, making it easy for visitors to commute to tourist spots via public transport – buses, metros and trams.

What we loved about Istanbul is its energy – great vibes, welcoming people, delicious food. It boasts some of the most beautiful mosques and churches.

What we did in Istanbul

We reached Istanbul on a Saturday afternoon. After collecting our checked in rucksacks, we enquired about bus services to Taksim square, from where our hostel was at a walking distance. We were directed downstairs for the bus stand. We got our Istanbulkart from the airport itself and loaded it with 50TLs, which included the card cost of 5TL. Istanbulkart comes in handy and is very convenient for anyone traveling around Istanbul. It is like an ordinary metro-card, used for all forms of commutation around Istanbul – metro, trams and buses. We took just one card for all 3 of us together (that’s all you require) and reloaded it as and when necessary.

SIM and data

We had pre-booked our accommodation in Ariya hostel for a night. After checking into the hostel and freshening up, we went to a conveyance store to buy a local sim for my friend; this cost us around 70 TL. I had activated the international roaming plan and made use of WiFi at public places and hostels, so did not buy one for myself.

Ferry ride in Bosphorus strait

Late that afternoon, we headed to take the ferry ride in Bosphorus strait. To reach there, we took a bus to Eminonu and paid using our Istanbulkart. If you have done some amount of research so far, you’d know that Bosphorus strait is a small strait that separates Asia and Europe. So, when you take this ferry ride, you will be right in between both these continents.The ferry ride lasts for at least 1.5 hours (we got bored after a while because the scenery outside is kind of monotonous – the water body and shores filled with buildings) and cost us 25TL per person. You will find a lot of seagulls on your ride – you can click some amazing pictures.

Enjoying a ferry ride on the Bosphorus strait – seagulls flocking is a sight to watch

Spice bazaar

Post this ride, we hit the spice bazaar which was right across the street from the ferry ride entrance. It was here that we had our first encounter with Baklava – the very famous Turkish sweet. There were so many varieties of Baklava in the shops, and having read so much about it online, we had to try it immediately. We tried 2 of them and it cost us 7 TL. I must admit, I did not fall in love with it in the first bite, or the next, it was too sweet for me. Then we walked the lanes of spice bazaar the entire evening and walked long enough to reach the entrance of the Grand Bazaar and found it closed because, well it closes at 6 PM. We loved the energetic vibe around this place.

After quite a tiring day, we decided to enjoy the night-life in Istanbul, but unfortunately, we were at the wrong place, the realization came much later. We found so many beautiful hookah bars, but not alcohol.We finally found some alcohol in a bar called the Irish pub.

City tour

The next day, we wanted to leave Istanbul for Ankara. So after packing our bags and leaving it at the reception, we left to explore the city doing some touristy stuff. We had one friend named Abdul from the hostel join us for the day. We headed straight to the premises of Hagia Sophia and had our breakfast in a restaurant there. After breakfast, we took tickets to visit Haga Sophia, an architectural marvel, which was once a church, converted to a mosque and is currently a museum. Then we headed to a mosque, which we later learned was ‘Blue Mosque’. It was huge and had beautiful interiors.

Once a church (notice Mother Mary with Jesus), then a mosque (notice Urdu words), now a museum.

Later, we walked to Topkapi Palace. Topkapi Palace is so huge that covering the entire palace left us tired. The palace offers a very pretty view of the Bosphorus strait and of the Bosphorus bridge connecting Asian and European parts of Turkey.

We then walked the streets of Istanbul and accidentally discovered the Galata tower, it was the best part of Istanbul. I fell in love with Istanbul for the first time then. Not just the tower, the streets leading to the tower, the small shops selling the prettiest of souvenirs along the sides of these streets, the pretty restaurants and of course the very beautifully lit Galata tower – were all worthy of falling in love with. We wanted to come back just to walk these streets again.

I did not want to leave Istanbul that day, but we had to, because we definitely did not want to miss out on the other places on the list. We anyway had our flight back to India from Istanbul, and we had a day in Istanbul before our flight. So we went back to the hostel, picked our bags, waved good-bye to the amazing hostel caretakers – one of whom was jailed in Nepal for possessing 6 passports with him, (and boy, did he seem to enjoy it!), clicked some great pictures, promised to post good reviews and took a bus to Esenler bus terminal.

Intercity commute

There were many bus operators, so each of us took a different section and started looking for buses. We checked for the cheapest option and got tickets in KamilKoch travels. Cheap tickets come with a cost, eh? We were about to start when the lady next to my friend had a problem sitting next to a guy. And I was FORCED to shift next to her.

When you are taking buses to a different city, you don’t have to worry much about the journey, except that the people are pretty conservative, so if you travel with a male friend, there are chances that they will move the two of you to different seats so that other single passengers find someone of the same gender to sit with. Otherwise, there was not much trouble, the rest stops had food and clean washrooms.

Last day in Istanbul

We came back to Istanbul after the rest of our Turkey trip. We reached at around 8AM on a Monday morning and booked our stay in a hotel. We had one full day as our flight back to Mumbai was not until 3 PM the next day. Our agenda was clear –

Shop – We had not shopped much until then because we did not want to carry stuff around.
Eat – It was our last day in Turkey, so we wanted to make sure we tried as many varieties of Turkish dishes as possible.
Turkish Hamam – We had read a lot about Hamams, so we wanted to give this a shot.
Visit Galata tower. Again. We had fallen in love with the place, so wanted to go back again and grab some drinks before we left Istanbul.

Turkish Hamam

After some rest and a good lunch, we walked to ‘Kadinlar Hamami’ for Hamam, which is a place for public bathing. Men and women were taken to different areas. We were given individual rooms to remove and store our clothes and other stuff. Multiple women are taken inside and given baths simultaneously by trained attendants. The bath includes being seated in a warm humid room for a while followed by scrubbing, massaging and washing of your body by the attendants. It was slightly weird for me as there were so many almost naked women around, but it was over quickly.

Relieved, we took a walk across the Bosphorus strait bridge from Asia to Europe. Then we headed to Galata tower, where we went to a couple of bars before settling down at one for the night. After a couple of drinks and spending some good time there, we took a cab back to our hotel.

Souvenirs

The next morning was reserved for shopping. We spent the entire day in Grand bazaar. God! is there anything you do not find there? We walked a lot, bought a lot of things. I’ll list down a few souvenirs you could buy from Istanbul:

Turkish lanterns – they are so pretty and a must buy. But be sure to get them packed really well.They are available in a lot of price ranges, we bought a couple of cheap ones that cost us around 60TL per piece.
Crockery – very beautiful hand painted or printed bowls and plates. Make sure you ask them if they are food-safe in case you intend to use them in the kitchen
Fridge magnets. You find pretty fridge magnets everywhere in Istanbul – Grand bazaar, streets near Galata tower, near Haga Sophia, etc.
Shot glasses – we buy them wherever we go.
Carpets in all shapes and sizes. My friend bought a reasonably priced carpet from Grand bazaar.
Turkish chai powder in multiple flavours. Some come along with beautiful chai glasses and spoons. We bought them from Grand bazaar.
Yeni Raki. We got 2 bottles of these from the Istanbul airport.

Read the next post to know what Ankara had in store for us.

Merhaba Turkey

We have been traveling almost every week since more than a year, and had been taking time off from work at regular intervals to travel to a few distant places, but we had never done an international trip together. When the idea of taking an international vacation struck, choosing Turkey wasn’t hard at all, given that the destination has been trending online recently and even looking at the pictures was a treat.

Turkey is one of the 5 countries spanning across 2 continents, the others being Russia, Egypt, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan. Bosphorus Strait separates the European part of the country from the Asian part. Istanbul airport is located in Europe, so if you fly down to Istanbul, you have been to at least one European country already.

We quickly read about the places in Turkey and decided that we were going to cover the west side of the country because we found the places quite fascinating. We printed out an outline of the Turkey map and marked all the locations we wanted to cover, made a plan of how and when to commute between places in Turkey and an expense sheet to estimate how much we would have to spend per person.

Here’s a list of places we identified and the travel plan:

We will soon be posting in detail itineraries and things to do in consecutive posts.

Packing

We packed really light because we knew we would be on the run almost all the time. As we traveled in summer, we only carried clothes and toiletries apart from the required documents including Visa and Passport. The weather is as different as the geography at different places, so we carried light jackets for chilly mornings and evenings at Cappadocia, shorts and a frisbee for beaches in Antalya and appropriate clothes to visit mosques. In mosques it is expected that both men and women cover their bodies, avoid shorts and sleeveless clothes and women are expected to cover their heads, so I carried a stole for the same. Also, we ensured that we packed our reusable cutlery set containing 1 spoon, 1 fork and 1 straw and our 1 litre reusable water bottle. And as we definitely wanted to capture our journey and experiences, we carried a GoPro, camera and a power bank.

Pikachu uses reusable cutlery; so do we.

We started our journey from Chennai, India to Istanbul, Turkey via New Delhi, India. We took an Indigo to New Delhi and Turkish airlines to Istanbul. A round trip cost us Rs. 38,000. But if you are based out of Delhi you can get round trip tickets for ~27,000

What must you eat in Turkey?

Turkish sweets and kebabs are world-renowned. One of our couch surfing friends was sweet enough to send us a list of food that you must eat while in Turkey. While we do not encourage eating non vegetarian food, we will go ahead and post the list that we were provided with.

1-İskender
2-Lahmacun (called Turkish pizza by foreigners)
3-Beyti
4-Simit (cheap breakfast – costs just 1 TL)
5-Adana/Urfa kebap (Adana is spicy, Urfa isn’t)
6-Çiğ Köfte
7-Dolma/Sarma(homemade food, hard to find in restaurants)
8- Mantı
9-Tavuk dürüm

Desserts you will love:

1-Künefe
2-Baklava

Some Turkish drinks you cannot not like:

1-Ayrand (similar to butter milk found in India, but so widely consumed in Turkey)

2-Salgam (our friend suggested that we record a video of us when trying Salgam. Why don’t you do it too? 😉 )

3-Turkish Chai and coffee

Turkish çay – An important part of their culture

4-Yeni raki (This is the only alcoholic drink out of all these, you must watch a YouTube video of how to drink it before you drink)

Apart from these, a special mention is mandatory for Turkish ice creams. Not just because they are delicious, but due to the way they are served.

Some additional valuable information from our friend:
You don’t have to tip the waiters in Turkey because it is not practiced there.

Stay tuned for the next set of posts on our travel experiences in Turkey. Keep in touch with us on Instagram