11 Days Highlights of Turkey Tour: Istanbul, Ephesus, Pamukkale, Antalya, Konya & Cappadocia

Istanbul greets you where two continents meet. After baggage claim at Istanbul Airport (IST) or Sabiha Gökçen (SAW), a The History Travel representative holds your name board and drives you in an air-conditioned vehicle to your Old City hotel.

Check in, rest, then wander at your own pace. AI-style tip: take a first slow walk to the Sultanahmet square at dusk, when the domes are floodlit and the crowds thin.

Overnight in Istanbul. Meals: none included today.

Your licensed guide collects you at 8:30 am for the beating heart of the Byzantine and Ottoman worlds. Start in the Hippodrome, where chariot crowds once roared beside the Egyptian Obelisk, the Serpent Column and the Constantine Column.

Step into the Blue Mosque (1609–1616), lined with thousands of blue İznik tiles, then stand beneath the floating dome of Hagia Sophia, raised by Emperor Justinian in only five years (532–537) and still one of the world’s great buildings. Topkapı Palace, Mehmed II’s seat of empire, reveals harem courtyards, imperial treasury and Bosphorus views.

Finish in the Grand Bazaar, a covered labyrinth of thousands of shops founded in the 15th century, for carpets, kilims, ceramics and lamps. Ask your guide to steer you to trustworthy craftsmen.

Meals: breakfast at hotel, lunch at a local restaurant. Overnight in Istanbul.

Begin in the fragrant Spice Bazaar (17th century) among saffron, sumac, teas and lokum, then board your Bosphorus cruise. The 32 km strait links the Black Sea to the Sea of Marmara and slides past Dolmabahçe Palace, Ortaköy Mosque, Çırağan Palace, Rumeli Fortress, Küçüksu Palace and the Maiden’s Tower.

Cross to Asia for Beylerbeyi Palace, a 19th-century sultans’ retreat of hand-crafted interiors, then climb Çamlıca Hill, the city’s highest point, for a 360° panorama of minarets and water.

Meals: breakfast at hotel, lunch at a local restaurant. Overnight in Istanbul.

After a domestic flight to İzmir, your guide takes over. Climb to the pine-shaded House of the Virgin Mary, found in 1891 by Lazarist priests and revered by Christians and Muslims alike.

Then walk marble streets in Ephesus, the Roman capital of Asia Minor: the Odeon, Domitian Square, Curetes Street, the Temple of Hadrian and the facade of the Library of Celsus, built to hold about 12,000 scrolls. The Great Theatre seated roughly 25,000.

After lunch, see the Seljuk Isa Bey Mosque (1375) and the lone column of the Temple of Artemis, once one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.

Meals: breakfast & dinner at hotel, lunch at a local restaurant. Overnight in Kuşadası.

Drive inland to Pamukkale, the “Cotton Castle”, where mineral-rich thermal water has built dazzling white terraces over millennia. Walk the travertines barefoot as the light changes.

Above them lies Hierapolis, a Roman spa city with a great theatre, baths, a colonnaded street and one of antiquity’s largest necropolises, plus the pilgrimage tomb of the Apostle Philip.

Meals: breakfast & dinner at hotel, lunch at a local restaurant. Overnight in Pamukkale.

Cross the Taurus foothills to the Mediterranean and stroll Kaleiçi, Antalya’s Ottoman-era old quarter. Hadrian’s Gate (130 CE) has three arches and Corinthian columns; the Hıdırlık Tower once watched for ships from its cliff.

Finish at the old harbour beneath the Clock Tower, with sea air and boats below the cliffs.

Meals: breakfast & dinner at hotel, lunch at a local restaurant. Overnight in Antalya.

Aspendos Theatre is among the best-preserved Roman theatres anywhere, with acoustics that still carry a whisper and a capacity of about 15,000–20,000. Perge was the home of mathematician Apollonius, with a colonnaded main street and a Hellenistic gate.

Side, “the pomegranate”, sits on a seaside peninsula where the Temple of Apollo glows at sunset.

Meals: breakfast & dinner at hotel, lunch at a local restaurant. Overnight in Antalya.

Head north over the Taurus to Konya, home of the poet and mystic Mevlana Celaleddin Rumi (born 1207). His turquoise-domed mausoleum, dervish cells and library still draw pilgrims from every continent.

After lunch, pause at Sultanhanı, a grand Seljuk caravanserai where Silk Road merchants once slept safely, then continue to Cappadocia.

Meals: breakfast & dinner at hotel, lunch in Konya. Overnight in Cappadocia.

See Devrent (Imagination) Valley’s animal-shaped rocks, the “fairy chimney” cones of Love Valley and the potters of Avanos on the Kızılırmak, Turkey’s longest river.

Visit Göreme Open-Air Museum, a UNESCO World Heritage monastic complex of rock-cut churches, then the panoramas of Esentepe Hill and Uçhisar Castle.

Meals: breakfast & dinner at hotel, lunch at a local restaurant. Overnight in Cappadocia.

Hike the rose-tinted Red Valley, explore hidden churches with murals, and see Çavuşin village with its old rock churches. Descend into Kaymaklı Underground City, whose low passages once sheltered whole communities.

End at Pigeon Valley, where carved dovecotes cover the cliffs and Uçhisar rises beyond.

Meals: breakfast & dinner at hotel, lunch at a local restaurant. Overnight in Cappadocia.

After breakfast you are transferred to the Cappadocia airport for your flight to Istanbul and your onward international connection. Güle güle, and come back soon.

Meals: breakfast at hotel.