Europe
Balloons over Cappadocia, ferries between two continents
The place
Istanbul is the only city in the world on two continents, and you feel it on the twenty-minute ferry from Eminönü to Kadıköy — mosques and Byzantine domes behind you, a completely different, younger city ahead. Six and a half hours from Mumbai, and a euro-quality holiday at roughly half the euro price.
The standard circuit is Istanbul, Cappadocia, and then either Pamukkale and Ephesus in the west or Antalya on the Mediterranean. Cappadocia is the reason most people book: a valley of volcanic rock carved into churches and hotel rooms, with a hundred balloons going up at first light. It is genuinely as good as the photograph, on the mornings the wind allows.
Go in April, May, September or October. Summer is 35°C in the interior and the coast is full; winter closes the mountain roads but puts snow on the fairy chimneys, which some people prefer. Whenever you go, give Cappadocia three nights so a cancelled balloon flight has somewhere to go.
Best months
The months in gold are when Türkiye is at its best — weather, crowds and price together.
Gold = best months to travelDroplets = how wet the month isHigh / low °C
Holiday Packages
7N / 8D · Flights includedIstanbul 3N · Cappadocia 2N · Antalya 2N
Three Turkeys in one week — imperial Istanbul with Hagia Sophia and the Bosphorus, the volcanic rock valleys and cave hotels of Cappadocia, and two nights of Mediterranean Antalya, connected by internal flights rather than fourteen-hour night coaches.
₹1,31,500 on Flamingo Travels
*Indicative — final price confirmed on live availability.
Worth your days
All three are within a five-minute walk of each other. Hagia Sophia has been a cathedral, a mosque, a museum and a mosque again, and the layered Christian mosaics above Islamic calligraphy are the whole history of the city in one ceiling. Go at opening; both mosques close to visitors during the five prayer times.
Pickup is at 4.30am, the flight is about an hour, and you land to a glass of cherry juice in a field. Flights are cancelled by the civil aviation authority for wind far more often than agents admit — perhaps one morning in four in spring. Book day one of a three-night stay so there are two more chances.
Take the public ferry rather than the tourist cruise — same water, a tenth of the price, and a glass of tea on deck. Get off at Kadıköy for the produce market and Moda seafront, which is where Istanbul actually eats, and come back at sunset with the skyline in front of you.
White calcium terraces stepping down a hillside, filled with warm mineral water you walk through barefoot — shoes are not allowed, to protect the travertine. Above it sits the Roman spa city of Hierapolis with a theatre and a necropolis, and almost nobody walks the extra ten minutes to see it.
The best-preserved classical city in the eastern Mediterranean — a marble street you can walk from the top gate down to a two-storey library facade, past the terraced houses with their mosaic floors still in place. Enter from the upper gate and walk downhill; the coach parties do the reverse and climb.
The historic baths — Çemberlitaş, Kılıç Ali Paşa — are three hundred to four hundred years old and separate men and women completely. The full service is a heated marble slab, a coarse kese scrub and a foam massage, and it takes ninety minutes. It is not a spa treatment and it is not gentle.
Indicative
Spending money on the ground, per person per day — food, local transport and entry tickets outside your package.
Shoestring
₹2,000
a day, per person
Street food, public transport, one paid sight
Comfort
₹5,000
a day, per person
Sit-down meals, taxis, a tour or two
Luxury
₹14,000
a day, per person
Fine dining, private car, premium experiences
Visa
Practicalities
Turkey is a meat country with an outstanding vegetable tradition hiding inside it. Haydari, ezme, patlıcan salatası, dolma and imam bayıldı are all meat-free and make a full meal between them. The word to use is etsiz, without meat; be aware that many soups and pilafs start from chicken stock even when they look plain.
Breakfast in Turkey is a spread, not a plate — cheeses, olives, tomato, honey with clotted kaymak, and menemen, which is eggs cooked into tomato and green pepper. Simit, the sesame ring sold from every street cart, is vegan and costs almost nothing.
Lahmacun is minced lamb on a thin base and is not vegetarian, but almost every pide house also makes a peynirli pide — cheese, sometimes with spinach or mushroom — from the same oven. Ask for it explicitly rather than assuming the vegetarian option exists on the printed menu.
Pistachio baklava from Karaköy Güllüoğlu or Hafız Mustafa is a different food from the version sold in Indian bakeries. It is made with butter and sugar syrup, so it is vegetarian but not vegan. Turkish delight is usually starch and sugar, but check the chewy fruit varieties for gelatin.
There is a small, reliable cluster of Indian restaurants around Sultanahmet, Laleli and Beyoğlu that will cook Jain with a day notice. Cappadocia and Pamukkale have essentially none, so for a Jain group we arrange the meals through the tour operator kitchen in advance rather than hoping.
Set a meal preference — vegetarian, Jain or halal — when you book and we brief every hotel and restaurant on your itinerary.
In Istanbul one Istanbulkart covers the tram, metro, funicular, bus and the ferries, and the tram from Sultanahmet to Kabataş is the spine of a sightseeing day. Between cities, domestic flights to Kayseri or Nevşehir for Cappadocia and to Izmir for Ephesus cost less than the coach in time saved. Cappadocia itself needs a car or a guided tour — the valleys are twenty kilometres apart with no bus. Istanbul taxis are the weak point: use BiTaksi or Uber, which run on the meter.
Travel Guide
Month-by-month weather, money, plugs, food, shopping and the small things nobody tells you.
