Things to Do in Cappadocia: Balloons, Cave Churches & Underground Cities
Cappadocia is a volcanic landscape in central Anatolia where soft tuff rock has eroded into the tall cones locally called fairy chimneys. People carved into that rock for centuries — producing cave churches, cave dwellings and entire multi-level underground cities.
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Quick answer
Göreme Open-Air Museum, a monastic complex of rock-cut churches with Byzantine frescoes, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, as is the wider Göreme National Park and the rock sites of Cappadocia.
It is also the best-known hot-air ballooning destination in Turkey. Flights are weather-dependent and launch around sunrise; book directly with a licensed operator.
What to see in Cappadocia — top sights
- Göreme Open-Air Museum — a UNESCO-listed cluster of rock-cut monastic churches, several retaining Byzantine frescoes.
- Hot-air balloon flights — sunrise launches over the valleys; weather-dependent and cancelled outright when wind conditions are wrong.
- Derinkuyu and Kaymaklı underground cities — multi-level settlements carved down into the rock, with ventilation shafts, wells and rolling stone doors.
- Love Valley and Pasabag — the most striking concentrations of fairy chimneys, including the twin- and triple-capped cones at Pasabag.
- Uçhisar Castle — a rock outcrop honeycombed with tunnels and rooms, and the highest viewpoint in the region.
- Avanos — the pottery town on the Kızılırmak, Turkey's longest river, where the red clay has supported ceramics workshops for generations.
Why visit Cappadocia
There is nowhere else where the geology, the architecture and the history are the same thing — the rock that eroded into cones is the rock people hollowed out to live in, worship in and hide in. The balloons are the famous image, but the underground cities are the more astonishing engineering.
FAQ
- Are the hot-air balloons guaranteed to fly?
- No. Flights are weather-dependent and are cancelled when wind or visibility conditions are unsuitable, which happens regularly. Allow two or three mornings in Cappadocia if the balloon flight is your main reason for visiting.
- What are the fairy chimneys?
- They are erosion formations: tall cones of soft volcanic tuff, many capped by a harder rock that protected the column beneath it from weathering. Many were later hollowed out as dwellings, churches and storerooms.
- How do you get to Cappadocia?
- The region is served by two airports, Nevşehir (NAV) and Kayseri (ASR), both with domestic connections from Istanbul. Most visitors base themselves in Göreme, Ürgüp or Uçhisar.
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