5-Day Turkey Grand » Pamukkale, Ephesus, Izmir, Ankara & Cappadocia

A morning flight south-west to Denizli and straight to Pamukkale — the white travertine terraces, warm and calcium-white, running down the hillside like a frozen waterfall, with the Roman spa city of Hierapolis on the ridge above.

Overnight: 4-star hotel.

Ephesus in the morning — the Library of Celsus, the marble street, the Great Theatre — then Izmir on the Aegean coast, and the long drive inland to Ankara. Ankara is not a tourist city; it is the capital Atatürk chose precisely because it was not Istanbul, and it is where modern Turkey was decided.

Overnight: 4-star hotel.

Ankara in the morning: the Museum of Anatolian Civilisations, which holds the best Hittite collection on Earth, and Anıtkabir, Atatürk's vast mausoleum, where the guard change is worth timing. Then east into Cappadocia, arriving among the fairy chimneys in the late afternoon.

Overnight: 4-star hotel.

The full day in the valleys. Göreme Open-Air Museum is a UNESCO site: a monastic complex of rock-cut chapels whose Byzantine frescoes have survived a thousand years underground, the colours still startling. You walk through Pasabag — the fairy chimneys of the monks — and Devrent, where the rock has weathered into shapes people insist are animals. Uçhisar Castle is a single enormous rock riddled with tunnels and rooms, and the highest point in Cappadocia. If you are flying in a balloon, it launches at dawn tomorrow — this is the place people come for.

Overnight: 4-star hotel.

A last morning in the valleys, the flight back to Istanbul, and your onward connection. End of our services.