Our travel companions have pulled out of the trip, so we are rethinking our time in Turkey. Has anyone hooked up with a small tour company that they would recommend? We are wanting to visit Cappadocia, Ephesus, and of course Istanbul. Would appreciate any suggestions.

|My husband and I were in Turkey Sept 06. I used Argeus Tourism. My guide's name was edip. He lives in Cappadocia. His direct E-mail is [email protected]
He picked us up at the airport in Cappadicia-we went on a hot air ballon ride-don't miss. We stayed in a cave hotel.He also made arrangements for hotels on our drive to Knosis-Ephesis is not to be missed. We had a time share in Yalova and I was Not happy with him-I called him and had him arrange a night for us in Bursa and an extra night in Assos on our way down the coast-I'm glad I did because it was very long to get there and a 1 night stay would have not been good.
In Istanbul we stayed at Dersaadet Hotel for 5 nights-I would highly reccomend.www.hoteldersaadet.com If you are staying there for a certain length of time they pick you up at the airport.
Turkey was one of my favorite destinations-Next to Greece. Hope this helps Chris

Take a look at Ekol Travel too - www.ekoltravel.com. We used them and thought they were very professional and good.

Dear Brahmama,

You can contact Mr. Cem Metin from Eurasia Tourism. They are a friendly and efficient tour company having great expertise in tailor made tours.

http://www.eurasiatourism.com/

With all good wishes

We used Anker Travel, based in Kusadisi, and were very happy with the driver/guide they provided for us. They also made hotel reservations for us, and everything worked out very well.

You might also want to check in with Murat at ProperTravel.com, who often posts on this forum. He is based in Cappadochia, and has lots of great information about the area. I'm pretty sure he's a travel agent.

Another place to definitely check: Turkeytravelplanner.com. Great website, full of excellent general information and travel agent listings.

Enjoy Turkey- we did!

Thanks for the replies. They are much appreciated. I have checked out some of the links - and have looked through Turkey Planner at length.

Murat is a wonderful source, but only handles private tours, which, (unfortunately) we can't do this time.

We will land (if on time) in Istanbul at 4:25 PM (if on AA) or 2:05 PM (if on Luft). We are still trying to find the most affordable rate.

We are hoping to fly on to Cappadocia when we arrive. Do you think we (seniors) will be too exhausted to do that? (we're leaving DFW at the afternoon before)

Then we could stay there 2 nights and fly to Izmir for 2 nights and back to Istanbul for 3 nights.

We leave IST at 10:40 AM on the 16th.

Would it be wiser (at our age) to just do Cappadocia for 3 nights and IST for 4? We have been to Athens, Pompeii and other ruins and might possibly get to Ephesus one day on a cruise but I'm sure we won't get back to Cappadocia.

What about booking air for domestic Turkey online? Has anyone had experience with this? Good? Bad?