Cappadocia

One doesn’t need Frank Lloyd Wright to blend a dwelling with nature. Long before the architect was born, settlers of the Cappadocia region burrowed their cities into the ground. This four-day sojourn—an ideal addition to Istanbul and the Aegean Coast or our other Turkey journeys—unveils the region's mystical vistas and industrious architecture.

Cappadocia’s fairy landscapes are the result of seas of volcanic ash solidified into soft stone, or tufa, which in turn eroded magically into deep valleys, needle-like towers and irregular cones. Early Christians, on the run from the Arabs, carved sanctuaries into the tufa resulting in a complex maze of cave dwellings, churches, and passageways. Your adventure begins with a guided visit to Goreme’s spectacular Dark Church and an Avanos pottery workshop. From here it’s off to the Red Valley to behold stunning Byzantine churches and spellbinding Whirling Dervishes. Then wind through underground Kaymakli, once a city of some 3,500, built among nearly 100 tunnels, eight floors deep. It’s hard to say whether nature’s work or humankind’s is more striking in Cappadocia, but they work together beautifully, an early example of organic architecture before Wright ever coined the term. It’s a region that must be experienced.