- Explore in a small group of maximum 10 women travelers as you journey through two of Turkey's most enchanting regions, where ancient history meets timeless beauty.
- Expert certified local guides bring Istanbul's Byzantine and Ottoman heritage to life, while Cappadocia's specialist guides reveal geological wonders and hidden stories carved into fairy chimneys.
- 21 meals featuring authentic Turkish cuisine: 7 breakfasts, 7 lunches, 7 dinners including aromatic meze spreads, fresh seafood along the Bosphorus, and traditional Anatolian dishes prepared by local families.
- 11 immersive small group activities including private yacht cruise on the Bosphorus where continents meet, traditional Turkish hammam spa ritual, hands-on cooking class with a women's cooperative, ancient underground city exploration, pottery demonstration with a seventh-generation artisan family, and guided walks through Istanbul's Historic Peninsula and Cappadocia's otherworldly valleys.
- Boutique accommodations in carefully selected hotels including a unique cave hotel carved into Cappadocia's volcanic rock formations, offering authentic character and modern comfort.
- Internal roundtrip flights to Cappadocia ensuring seamless travel between destinations, plus all ground transportation in comfortable private vehicles.
- Optional post-trip extension to Turkey's stunning Aegean Coast with visits to ancient Ephesus and the cascading white travertine terraces of Pamukkale.
- Women Travel Abroad female host serves as trip concierge and community builder, ensuring seamless travel and lasting friendships throughout the journey.
- Gratuities for local guides, drivers, and luggage porters
- Optional 3 night post-trip extension to Turkey's Aegean Coast including Ephesus and Pammukale (September 12 - 15).
Please note:
Deposit requirement on land trips is $400
Past traveler savings of 5% if you traveled from 2018 onward
New travelers get $100 savings
Where East embraces West, where ancient empires left their magnificent mark, and where landscapes defy imagination, Turkey beckons with stories waiting to unfold. This journey carries you through Istanbul's vibrant tapestry of Byzantine domes and Ottoman minarets, across the Bosphorus where two continents whisper to each other, and into Cappadocia's fairy tale realm of honeycombed hills and cave dwellings that seem sculpted by dreams rather than nature.
Wander through the Grand Bazaar's labyrinth of treasures, feel history beneath your fingertips in underground cities carved by ancient Christians, and watch sunrise paint the sky as hot air balloons drift over volcanic valleys. Share laughter with local women as you knead dough and roll grape leaves in a traditional cooking class. Experience the ancient ritual of the hammam, float along the legendary Bosphorus, and stand in awe before the soaring dome of Hagia Sophia.
This is Turkey revealed through women's eyes, shared among kindred spirits, where every sunset over a minaret and every cup of apple tea creates bonds that transcend borders and last a lifetime.
DAY-BY-DAY ITINERARY
DAY 1: WELCOME TO ISTANBUL
Your Turkish adventure begins the moment you arrive in this city of legends, where the call to prayer echoes across waters that have witnessed emperors and sultans for millennia. After settling into your boutique hotel, your expert female guide welcomes you into Istanbul's embrace with an evening stroll through neighborhoods alive with energy and possibility. The streets hum with conversation, the aroma of grilled kebabs and fresh bread fills the air, and as you gather with your fellow travelers for your first Turkish feast, you sense this is the beginning of something extraordinary. Over mezze platters and stories shared around the table, new friendships begin to bloom as naturally as the jasmine in Ottoman gardens. Tonight, Istanbul whispers its first secrets to you, promising adventures to come.
Meals: Dinner
Accommodations: Aprilis Deluxe Hotel Istanbul or similar
DAY 2: HISTORICAL PENINSULA WALKING TOUR
Today you walk in the footsteps of emperors and empresses through Istanbul's Historic Peninsula, where every stone tells a thousand stories. Stand beneath the soaring dome of Hagia Sophia, a masterpiece that has served as church, mosque, and museum, its golden mosaics still glittering after fifteen centuries. Cross to the Blue Mosque, where six graceful minarets pierce the sky and over 20,000 handmade ceramic tiles create an ocean of indigo beauty overhead. Your guide brings history alive as you explore Topkapi Palace, once home to Ottoman sultans, where the opulent Harem Section reveals the lives of the powerful women who shaped an empire from behind latticed windows. Walk across the ancient Hippodrome where chariot races once thrilled Byzantine crowds, and feel the weight and wonder of civilizations layered one upon another in this extraordinary corner of the world.
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Accommodations: Aprilis Deluxe Hotel Istanbul or similar
DAY 3: CRUISE AND SHOP
The morning awakens your senses at the legendary Spice Bazaar, where pyramids of crimson sumac, golden saffron, and emerald pistachios create a painter's palette of color and fragrance. Vendors call out cheerful greetings as you sample Turkish delight dusted with powdered sugar and browse displays of exotic teas and hand-hammered copper. Then the adventure takes to the water as you board a private yacht for a Bosphorus cruise unlike any other. Glide past waterfront palaces and centuries-old fortresses as your boat traces the line where Europe and Asia meet, the city spreading magnificently on both shores. After lunch, lose yourself in the Grand Bazaar's enchanting labyrinth, where over 4,000 shops display hand-knotted carpets, intricate ceramics, glittering evil eye amulets, and treasures both ancient and new. Here, the art of conversation and tea-sipping accompanies every transaction, and shopping becomes cultural immersion.
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Accommodations: Aprilis Deluxe Hotel Istanbul or similar
DAY 4: HAMMAM EXPERIENCE & FREE TIME
This morning you experience one of Turkey's most treasured traditions at a historic hammam, a bathhouse that once served Sultan Süleyman's beloved queen. In the steamy marble chamber beneath ancient domes pierced with star-shaped skylights, surrender to the ritual that Turks have perfected over centuries. Feel tension melt away as skilled attendants scrub, massage, and pamper you, the centuries-old stones warm beneath you, the sound of water echoing in the hushed space. Emerge refreshed and glowing, ready to claim the afternoon as your own. Perhaps you will wander through the hip neighborhoods of Karakoy or Cihangir, discover tiny galleries and artisan workshops, sip Turkish coffee while watching ferries crisscross the Golden Horn, or simply relax at a rooftop café watching the sun paint the minarets gold. This is your time to follow your curiosity wherever it leads.
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Accommodations: Aprilis Deluxe Hotel Istanbul or similar
DAY 5: FLY TO CAPPADOCIA
Trade the minarets of Istanbul for landscapes that seem conjured from fantasy as you fly to Cappadocia this morning, where millions of years of volcanic activity and wind erosion have created a geological wonderland. En route to your extraordinary cave hotel, stop in Avanos town on the banks of the rust-colored Red River, where a local family welcomes you into their pottery workshop. For seven generations, they have shaped the region's distinctive clay on foot-powered wheels, and you watch skilled hands transform earth into art using techniques unchanged since Hittite times. The afternoon brings you to the Goreme Open Air Museum, a UNESCO World Heritage site where early Christians carved elaborate churches directly into the soft volcanic rock. Step inside these cave sanctuaries to discover stunning frescoes still vivid with Byzantine blues and golds, their sacred images protected by stone for over a thousand years. Tonight, settle into your unique cave hotel, where modern comfort meets ancient architecture in rooms carved into the hillside.
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Accommodations: Terra Cave Hotel Cappadocia or similar
DAY 6: UNDERGROUND CITY EXPLORATION
Dawn offers the chance to soar above Cappadocia in a hot air balloon, watching the fairy chimneys and honeycombed valleys emerge from shadow as the sun rises over this surreal landscape (optional, weather dependent). After breakfast, prepare to descend into one of the region's most astonishing secrets. Kaymakli Underground City plunges 85 meters into the earth, a vast subterranean refuge carved by early Christians fleeing persecution. As you explore this engineering marvel through its narrow passages and vaulted chambers, your guide explains how up to 3,000 people once lived in this hidden world, complete with ventilation shafts that still function, wine presses, storage rooms, stables, and even a church. Rolling stone doors once sealed off sections during attacks, and the ingenuity of these ancient architects becomes more apparent with every level you descend. Emerging back into sunlight feels like time travel, the modern world suddenly vivid after hours in the earth's embrace.
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Accommodations: Terra Cave Hotel Cappadocia or similar
DAY 7: LOVE VALLEY AND COOKING CLASS
If yesterday you opted not to balloon, this morning offers another chance to float above Cappadocia's fairy tale landscapes as dawn breaks (optional, weather dependent). Later, take a gentle walk through Love Valley, named both for its distinctive rock formations and the romantic legends whispered among the towering fairy chimneys. Your guide shares the geological story of how volcanic eruptions and millennia of erosion sculpted these otherworldly pillars, while local folklore adds layers of magic and meaning to every formation. This afternoon brings one of the journey's sweetest experiences as you join a women's cooperative for a hands-on Turkish cooking class. In a cozy kitchen filled with laughter and the perfume of herbs, learn to prepare a four-course feast of regional specialties. Roll grape leaves, shape delicate pastries, master the art of the perfect pilaf, and discover spice combinations passed down through generations. Tonight's farewell dinner tastes all the sweeter because you helped create it, and around the table, stories and contact information are exchanged with women who began as strangers and now feel like sisters.
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Accommodations: Terra Cave Hotel Cappadocia or similar
DAY 8: RETURN TO ISTANBUL AND DEPARTURE
After a final breakfast in your cave dwelling, transfer to the airport for your flight back to Istanbul. The landscapes of Cappadocia grow small beneath your window, but the memories remain vivid: the play of light on ancient frescoes, the warmth of tea shared with new friends, the surreal beauty of valleys that look like they belong on another planet. Schedule your international departure after 3pm to ensure smooth connections, giving you time to reflect on this journey through civilizations ancient and modern, landscapes both grand and intimate, and friendships that will endure long after you return home. Turkey has worked its magic on you, leaving you changed in ways both subtle and profound, carrying stories you will tell for years to come.
Meals: Breakfast
Accommodations: N/A
Days 8 - 12: Aegean Cost Trip Extension
Continue on an optional 4-day trip extension to see Turkey’s Aegean Coast, Ephesus & Pamukkale. You will stay in the seaside resort town of Kusadasi and enjoy guided day trips to the historic Roman ruins of Ephesus and to the unique mineral-rich thermal pools amid gleaming white travertine terraces of Pamukkale. Plus, have a whole free day just to enjoy the beach!
Note, the optional extension can be run for as few as 1 guest. A WTA host will not accompany the post-trip extension, guests will have local guides & transportation only.
