Full-Day Private Historical Guided Tour of Cappadocia

The tour guide and his driver were excellent and patient . Very polite and accommodating to guests. My mom speaks Russian only and my son (6 years old) English . Gotham was patient to translate everything to 2 languages . He is an excellent and out going tour guide . We had a custom made tour. Highly recommend.

Professional and nice tour guide, very knowledgeable We saw a lot of things and learned a lot about the city and the rich history I recommend private tour

I am very happy as our trip to Cappadocia felt very welcomed. We are able to understand the history of Cappadocia through the sharing given by our tour guide, Cengiz from MyTrip Travel Agency. The places we visited in Cappadocia we shared with others who haven't gotten the chance to visit Cappadocia making them felt like they were there too. We feel like coming to Cappadocia again if given the chance especially to experience the hot air balloon.

We took all in one private tour and it was a great experience. The service was superb. Our guide Cengiz was really good with a lot of knowledge. He and our captain made our day amazing . We had an opportunity to visit many places in one day and get detailed information about the history. Thank you for a very well organized tour and a lovely experience.

For Cappadocia, I used Google Search to find Elif at MyTrip Travel & Tourism Agency and cappadociashuttleservices.com which ended up being both operated by Elif as my point of contact. Elif was the best travel agent to work with. Here are my many reasons why: 1. I had originally booked a Cappadocia day tour for the day after we arrived but we couldn’t sleep properly due to the time change so I asked Elif if it was possible to change our day trip to the same day. He pulled strings and was able to change my tour to the same day. I asked at 7am and my day trip was now only a few hours away at 10am. That would NEVER happen in America! How wonderful is this! While researching, I had a lot of questions and I’d email Elif and he would respond very quickly, for sure within one day’s time. He also asks when we want to start the private tour and I said around 10am so that was nice to go at the time we preferred. 2. I also had booked my car ride from the airport to Cappadocia through a different company cappadociashuttleservices.com but Elif was also my main point of contact (maybe they’re same company, not sure). Our plane landed in the middle of the night at 2am. I was worried if a private car was actually going to be there at 2am waiting for us. And there was! We paid Euro cash at the end when we got dropped off. Also Elif would WhatsApp message me the driver’s name, type of car, and the license plate about a few hours before the ride so I was sure we’re getting into the right vehicle which is really good for safety purposes. 3. Cengiz and our driver picked us up from our hotel on-time and took us all over Cappadocia. Cengiz was an amazing tour guide. He speaks English really well. I’d highly recommend taking a private tour over a bus tour (see my notes at the end). Cengiz is very accommodating - he’d ask when we wanted to eat and plan the trip around that. He was able to customize and modify the itinerary on the fly based on our preferred eating schedule, and our tiredness towards the mid afternoon. He was extremely accommodating, asking us our preferences for everything. The best part of the tour is the Kaymakli Underground City. If Cengiz didn’t guide us inside, we would have been so lost. It’s a crazy maze down there. Also Cengiz described the history behind all the different rooms. If he didn’t tell us, something was an altar, we would have no idea. The car was a large Mercedes shuttle van so very roomy for the two of us. Cengiz also took a lot of photos for us. 4. I asked Elif to arrange my private car back to the airport. I had the same driver as my day tour. It was so easy, to just WhatsApp message Elif what I needed and he just took care of it. The drivers always arrived on-time and exactly where I needed them to be. 5. I didn’t think Elif did business in Istanbul so I planned to just take a cab from the Istanbul airport to our Istanbul hotel. During my ride from Cappadocia to the the airport, I WhatsApp messaged Elif if he could arrange rides for me in Istanbul. He said yes! So he arranged for my ride from the Istanbul airport to my Istanbul hotel that would occur in only a few hours later. 6. Later I messaged him to arrange my car from the Istanbul hotel to the airport. Both times, a private shuttle vehicle picked us up on-time and took us where we needed to go. Elif is such a lifesaver. He made everything so easy. Just message him on WhatsApp with a potential request and he always could take care of it! Passport Needed for Private Cars in Istanbul: Initially I found it odd that they needed my passport information to arrange the private cars in Istanbul but I found out that it is a law they have in Istanbul that this information is required for booking private cars. Restrooms on the Private Tour: The driving portions are very short so there is no need to worry about using the restroom because with the private tour they are able to stop anytime you need to. But also the driving from one point to the next, is pretty short so it wasn’t an issue for me (I’m always worried about restroom usage). Private vs. Bus Group Tour: We took a private tour. Surprisingly, it was only a tiny bit more for the private tour vs. the group bus tour. I’d highly recommend a private tour because you go at your own pace. My husband and I only wanted to snap a few photos in some places so we were able to leave right away when we were done. I liked the jewelry shop, so I spent more time there. Also if I had to use the restroom, we could stop anytime (not so with a bus tour). Towards the afternoon, my husband was tired and Cengiz edited the itinerary so that we just drove by some sites that were repetitive to the ones we had seen earlier, and skip some that we didn’t need to see. We wouldn’t have been able to do this with a group tour where you have to wait for a boatload of people at every stop. The group tour also ends really late, but because it was a private tour, we were able to finish earlier since we moved a lot faster through the sites and didn’t have to wait for anyone. Cengiz kept asking if we were hungry and when we were hungry, we stopped at an eatery immediately. Cengiz had several eatery options depending on when we stopped during the tour so that was really nice. The choice of eatery was really good too. The lunch was included in our tour package price and we got to sample a wide range of foods in our Turkish lunch. I really liked the food at the eatery. They even served us meat in a clay pot that was on fire. We dined outside and there was a beautiful panoramic view. There were other diners but it seemed they had a different dining package than ours because they were eating buffet style. Waiters came by to serve us and the food and view were really nice. I’m not sure but I am assuming the other diners were from group bus tours. No time constraints, no need to rush. Just taking your time to see what you like, skip or drive by what you don’t like. One of the most incredible tours I’ve taken my entire life.