Things to do in Göreme

Goreme is a village of about two thousand people at 1,104 metres, fifteen minutes end to end on foot. The houses are cut into tuff and most are now cave hotels. It answered to Avcilar before the tourists came.

The open-air museum

The Goreme Open Air Museum sits ten minutes uphill. It is a monastic valley rather than a building, with chapels, refectories and a kitchen cut into one cliff. The frescoes survived because the rock kept them dark.

Tokali, the largest and best painted of them, stands across the road outside the gate and goes with the same ticket. The Dark Church inside carries its own. It has a single window, which is why the colour is still on the plaster.

Valleys that start at the last house

No transport is needed to walk here, because the paths begin where the houses stop.

• Pigeon Valley — dovecotes cut into the cliff, and the climb up to Uchisar.
• Love Valley — the tall thin chimneys that everyone photographs, half an hour out.
• Rose and Red — the sunset walk, with rock chapels and tea stalls on the ridge.
• Kiliclar — narrow, scrambly and empty, for people who have done the others.
• Sunset Point — the ridge straight above the village, fifteen minutes up on foot.

The balloon morning

Pickup is in the dark, usually around five. The launch fields are just outside the houses. More than a hundred balloons lift together on a good morning.

Wind grounds them often, and operators refund rather than reschedule. Put two mornings in the plan and take the earlier one. The money comes back; the sunrise does not.

Staying on the ground is a fair choice, and the watching tours drive up for the same light. A photo trade has grown around all this. Cave terraces, stacked rugs, a hired dress, and the balloons rising behind you.

Practical

• Shoes. Tuff is abrasive and the paths are loose. Closed shoes matter more than anything else in the bag.
• Cave rooms. They stay cool and very dark, and the cheap ones have no window at all. Ask before you book.
• Heat and cold. July afternoons pass 35C with no shade; January nights sit well below zero. Snow does not stop the flights.
• Sleep. A four o'clock pickup after a late dinner is the standard mistake.
• Water. Once you leave the last house there is nothing to buy in the valleys.
• Museum timing. The open-air museum fills between ten and one, when the tour minibuses land.
• What costs what. A balloon seat is the biggest single line in most budgets here.