Cappadocia: Journey Through Earth and Sky (Turkey)

Eight nights and around 932 miles from Cappadocia into the Anti-Taurus mountains and back on a Royal Enfield, the operator’s first Turkish route and a considerably wilder one than the country’s reputation suggests.

Cavusin opens it in Goreme National Park, where volcanic tuff has eroded into the rock cones known as fairy chimneys and the balloons go up at dawn in large numbers. Camardi follows through troglodyte villages and a rock-cut monastery to the gateway of the Anti-Taurus.

Kapuzbasi is next among peaks reaching 3,750 metres, and the waterfalls there are the reason to come: seven of them, among the highest in Turkey, emerging straight out of the rock face. Dongele follows through mountain villages with thermal water at the hotel, then Malatya on the Cappadocian highlands at around 1,000 metres, apricot country and capital of what was once the easternmost province of ancient Cappadocia.

Kemaliye comes next, reached by taking the bikes across the Euphrates by boat, which is the sort of thing that makes a route memorable, and the village itself sits in a valley looking more Alpine than Anatolian. Gurun follows through the Karanlik canyon, the Dark Canyon, on a cliff road of hand-cut rock tunnels, with the great mosque at Divrigi on the way. The return to Cavusin passes Mount Erciyes, a dormant volcano of around 4,000 metres, with lunch at the Pinarbasi waterfalls and a sunset over the chimneys. Bike rental is included and the price is quoted per person. Eastern Turkey is empty, high and almost entirely free of other visitors.