Small group Turkey tours led by a Turkish-speaking founder
Esplora has been running small group Turkey tours since 2009, and Turkey remains one of the destinations closest to our founder Damian’s heart. His Turkish is close enough to native that he has, more than once, nearly passed for a mother-tongue speaker, and he leads many of our Turkey tours himself, including our Istanbul departures. That matters more than it might sound: a country this large and this layered, Hittite, Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Seljuk, Ottoman, rewards a guide who can talk to a village baker as easily as a museum curator, and get an honest answer either way. Every Esplora Turkey tour is capped at twelve guests, small enough that a real conversation with your guide is the norm rather than the exception, and paced so that a site like Ephesus or Gobeklitepe gets the time it deserves rather than twenty minutes and a photo stop. We do not run tours to places we do not love, and Turkey, in all its size and contradiction, is a place Damian has spent decades falling further for rather than out of.
From Ephesus to Eastern Anatolia: our small group Turkey tours
Treasures of Western Turkey is a 12-day small group Turkey tour through Troy, Pergamon, Ephesus and Aphrodisias, the classical heartland that most visitors only skim. The Lycian Coast spends nine days along Turkey’s turquoise southern shore, taking in Fethiye, Patara, Myra and Antalya, with rock tombs and ancient theatres set against the coastline. Our Istanbul Tour is a six-day short break built around the Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque, Topkapi Palace and a Bosphorus cruise, staying in a boutique hotel in the old city. For guests who want to go further off the tourist map, the Eastern Turkey tour spends 13 days reaching Ani, Lake Van, the Syriac monasteries of Mardin, Sanliurfa and Gobeklitepe, the oldest known temple complex on earth. Northern Turkey tour explores the country’s quieter Black Sea side over 14 days: Safranbolu’s well-preserved Ottoman houses, Amasya’s rock tombs, the cliffside Sumela Monastery and the forested Kackar Mountains. And for those who would rather walk than ride, Walking in Cappadocia is a gentle small group holiday through Goreme’s rock-cut churches, Urgup and the Ihlara Valley’s volcanic landscapes, with fairy chimneys and underground cities along the way.
Small groups, real insight: Book or tailor your Turkey tour
If you cannot see quite the trip you want among our small group Turkey tours, tell us what draws you to the country and we will see what we can build. We can add departure dates to an existing itinerary, or put together an escorted tour of Turkey especially for your own group of family or friends. Because our guides live and breathe the country, and because Damian’s own Turkish opens doors that a phrasebook cannot, an Esplora Turkey tour tends to go further into the country’s history and daily life than a standard coach tour ever could, while staying small enough, at no more than twelve guests, to feel personal throughout.
