Istanbul

Also known as the cat capital of the world, Istanbul is the perfect mix of Europe and Asia. We had so much fun exploring this beautiful city, from the stone streets to the large mosques and palaces and even an underground basilica. The amount of color and things to see was incredible. We spent our days walking around, playing with all the stray cats, and enjoying the Turkish food, which is super good!

Cappadocia

If you want to know about one place that exceeded my expectations the most, it would be Cappadocia. From the day we arrived and settled into our cave hotel—yes, our hotel room was in a cave—and we saw the beautiful mountains with all of the houses dug into them, we fell in love. We spent one day exploring the cities on a tour that took us through the valleys with huge mountains, an underground city, an open-air museum, and a phenomenon of rocks that are carved out by nature. We were amazed by the number of caves in the mountainsides used as houses by the locals.

The next morning, we woke up at 3 AM and got on a shuttle to watch the infamous hot air balloons take off, and it was INCREDIBLE! We watched them set off while the sun rose, and it is something I’ll never forget seeing. Later that day, we did a short horseback ride through Rose Valley, and it was tons of fun. I had never ridden a horse before, so it was a cool learning experience. I would love to visit this city again in the future and hopefully explore more of its history.