Van Kars Erzurum Tour by Turkish Airlines with Plane & Eastern Express / 3 Nights Hotel Accommodation

Day 1: Edremit – Gevaş - Van Lake – Akdamar Island - Van Cats – Arbuni Savat Silver Workshop – Van Cat House – Van Museum – Van Castle – Van city center

Dear guests, after our individual check-in procedures at least 2 hours before the flight, we arrive in Van with Turkish Airlines flight TK2746 departing from Istanbul New Airport at 09:40, Istanbul – Van. After welcoming you, our esteemed guests, at Van Ferit Melen Airport, we stop in Edremit district of Van to have the famous Van breakfast at a beautiful lakeside venue. After breakfast, we head to Gevaş. Together with our guests who wish to participate, we will carry out our Akdamar Island visit and boat tour, which we offer as an extra. Our boat tour and island visit will take approximately 2.5 hours. Guests who do not wish to join our tour will be able to spend time at the lakeside facility in Gevaş.

Extra Akdamar Island, Gagik Church Tour;

In this extra tour, we set out on a journey into one of the most well-known legends, myths, and mysteries of Van and Van Lake. After our approximately 35–40 minute boat ride from Gevaş, we arrive at Akdamar Island, the most famous island of the largest lake in our country. After listening to our guide tell us the story of the love that took place on Akdamar Island, the history of King Gagik’s magnificent church—an вершина of Armenian architecture and stone craftsmanship—and the reliefs on its exterior featuring some scenes taken from the Torah, we take a tea/coffee break with that beautiful view of Van Lake. Then we board our boat again and return to our facility on the shore of Van Lake. . The extra tour fee will be announced by your guide on the bus due to the conditions of the day.

After getting off our boat, we take our lunch break. After lunch, as we continue toward the city center of Van, we stop at the Carpet-Kilim Cooperative, where we can get detailed information about carpets and kilims, one of the most important elements of Eastern Anatolian and Iranian culture. (This workshop visit will only be carried out if the timing of our tour is suitable.) After our workshop visit, we go to the Van Cat House to get to know the Van Cats up close, a rare and noble cat breed that may have blue or amber eyes, or one blue and the other amber. You will be fascinated when you see these cute little ones. Then we take a short shopping break at the Arbuni Savat and Urartu Production Silver Center, one of the region’s very important handicrafts. After that, while visiting the Van Museum, one of the most beautiful museums in Turkey, which houses a total of 42,000 items in its inventory but only 1,500 of which are exhibited, and where various ethnographic and archaeological artifacts brought from the Muş, Bitlis, and Hakkâri regions are displayed, we also learn about the Urartians, the largest known civilization in the region, through our guide’s explanations. We are sure that as you get to know the Urartians, your curiosity about this region will increase. After touring the Van Museum, we also have an opportunity to get to know the children who welcome tourists at Van Castle with their sweet local accent, each of whom speaks 6–7 different foreign languages. At the foot of Van Castle, we will also have a chance to learn about the model Van Houses. Far from the traditional house architecture of the Eastern Anatolia Region, the historic Van houses built mainly of adobe and wood have remained only as examples due to the wear of years and the earthquakes that have occurred, but seeing and walking among the surviving ones is a magnificent pleasure. In our visit to Van Castle, built of massive stone in the 9th century BC by Sarduri, son of Urartu King Lutipri, and overlooking the Urartian capital Tushpa from a bird’s-eye view, we see the Urartian ruins and the Suleyman Han Mosque from the Ottoman period, and after listening to our guide’s explanations, on the last day of our tour we end the day by watching the sunset at the farthest point of Van Castle, with the view of Van Lake (we remind you that the local people call it “SEA”), and then we head to our hotel.

*Breakfast: Will be taken freely in Edremit (extra)

*Lunch: Will be taken in Gevaş as à la carte or set menu. (Extra)

*Dinner: Will be taken at the hotel and is included in the tour price.

*Accommodation : Van city hotels

Day 2: Muradiye Waterfall – Bendi Mahi Stream – Tendürek Mountain Pass – Doğubeyazıt – Ishak Pasha Palace – Iğdır – Tuzluca - Digor – Kars

After our breakfast in the morning, we set off with the beautiful views of Lake Van, and our first stop will be Muradiye Waterfall on the Bendi Mahi Stream. After our short photo break here, we will pass through the Çaldıran Plain, and as we cross the Tendürek Mountain Pass, one of the highest passes in our country (2644 m), hardened lava will surround us. These magnificent formations of nature can take you to entirely different places if you let your imagination work. Afterwards, we continue to Doğubayazıt, and after visiting Ishak Pasha Palace, the last great monumental structure of the Ottoman Empire in the Tulip Period, whose construction began by the sanjak bey Abdi Pasha and was completed by his successors, Ishak Pasha, in about 100 years and given its final form in 1784, we will take our lunch break. After lunch, we are already drawn under the mesmerizing influence of the Sacred Mount Ararat, the highest mountain in our country at 5137 m, whose shadow is felt everywhere in the region. As we continue our journey accompanied by the impressive view of Mount Ararat, we will reach Iğdır after a photo break at a suitable point. Get ready to be surprised by the scenery you will see as we pass through Iğdır, which has a very different place in the geography we are in, with its greenery, vineyards, and orchards. Starting from Iğdır, for a long time we will continue our journey at the zero point of the Turkey–Armenia border and, via Tuzluca, reach Digor and then Kars, where we settle into our hotel.

Extra Night Entertainment:

1. In this border city, where the tradition of minstrel performance is kept alive, you can have an enjoyable time listening to the minstrel duels arranged especially for us at the Minstrels Association. By listening to the improvised praises, satire, duels, and rhymes composed by the minstrels among themselves, you can experience the finest examples of this old but timeless tradition. We can guarantee that it will be a very fun and very different experience for you.

2. You can join the Kars Caucasus Night, specially organized so that you can watch the magnificent performance of young people presenting the world-famous Caucasian Folk Dances of this beautiful city, where Caucasian culture lives on. In this fun night, the figures performed by the men dancing like eagles, and the graceful dances of the girls as if gliding over water, will amaze you.

Note: The Caucasus night entertainment requires a certain number of participants. Seasonally, this night event is not held routinely every day of the week. Our guide will provide you with the details about the night during the tour.

*Breakfast: Will be taken at the hotel and is included in the tour price.

*Lunch: Will be taken in Doğubayazıt as à la carte or menu. (Extra)

*Dinner: Will be served at the Kars Caucasus Night. It is not included in the tour price.

*Accommodation : Kars city hotels

Day 3: Lake Çıldır - Ani Ruins - Little Bath – Cathedral (Virgin Mary Church or Fethiye Mosque) – Menucehr Mosque – Work Workshops – Church of the Twelve Apostles – Stone Bridge – Kars Castle

After the breakfast we will have at the hotel in the morning, we go to the Ani Ruins, built on the banks of the Arpaçay, which forms our border with Armenia. Ani was the largest and richest city in the region 1,000 years ago. You will immediately understand this from the monumental structures you will see at the archaeological site. Among the works containing the most important masterpieces of Armenian-Georgia culture, we see the Cathedral, Surp Kirkor, Surp Pirgiç (Keveli Church), the Seljuk works Menucehr Mosque, Ebul Muhammeran Mosque, and Sultan Palace, and then we set off toward Lake Çıldır, located an hour and a half away. By the lake, we take a pleasant lunch break where the famous Sarı fish of Lake Çıldır is served, and we immortalize this beautiful view of the lake by taking photos. (If seasonal conditions are suitable and the lake is frozen, we may also have the opportunity to take a lovely ride on horse-drawn sleds on it.) After the enjoyable moments we will spend around Lake Çıldır, Kars is a city that, despite being in the far east of our country, is actually in the far west of the Caucasus; in other words, with both eastern and western characteristics, it is culturally very different from nearby provinces such as Erzurum, Ağrı, and Iğdır, and it is vibrant and full of life. Rebuilt during the 40 years after 1877 while under Russian occupation, the city is the best place in our country to observe Baltic architecture. Streets intersecting at 90-degree angles, facades adorned with decorative cut-stone buildings, and much more. You will love Kars; we see the Church of the Twelve Apostles, Stone Bridge, and Kars Castle panoramically. We give free time for shopping for Kars’s famous local products and settle into our hotel in Kars.

*Breakfast: To be taken at the hotel and is included in the tour price.

*Lunch: Will be taken as à la carte or as a menu at Lake Çıldır or in Kars city center. (Extra)

*Dinner: Will be taken as an extra. Not included in the tour price.

*Accommodation : Kars city hotels

Day 4: Eastern Express – Allahuekber Mountains – Horosan - Double Minaret Madrasa – Erzurum Grand Mosque – Old Erzurum Houses – Yakutiye Madrasa – Lala Pasha Mosque - Taşhan

Dear guests; After the breakfast taken at the hotel in the morning, we go to Kars train station to have a pleasant train journey and enjoy a nice nostalgia, and we begin our Eastern Express journey. (Note: If there is no room on the train, the journey from Kars to Erzurum will be by bus.) On our journey between Kars and Erzurum, the most beautiful route of the Eastern Express, we reach Erzurum via Horonsan and Pasinler, accompanied by the magnificent view of the Allahuekber Mountains. We panoramically see the Double Minaret Madrasa, also called Hatuniye Madrasa, a Seljuk work that has become the symbol of Erzurum; then the Grand Mosque, which is the first and most important example of the Seljuk Cami-i Kebir mosques and was used as a food depot during the time of Sultan Murat IV; and we visit the Old Erzurum Houses, an ethnographic museum formed by the combination of 11 houses. Afterwards, while walking in the city center, we will have the opportunity to photograph the Lala Pasha Mosque, one of the rare works of Mimar Sinan in Anatolia, and the Yakutiye Madrasa, which is next to the mosque and is one of the finest examples of Seljuk-era madrasa structures. In the historical Taşhan, where objects made of Oltu stone, the most famous underground wealth that comes to mind when Erzurum is mentioned, are sold and exhibited, we give you our valued guests free time until our flight departure time. After the free time, we head to the airport. We board our Turkish Airlines flight TK2709 at 20:40 from Erzurum to Istanbul New Airport and head to Istanbul. We bid farewell to our valued guests, hoping to see you on another Tatil Avcısı Turizm tour.

*Breakfast: Will be taken at the hotel and is included in the tour price.

*Lunch: Will be taken à la carte in Erzurum city center (Extra)

*Dinner: Will be taken à la carte in Erzurum city center (Extra)

*Accommodation: Since it is the return day, we will not have accommodation tonight.