Labor day 2025: Istanbul, Cappadocia and Amalfi coast trip

One complaint I get from folks who go to the blog to get travel tips is that they have to go post to post backwards. There is no link from day 1 to day 2.. as I write in start to end sequence. My walking buddies suggested that everytime I finish a “series of posts”, there should be a summary post that describes the placed we stayed in, times between locations, etc.. something that they can literally cut and paste for a future itinerary. So for the first time trying that.

Click on the images to see the individual posts..

Day 1: Fly out of SFO to Istanbul. Start Friday afternoon. Reach Saturday afternoon local time in Istanbul airport.

Day 2: Two hours to reach hotel in old Istanbul area from Airport. Check in, change and visit Grand Bazaar, then walk around, see the Grand Cisterns and have dinner outside the Cisterns at a roof top restaurant, walk around the Sultanahmet mosque and square and get back to hotel.

The Grand Bazaar

Day 3: Sunday (Grand Bazaar is closed) All day walking tour of Istanbul with Viator. Hippodrome, Blue Mosque, Hagia Sophia, catwalk at a mall, lunch break on our own, back to hotel, then Topkapi palace, back to hotel, then a night cruise on the Bhosporus strait.

Walking tour..

Topkapi palace

Night cruise

Day 4: Monday : Another morning at Grand Bazzar and walking around, then go to Hammam for 2+ hours, lunch near the Hammam place and back to hotel, pack and leave for Airport. Fly from Istanbul to Nevshehir and a long ride to Cave hotel in Kapadokya (Cappadocia).

Hammam and bye to Istanbul

Day 5 Tuesday: Wake up to see the ballons, then go on an all day Viator tour of Kapadokya. Open air Museum at Goreme, Lover’s hill, Pottery at Avanos, buffet lunch, Imagination point, PInk Valley, underground city of Kaimakli, Pidgeon valley, Uchisar castle, stop for buying Turkish delights, back to Cave hotel. Walking around the Goreme village at night and a dinner in Indian restaurant.

Hot air balloons in Kapadokya

Goreme open air museum

Lover’s hill

Pottery gallery at Avanos

Imagination point and PInk Valley

Kaimakli underground city, Pidgeon valley and Uchisar castle

Day 6 Wednesday: Cancelled Ballon ride. Spend time in the village, drive to Nevshehir airport, fly to Istanbul, wait, fly to Naples (basically entire day in cars, airports), drive from Naples airport to Sorrento hotel.

spending time at cave hotel and off to Naples (all day travel via Istanbul)

Day 7 Thursday: Walking Food tour in Sorrento followed by visiting Church and Cathedral. Back to hotel and walk to the water to spend time in the sea in the public area. Back to hotel, change, visit city center for dinner, followed by sunset viewing.

Sorrento food tour

water time and sunset in Sorrento

Day 8 Friday: Drive to Ercolano to see the buried city of Herculaneum. Then drive to Pompeii to see buried city there, lunch at Pompeii, drive back to Sorrento, short break and Kayaking in sunset in Sorrento.

Buried city of Herculaneum

Pompeii

Kayaking at sunset in Sorrento

Day 9 Saturday: Say bye to Sorrento, load luggage, drive to Positano, spend time seeing vertical village, lunch, then drive to Naples hotel. See the Naples City center, Castle, Galleria Umberto, Via Toledo, ice cream, take out dinner which we had back in hotel with the little one and pack.

Positano Vertical village

An evenings in Naples

Day 10 Sunday: Early morning flight from Naples to Rome and Rome to SFO and back by Sunday late afternoon. Time to recover in time to head back to office Monday!

Had to take five days off instead of 4 as Turkish airlines flight time moved earlier. So had to take off Friday before labor day.

There was something for everyone in the family in this trip. No check in baggage. Managed to pack only clothes (fortunately summer clothes) and do a 9 day trip with a carry on bag each. Did not buy anything that would add to weight. Didn’t take laptops on trip. It was an exercise in luggage frugality. Enjoyed it thoroughly.

Hope this summary post helps you better. If it does drop me a note or let me know on FB and will do this for all future trips.

Cascais area of Lisbon

The previous post in this series is here..

Haven’t been able to finish blogging about a trip from July last year because life always throws some distractions. The last three weeks have seen me try to do yoga thrice. That is a new low. Severe allergies which kept me from office twice last week, then a sinus infection, fever, migraines, body pain thanks to some bug, then promptly followed by embarasing nose bleeds while in office.. it has been one thing after another.

Finally a long weekend which is going to be dedicated to recovery, lots of sleep and finish all those blog posts that were long overdue.. given the nose and throat, my sruthi is now enabling me to sing classics like “meow meow poonaikutty” and similar songs… so singing is also ruled out for now.

There were only two things we did after visiting Sintra on that Viator tour on our last day at Lisbon. The last stop on the tour was to Cascais area of Lisbon. We drove down the hill past beautiful beaches. I love beaches but we did not get to even wet our feet in one on this leg. We were in Cascais for lunch stop.

It was already late afternoon and my stomach acid had arrived in style. Badly needed some ginger tea to calm my head. There were visions of butter naans, malai paneers and jeera rice.. but google searches showed zero Indian restaurants in Cascais. San suggested that I just drink some water and wait till the acid subsides. She was going to eat at a Vegan place called House of wonders, which had rave reviews. The menu was all laid out and you got to choose with your eyes! She thoroughly enjoyed the food.. Even though I am allergic to lots of things and didn’t get anything, was very impressed with the visuals of the food and the service. After that we walked by a pizza place and I got to eat a nice full cheese pizza. We were the only customer in the second floor and the pizza was amazing!

Then we decided to walk around the souvenir shops and all three touristy blocks of Cascais and the waterfront. It was very windy and we mostly stayed in the side streets. That is when we found multiple really nice Indian restaurants! San saw the disappointment in my face and agreed to make up for the miss later. We were to meet outside a Mcdonalds before making our way back to the Baixa area on the return ride. So I got an ice cream to cheer myself up. McD’s does not disappoint.

A short video of our time in Cascais..

We were dropped back in Baixa where we were picked up early in the monring. It was our last evening in Lisbon… will finish that in the next post..