Göreme

The malleable nature of the rocks and cones in and around Göreme has meant that people have carved out cave homes here from at least the third century (and probably from long before). The earliest such homes were probably simple caves but by the 20th century most of the houses (except those in single cones) had stone rooms built in front of the caves for families to live in while the caves were relegated to stabling and storage. The houses were designed to suit a place-specific way of life, with mangers for the animals cut from the rock along with presses used to tread grapes and later to make pekmez (grape molasses). Tandır ovens cut into the floors doubled as heating. This was a way of life that continued right into the first decade of the 21st century but that came to an effective end as a result of a tourism book that saw almost all the old houses converted into boutique hotels by around 2015.[11]

Göreme was little visited by tourists until the 1970s but by 2000 had become the tourist capital of Cappadocia. Tourism brought wealth and a better standard of living to the village but it has completely changed not just the use of the old cave buildings within the village which have almost all been converted into hotels but also the lives of the villagers, almost all of whom now work in tourism.[12] Many erstwhile residents have moved to live in the surrounding towns and villages – Nevşehir, Avanos, Uçhisar and Ürgüp – having sold their houses in Göreme for conversion into hotels. In the second decade of the 21st century an increasing number of hotels started to be built or bought by investors from outside Göreme.

Göreme Open Air Museum (Göreme Açık Hava Müzesi), one of Turkey's most-visited tourist attractions, preserves some of the best of the rock-cut, frescoed churches for which Cappadocia is known.[13] However, there are also a few other churches in and around the village itself: the Bezirhane,[14] Durmus Kadir,[15] Orta Mahaalle, Karabulut,[16] Yusuf Koç churches[17] Aynalı,[18] El Nazar[19] and Saklı[20] churches.

Deep valleys run out of Göreme on all sides and make for excellent walking although not all are well signed. Some of them contain little-visited rock-cut churches; most are dotted with pigeon-houses from the days when local farmers reared pigeons to use their guano for fertiliser. Probably the best known of the valleys is Pigeon Valley (Güvercinlik Vadesi) which runs between Göreme and neighbouring Uçhisar. Also popular is the Rose Valley (Güllüdere Vadesi) which contains the remains of the Column Church (Kolonlu Kilise)[21] and several others. Other valleys to explore include the Zemi Valley (Zemi Vadesi), the Valley of the Swords (Kılıçlar Vadesi)[22] and the Kızılçukur Valley.[23]