The area of Cappadocia is a famous and popular tourist destination, as it has many areas with unique geological, historic and cultural features.

The region is located southwest of the major city Kayseri.

The Cappadocia region is largely underlain by sedimentary rocks formed in lakes and streams, and ignimbrite deposits erupted from ancient volcanoes approximately 9 to 3 million years ago, during the late Miocene to Pliocene epochs. The rocks of Cappadocia near Göreme eroded into hundreds of spectacular pillars and minaret-like forms. The volcanic deposits are soft rocks that the people of the villages at the heart of the Cappadocia Region carved out to form houses, churches and monasteries. Göreme became a monastic center between 300—1200 AD.

The first period of settlement in Göreme goes back to the Roman period. The Yusuf Koç, Ortahane, Durmus Kadir and Bezirhane churches in Göreme, houses and churches carved into rocks in the Uzundere, Bağıldere and Zemi Valleys are all carriers of history that we can see today. The Göreme Open Air Museum is the most visited site of the monastic communities in Cappadocia and is one of the most famous sites in central Turkey. The complex contains more than 30 rock-carved churches and chapels, some of them have superb frescoes inside, dating from the 9th to the 11th centuries.

In early Christianity, Caesarea was an important bishopric. Cappadocia was one of the most important early Christian centers. Until 1071 it was under Byzantine rule. More than 3,000 churches that have been discovered there today bear witness to the Christian past, until the beginning of the 20th Century. The last Greek Orthodox Christians left the region as part of the great population exchange between Turkey and Greece between 1922 and 1924.
Cappadocia was on the famous Silk Road. The people living there have often been attacked by many different invaders. Therefore, the residents have eroded the soft tufa, to hide themselves there. There were whole underground cities, which are still visible today.
Because of this active cultural history and breathtaking landscape formations, the region was taken under protection in 1985 by UNESCO as a world cultural heritage and natural heritage.