Guide
Mount Erciyes rises to 3,917 metres south of Kayseri and is the highest mountain in central Anatolia and the fifth highest in Türkiye. It is an extinct volcano, and its eruptions some thirty million years ago laid down the material from which the landscape of Cappadocia was later carved — so the mountain you see from Kayseri is the source of the rock formations a hundred kilometres away. Snow stays on the summit, and the Hittite name for it meant White Mountain.
Today it works as a year-round destination rather than a single-season one. The ski centre on its flanks is one of Türkiye's more significant winter sports areas, and the mountain is also among the ones Turkish climbers choose most often for mountaineering and ice climbing. In summer the activity is walking: trekking tours are organised here, and the route running from the lake district between Kayseri and Niğde as far as the Kapuzbaşı waterfalls is one of the better long walks in the region. Minibuses towards Develi from central Kayseri serve the ski centre, at Hisarcik.
