Hot Water Springs in Turkey

The white terraces above Pamukkale village are the reason most people come to Turkey for hot water at all: calcium carbonate deposited by seventeen springs over thousands of years, stacked into shelves of shallow warm pools. You walk the marked route barefoot and wade in the pools along it. The site ticket also covers the ruined Roman city of Hierapolis on the plateau above and the archaeology museum.

Good to know: Shoes, sandals, water shoes and socks all have to come off before you step onto the white terraces. The South Gate is the flattest approach.

The closest serious thermal town to Istanbul, in the wooded hills above Yalova on the southern shore of the Sea of Marmara. The springs are concentrated in the settlement actually called Termal, where the bath buildings and the surrounding plane trees have been in use since Roman and Byzantine times and were restored in the early republican period. Indoor and outdoor pools, sulphur and calcium in the water, forest walks between soaks.

Good to know: Reachable from Istanbul by fast ferry to Yalova and then a short drive, which makes it a same day trip.

Oylat sits 27 km from Inegol, in the pine covered hills east of Bursa, so it is a proper drive rather than a city trip: the figure of 30 km from Bursa that circulates online is well short. The waters are hot and mineral heavy, and the setting is the draw, a narrow wooded valley with hotels built around the bath houses. Oylat Cave, one of the longest in the region, is close enough to pair with a soak.

Bursa has been a thermal city since Roman Prusa, and Cekirge is its bath quarter, on the lower slopes of Uludag west of the centre. Almost every hotel here is plumbed straight into the springs. The reason to come, though, is the historic bath houses nearby: Eski Kaplica and Yeni Kaplica are working Ottoman era hamams over much older foundations, and bathing in one of them is a different experience from a hotel pool.

Good to know: Easy to reach on public transport from central Bursa, so no car needed.

Cesme's thermal water is at Sifne, on the bay near Ilica rather than in Cesme town itself, and it is the only place on this list where you can go from a hot sulphur pool into the Aegean on the same afternoon. Hotels and day facilities there run thermal pools, some with sea views, and the mud is used alongside the water. Combine it with the Cesme beaches and the windsurfing at Alacati rather than treating it as a destination on its own.

Five minutes north of Pamukkale and much less visited, Karahayit is the red counterpart to the white terraces. The same geothermal system feeds it, but the iron in this water stains the travertine rust and ochre instead of white, which is why locals call it Kirmizi Su, red water. The village runs on thermal hotels that pipe the springs into their own pools, so it is the easier place to soak at length.

Balcova, on Izmir's southwestern edge, is the oldest named thermal site in the country: the Agamemnon Baths, tied by legend to the Mycenaean king whose wounded soldiers were said to have bathed here. The water is strongly mineralised and reaches around 62 degrees at source, so it is cooled for the pools. It is a working spa and physiotherapy complex rather than a scenic one, and it is inside the city, reachable by public transport.

Afyonkarahisar province is Turkey's thermal heartland and Hudai at Sandikli is its best known site, sitting on a geological fault that pushes sulphurous water to the surface at 75 to 80 degrees. It has to be cooled substantially before anyone gets in. Alongside the pools it is known for warm mud, applied and then rinsed off in the thermal water, which is the local ritual and the reason most Turkish visitors come.

Bolu sits halfway along the Istanbul to Ankara road, which is exactly why its thermal facilities get used: it is the natural break on that drive. The springs are just outside the city at Karacasu, run as municipal and hotel thermal baths rather than as a resort strip. The reason to stop for more than a soak is the surrounding country, the lakes at Abant and Yedigoller and the beech and fir forest around them.

The least visited entry here and the most local. Hamambogazi is in Usak province, in the uplands between the Aegean coast and inland Anatolia, and it is where people from the surrounding towns go rather than where tour buses stop. Facilities are simple, the water is bicarbonate rich, and the appeal is that you are unlikely to share the pool with anyone who is not Turkish.

Also called Cleopatra's Pool, this is where you actually swim at Pamukkale, rather than on the terraces. It is a warm, fizzing, spring fed pool inside the Hierapolis site, with fallen marble columns from the Roman colonnade lying on the bottom, which is what makes it worth the detour. Bring a towel and swimwear; there are changing rooms and lockers.

Good to know: Swimming here is charged separately from the main site ticket, so budget for two entries.

On the far shore of Lake Koycegiz, most easily reached by river boat from Dalyan, and the most enjoyable soak on this list because of how you get there. The routine is fixed: coat yourself in the grey mud, let it dry in the sun, rinse it off in the lake, then get into the hot sulphur pool. It smells strongly of sulphur and it is often busy, and both of those are part of it.

Good to know: Usually sold as part of a Dalyan boat trip that also takes in the Kaunos rock tombs and Iztuzu beach.