Nature Escapes in Eskişehir: Gürleyik Waterfall, Musaözü and Çatacık Forests

While travellers crossing Eskişehir on the train see the flat golden wheat plains along the railway corridor, the northern border of Eskişehir province rises into the 1,800-metre pine-and-oak ridges of the Sündiken Mountains (dropping down toward the Sakarya River valley), hiding natural travertine waterfalls, red-deer sanctuaries and forest lakes.

1. Gürleyik Waterfall and Natural Travertine Pools (In Mihalıççık, 110 km east of Eskişehir)

Declared a 1st-degree natural protected site in the forested valleys of the Mihalıççık district (reached in 1 hour 40 minutes by car via Alpu and Mihalıççık, or combined with a day trip to Sivrihisar and Yunus Emre's tomb), Gürleyik Stream (Gürleyik Çayı) is one of the hidden natural wonders of Central Anatolia:

• Natural Travertine Swimming Terraces: because the clear mountain spring water is rich in dissolved calcium carbonate, it has built up a series of smooth, stepped natural travertine rock shelves and emerald-turquoise cascading pools shaded by walnut, willow and pine trees. Between June and September, visitors wade and swim in the refreshing 4-to-5-metre-deep natural rock pools right below the 5-metre waterfall cascade.
• The Tomb of Sufi Poet Yunus Emre (In Sarıköy / Mihalıççık): on the road to or from Gürleyik, stop at Yunus Emre (Sarıköy), the 13th/14th-century home and resting place of Yunus Emre (1240 to 1320), the beloved pioneer of Turkish mystic poetry whose verses of universal human love ("Let us love and be loved, the earth shall be left to no one") are inscribed across Turkey.

2. Çatacık Forests (Red Deer Sanctuary) & Musaözü Nature Park

• Çatacık Forest Recreation Area & Red Deer Breeding Station (In Mihalıççık, 85 km north-east): at 1,300 to 1,600 metres elevation in the Sündiken Mountains, a magnificent forest of towering Scots pine, larch and beech trees shelters a 140-hectare protected wildlife enclosure for native Anatolian Red Deer (Kızıl Geyik).
• Musaözü Dam Lake & Nature Park (Only 21 km west of Central Eskişehir): if you want a peaceful pine-forest lake hike just 20 minutes from downtown Eskişehir along the Kütahya highway (past Sazova Park), Musaözü Tabiat Parkı offers quiet waterside trails surrounded by oak and pine woods.