Best Things to Do in Konya

Konya pairs two of the greatest milestones in human spiritual and prehistoric history, the 13th-century Sufi poetry of Mevlana Rumi and the 7400 BC Neolithic town of Çatalhöyük, with masterworks of Seljuk architecture. Here are the ten experiences that define a visit.

1. Visit the Mevlana Museum and the Green Dome (Kubbe-i Hadra). Step inside the former dervish lodge (dergah) to stand before the gold-embroidered sarcophagus of Rumi, the Semahane ritual hall and the former dervish cells.
2. Attend a Whirling Dervish Sema Ceremony at the Mevlana Cultural Centre. Watch the UNESCO-listed mystical ceremony of the Mevlevi Order accompanied by live ney reed-flute and kudüm drum music.
3. Marvel at the Seljuk domes of Karatay Madrasa and İnce Minareli Madrasa. Gaze up at the starry turquoise-and-cobalt tiled ceiling of 1251 Karatay Madrasa and the calligraphic stone ribbon portal of 1265 İnce Minareli.
4. Explore 9,400-year-old UNESCO-listed Çatalhöyük and its new Visitor Centre. Walk beneath the protective shelters over humanity's earliest mudbrick town and tour the new all-timber museum.

5. Walk Alaeddin Hill, Alaeddin Mosque and the Tomb of Shams of Tabriz. See the ebony pulpit of 1155 and the resting place of eight Seljuk sultans, then visit the shrine of Rumi's spiritual companion.
6. Spend an afternoon in the 5,000-year-old stone valley of Sille and Aya Eleni Church (327 AD). Tour one of the world's oldest churches founded by Helena, mother of Constantine the Great.
7. See 13th-century Konya recreated in miniature at Panorama Konya (Konyanüma). Walk through a 360-degree mural of medieval Konya and scale models of thirty Mevlevi lodges worldwide.
8. Walk among 10,000 live butterflies at the Konya Tropical Butterfly Garden. Step inside Europe's largest butterfly flight area in Selçuklu.

9. Taste metre-long etli ekmek and 6-hour fırın kebabı. Dine in the restored 19th-century stone lanes of Türbeönü and Bedesten Bazaar.
10. Take a day trip to the 1299 wooden columns of Beyşehir Eşrefoğlu Mosque or Sultanhani Caravanserai. Stand inside the largest surviving wooden-pillared mosque in the Islamic world.