CcatallenaThis hotel in the hot air balloon town is super convenient. The front desk helped us book a car to Salda Lake, airport shuttle, and hot air balloon rides – all without prior reservations, which was amazing! Their breakfast is delicious, with rose jam and flatbread. I even made my own 'hand-grabbed' pancake, totally satisfying my Chinese palate. I also made milk tea with milk and Turkish black tea, adding a bit of honey, and it tasted exactly like Hong Kong milk tea – I'm quite the foodie! The only issue is that the facilities are a bit old, but not dirty. Honestly, most other guesthouses and hotels in this town are pretty average anyway, so this one stands out as the best of a bad bunch and is definitely worth considering.
The restaurants in this town are all terrible and surprisingly more expensive than in the capital. The same menu items are miles apart from what you'd find in Istanbul. Except for one Chinese restaurant owned by a Shanghainese boss, located between the town entrance and a bunch of A*** hotels. We ate there twice in 3 days and were so satisfied – the Sichuan cuisine was incredibly authentic!
A special warning about the Pamukkale thermal spring entrance tickets: there's a scam! The ticket office at the park entrance brazenly scams people. It's supposed to be 30 euros per ticket, but they try to trick you by saying they don't accept euros, only Turkish Lira – this was the first time we encountered not being able to pay in euros in Turkey. My husband suggested paying by card. After swiping, the staff member said he'd give us two headphones for an audio guide inside the park. I suddenly remembered seeing this scam mentioned in a Xiaohongshu guide. The headphone cost is actually built into the card payment! I quickly calculated how much we'd just been charged. It turned out they charged us 75 euros for two tickets, which is 15 euros more than the original 60 euros. Was I crazy to pay 15 euros for two crappy headphones? I immediately demanded a refund, firmly telling him I didn't want the headphones. After receiving the refund, we paid again for 60 euros. I'm writing this in my review hoping other visitors don't get scammed!
Throughout Turkey, including Istanbul airport's metro card booths and the Grand Bazaar, scams are prevalent. Always be wary of strangers striking up conversations and ignore them! Absolutely do not let locals help you operate the card machines! They will secretly buy an extra card for themselves because metro cards can also be used at convenience stores! Prices in the Grand Bazaar are 10 times higher than in regular supermarkets! Do not go in there! It's Turkey's version of a 'cutting cake' scam. Before picking items, we'd ask for the price, and they'd just say it's by weight, without telling us the price per box. After they packed and weighed it, they demanded 800,000 Korean won, which is equivalent to three nights' accommodation in a Spanish hotel! They then tried to guilt-trip us, saying that since it was already packed, we couldn't refuse to pay or put it back. I told them to call the police because it was a scam and I wouldn't pay a single cent! We stood there for half an hour. They were big and tall, clearly trying to bully Asians. But seeing how resolute I was, they eventually let me go. These scams are mostly in tourist areas; we didn't encounter them in regular residential areas, where there are generally more good people. But definitely be on guard in tourist spots!
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