Customer reviews page:43

We loved our tour of Ephesus while docked in Izmir with our cruise. Our guide, Gonca, was so fun and gave us a great background to help us appreciate the sites we would see. Gonca has a really fun personality and it made our time with her delightful. We especially appreciated learning about her family and culture in a personal way. It made our tour all the better.We also appreciated the clean Mercedes bus and great driver we got from About Tours. They even gave us gift bags with souvineers from Turkey! What a great company. I highly recommend them. Wished we would have used them in our tour of Istanbul as well. They are top notch!One thing to be aware of, they will take you to a carpet factory as part of your Ephesus tour. It ended up being a good experience (they fed us an excellent lunch and weren't pushy) but I never like getting trapped inside something I didn't know was coming.All in all, we would definitely use About Ephesus for tours in Turkey again. We loved our visit and can't wait to go back!

We booked our private tour online at "About Ephesus Tours" for our day in port at Izmir. Cem, our guide, was waiting for us as we left the ship and gave us a fascinating history lesson of the area on our way to The House of the Virgin Mary. Then it was to the ruins of Ephesus which words cannot describe! We had a nice lunch consisting of Turkish food and then a short rug making demonstration and soon it was time to go back to the ship. Everyone associated with Ephesus Tours was very friendly, professional, and knowledgeable. We saved a bunch of money by going private over the ship shore excursion and in chatting with other cruisers I feel that we had a far superior experience.

This was our second cruise ship visit to Kusadasi and we had had an excellent experience with aboutephesus.com in 2010 for a private Ephesus tour (Mary's House, Ancient Ephesus, Selcuk highlights briefly, and meal and polite sales pitch at a rug-making co-op -- we didn't buy, but very polite). Our expectations for this second tour with aboutephesus.com were therefore very high. Ms. Arzu Altun met AND exceeded those high expectations for our "PMD tour" of Priene, Miletus, and Didyma.We found Ms. Arzu with ease upon leaving the port terminal after arriving on the Celebrity Reflection. She presented herself in both a friendly and professional manner, characteristics of hers present the entire day. The driver and car picked us up promptly. The driver was very polite and professional, coordinating his efforts with our guide seamlessly and skillfully gliding us through traffic and down highways as smoothly as silk thread. The vehicle was clean, luxurious, and crisply cool -- especially appreciated by us through the long and hottest part of the day.Ms. Arzu was well-spoken, very understandable, articulate, and expansive in answering questions from my wife and I on both the history of the three ancient sites we visited and helping immerse us in Turkey's proud, diverse culture with her youthful exuberance. She described everything in rich, comprehensive detail without talking our ears off (she never tried to overly impress us with the volume of what she knew, rather focusing on what we would want to hear -- a fine art in her profession as a professional tourist guide); made excellent use of our time; was respectful of our pace and capabilities in the day's sunny, hot, dry weather; and was nicely cordial (read patient) in ensuring we had good photo opportunities throughout the day.Priene was a tall climb but worth it. Regal without the big crowds of Ancient Ephesus. The discreet driveway approach to Miletus with its mountainous arena in its center was jaw-dropping.The Didyma stop included our meal at a local restaurant. The choice of meal location -- within easy sight of the ancient ruins across the street -- was an excellent one by our guide. The food was fresh and delicious and impressed us as a very local representation of cuisine and social setting with good, friendly service.The Didyma temple ruins were very cool to see; unrushed, we were able to appreciate the historic and religious details we would have missed had we not been escorted by Ms. Arzu. This helped reinforce to me and my wife the real value of their personal tour service. Our trip to Kusadasi was made wonderfully memorable by Ms. Arzu. I look forward to opportunities in the future (like those we had when we first returned to the ship) to tell other travelers how great their services are... again and again. Like I'm doing now with you, my fellow TripAdvisor community neighbors.Thank you, Ms. Arzu Altun. You have a great future with good referrals like this one, I hope. Thank you, Mrs. Kizilhan, the operations manager, and Mr. Teleri, the owner, for running such a good organization: from website (much better than the rest of the field)... to a smooth, simple AND HONEST reservations process at almost the last moment (just weeks before we left for Europe)... to reassuring pre-trip communications... to delivering on the promise for good service at a reasonable cost. I was truly impressed. Thank you, Osman Tourism, too: you made it happen for my wife and I. And thank you again, aboutephesus.com!

I think this tour is highly dependent on the guide you get ... We requested and were assigned to Ms. Gonca. A friend had used this same company and guide and had a great experience. Our guide and driver were very friendly and knowledgeable. Ms. Gonca laid out the schedule and gave us some options as to the way we could see things. We went to Mary's house first and we were glad we did. As we left, there were a TON of tour buses pulling up. Ephesus was amazing. We felt like we received enough, but not too much information while we were there. There were some other guides just rambling on and on at each and every pillar. Ms. Gonca was happy to spend more or less time at each area dependent on our questions and interest level. Her English is very, very good and she even communicated well with our 8 year old. As far as the pottery stop, we were given the option to stop or not and we chose to stop as we had time and our child was interested in seeing how it was made. After we saw how it was made walked through the over priced shop for about 90 seconds, we were on our way. We did not feel pressured to buy anything. The rug stop (also where we had lunch) was also interesting mostly to the kids. We had been in Turkey a couple of weeks at this point and were used to people trying to sell us rugs so we said no firmly and walked away. The lunch was bearable. It was at the rug place and was not very good turkish food. If they had taken us to a great local lunch place, I would have given them 5 stars.

First of all, before our trip I contacted lots of tour companies on TripAdvisor's top list as well as some recommendations in forums for quotes and some of them didn't even bother to reply me. About Ephesus was the only one exceeding my expectations because of their fast response rate and great price (cheaper than most in terms of total cost for our group of 10 including 2 children). They were also extremely patient with me and answered all my questions.Our price was $200 (group of 10) for transportation and guide. Entrance fees and parking are extra. They actually charged us USD without any additional transaction fee (both from them and from credit card company).Our guide was Gonca. She was very friendly and also very good with children. Her English was good although there was a little accent. We all loved her.The tour did include a visit to the carpet weaving demonstration (the actual weaving demonstration was only about 2 min and the carpet show was much longer) but there was no hard selling so it wasn't a problem.Overall we had a great experience with About Ephesus and would recommend it to everyone!

We were in Kusadashi for the day and had booked with About Ephesus in advance of our cruise. We had an absolutely fabulous time! Our guide, Gonca, was wonderful. She was personable, knowledgeable, very well spoken and her passion for her work and her country was evident. Gonca kept us one step ahead of the crowds all day which we greatly appreciated. Following our trip to the House of the Virgin Mary she took us to the ruins of Ephesus and a visit to the Terrace Houses. This turned out to be the highlight of our trip. Gonca's descriptions brought the ruins alive for us and gave us an understanding of what life must have been like when Cleopatra visited.Lunch was fantastic as we ate al fresco under an arbor of trees and enjoyed a feast prepared for us. We had resisted a visit to the carpet factory but this too turned out to be a most interesting and enjoyable experience. I highly recommend About Ephesus, and Gonca. You will learn a lot about Turkey, both past and present. Thanks for a great day!

We booked this very reasonably priced tour online for our party of 3. They provided quick and courteous responses. Language barriers were never an issue. We specifically requested that our tour guide was knowledgeable in Christian History. Our tour guide, Filiz Caprar was very educated in Christian history and the Bible. Her English was perfect too, absolutely no problems with understanding what she was saying. She was on time, had our name clearly showing on her sign, very courteous and exceptionally hospitable. She also greeted us with a goodie bag of souvenirs from Turkey to take home with us. Any concerns we had for being an American in a Muslim country quickly diminished, we were treated with respect and kindness by everyone we encountered. The van was cool (and it was very hot there that day) and the driver was also very courteous and professional. Filiz showed us everything we wanted to see and more. Her understanding of the history and the importance of certain areas was beyond anything we expected. She also managed time well and got us back to the ship on time. We felt like this was the best tour we took and we took many on our trip to Europe. Turkey is a beautiful country. We would love to return someday. I couldn't recommend Filiz enough, she quickly went from tour guide to friend. Thank you for the wonderful experience Filiz and https://ephesusbreeze.com. Wishing you many blessings and hope to return someday soon.

If you're heading to Turkey on a cruise, avoid the ship excursions and plan a great day in Ephesus through https://ephesusbreeze.com. I booked this tour about a month before we sailed and for $85.00 U.S. per person we got a better tour of Ephesus that included a small air conditioned bus just for us, a traditional lunch which was super and an extremely knowledgeable professional tour guide named Canan (pronounced Janna) Tunckanat. Canan went out of her way to share the history of Turkey and Ephesus as well as sharing her personal stories in the little town she grew up in and still resides within. Canan addressed each of us by our names and really made us feel welcome. She warned us of the vendors to watch out for and the ones that could be trusted. After Ephesus we enjoyed a presentation from a professional potter and then a rug maker. Although their objective is to make a sale, these presentations were no pressure. They treated us like honored guest, shared their trade and asked God to bless us as we departed. I highly recommend about Ephesus and strongly recommend that you request Canan for your guide. We had a lot of fun and made a new friend.

What a wonderful tour. Our guide Gerkun had a wealth of information and nothing was too much trouble. He got us back to the ship in plenty of time and took us to a family owned carpet factory/farmhouse for lunch. Ephesus is the most amazing place we have seen (including Pompeii). The terrace houses are a must for anyone visiting Ephesus (extra cost but well worth it)

Our private Ephesus Tour booked through https://ephesusbreeze.com was outstanding. Ms. Selda, our tour guide was the best. Her English, communication skills and the knowledge of history were very good. She was very professional, took time time to explain things and pleasant in her conversations. She is a good Ambassador for Turkey. The driver was good and the private van was clean. Eighteen of us enjoyed the tour. I recommend the tour everyone.Leo Martis