Fez Travel

An Istanbul operator with Turkey at its center

Fez Travel is a tour operator that runs its own trips. Its site describes the company as "based in Istanbul, Turkey" and "100 percent Turkish-owned," says it hires its own guides and operates its own vehicles, and states plainly: "We run our tours." The destination menu lists Caucasus, Cyprus, Egypt, Greece, Turkey and Uzbekistan, and the responsible-travel page says Turkey is where it does most of its tours. That page also says the range has been extended to the Balkans, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Israel, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran and Uzbekistan, though the tour menu itself only carries the 6 destinations above. The about page gives the company's founding year as 1997, its license as TURSAB Group A, A4339, sales offices in Istanbul and Sydney, and operation offices or representatives in Istanbul, Cappadocia, Fethiye and Kusadasi. Prices on the site are shown in euros.

The company started in 1997 as a hop-on hop-off backpacker bus around Western Turkey, according to its history section, moved into scheduled tours of the west of the country, added Greece in 2003, and now describes itself as a provider of comfort tours, city day tours and shore excursions. Besides selling to travelers directly, it offers ground services to international tour operators and acts as a travel agent for flights and outbound sales.

Day tours, multi-day tours and cruises

The site sorts its catalog by tour type: Turkey Group Tours, Anzac Day Tours, Gallipoli & Troy Tours, Land and Sea Tours, Gulet - Blue Cruises, Eastern Turkey Tours, Black Sea Tours, Turkey & Greece Tours, Greece Tours, Turkey & Cyprus Tours, Egypt Tours, Caucasus Tours, Uzbekistan Tours, Private Tours, Solo Tours, Women Only, Semi-Independent Tours, and two day-tour groups, Land Excursions and Shore Excursions. There is also a Hot Deals page and a Tailor Made Tour option.

The land-excursions page lists every entry as a 1-day tour, with "from" prices between 95 € and 235 €. In Cappadocia that means the Cooking Class, North, South, Ihlara Valley, Sinasos and Winery tours, several of them in both group and private versions. Istanbul gets the Bosphorous Half Day Group Tour, Bosphorus by Night, a Byzantine group tour, Classics tours in full-day, half-day and private form, a cooking course, a street food tour, a Thrace winery group tour, a Tulip Festival group tour, a Two Continents group tour and a Whirling Dervishes evening. Further out are Ephesus with the museum or with the Virgin Mary's House, Pamukkale, Gallipoli and Troy, Antalya excursions to Demre, Myra and Kekova or to Perge, Aspendos and Side, and private days in Bursa, Edirne, Laodicea and Aphrodisias, and Priene, Miletus and Didyma. A Kusadasi village cooking class rounds out the list. The shore-excursion list covers Turkish ports: Antalya, Bodrum, Canakkale, Dikili, Ephesus, Istanbul, Izmir and Marmaris.

The multi-day side is much larger. Named tours include Best of Turkey, Glories of Turkey, Turkish Odyssey, Crossroads of Empire, Flying Carpet, Eastern Turkey, Pearl of Hattusa & Black Sea, Land of Ararat, Gobeklitepe and Mt Nemrut, and combinations such as Best of Turkey and Greece, Magical Turkey And Egypt, and Wonders of Turkey with Cyprus Sun. Greece has Greece Classic, Greece Discovery, Greek Island Explorer, Mykonos Explorer and Santorini Explorer tours; the Caucasus has Caucasus Discovery and Georgia Discovery; Uzbekistan has Silk Road Treasures of Uzbekistan. Gulet cruises run under names such as Azure Blue, Sapphire Blue and Turquoise Blue. The ANZAC Day group has Colonel, Corporal, Digger, Major and Trooper tours, and the site says it plants saplings at Gallipoli, which it calls "the home of our company." Short "Mini Stay" packages cover Cappadocia, Istanbul and Kusadasi in 3-day and 4-day versions.

How the tours run

The "Why Choose Fez" section says the escorted group tours "have a maximum size of 20 people (with the exception of ANZAC Day tours)." It says the company hires its own guides, operates its own vehicles and has a local operations team in each destination, and the homepage describes the guides as "Certified and experienced." The about page says there are "hundreds of scheduled departures" of the small-group tours each year covering Greece and Turkey, and calls the brochure departures "guaranteed departure escorted group tours."

The solo-tours page lists 4 departures built for single travelers: Turkish Odyssey Solo (16 days, from 4.750 €), Wonders of Turkey with Gulet Solo (13 days, from 2.985 €), Glories of Turkey Solo Departures (12 days, from 3.399 €) and Magic Carpet - Solo Departures (10 days, from 2.700 €). The women-only line is represented by the Sultanas of Turkey - Women Only tour on the homepage. The site does not describe how the semi-independent tours differ from the escorted ones.

On costs during the trip, the site says its tours carry "No local payments, no surprises": what is included is set out at booking, and the prices of optional activities are given in a pre-departure pack. It also says tickets and vouchers are sent by email rather than printed. Tours include short stops at local businesses, and the responsible-travel page names carpet shops in Turkey, vineyards in Greece and papyrus shops in Egypt among them, which travelers who dislike shopping stops will want to know. The site does not state guide languages, meeting points or pick-up arrangements for the day tours, and it says nothing about children, accessibility or fitness levels.

Booking and contact

Booking runs through the website, with a booking cart and customer accounts. The site also sells hotel stays in Athens, Cappadocia, Istanbul and Kuşadası, and airport or city transfers in Athens, Bodrum, Cappadocia, Fethiye, Istanbul, Izmir and Kuşadası. For trips outside the fixed departures, the about page says a team designs tailor-made itineraries and private tours for cultural, study, religious and adventure interests, in accommodation "from budget to 5-star."

The head office is in the Fatih district of Istanbul. The footer lists 2 phone numbers (+90 532 374 49 51 and +90 212 520 04 34), WhatsApp on the first, the address feztravel@feztravel.com, and a separate address for requesting a printed 2026 brochure. The site also has an "Ask Fez AI" assistant. The footer links to FAQ and Terms & Conditions pages, but the about, tour-listing and responsible-travel pages do not set out a cancellation window, deposit amount or refund rule, so those need to be read on the terms page before paying. The site says that for every reservation of USD 1,000 or more it donates a day of care for injured sea turtles at the DEKAMER rescue center in Dalyan.

What stays open, and who it suits

A few things the site leaves open: the cancellation and deposit terms, the languages the guides work in, and where day tours start. The group-size cap of 20 does not apply to the ANZAC Day tours, and the site does not say what size those groups reach. Several group and private versions of the same day tour sit side by side on the land-excursions page, so it is worth opening each tour to confirm what the price covers.

Fez Travel suits travelers who want a Turkey-focused company with its own guides, vehicles and regional offices, whether for a single day out of Istanbul or Cappadocia, a cruise-port excursion, or a multi-day circuit of the country of up to 22 days. Australians and New Zealanders heading to Gallipoli will find a whole ANZAC Day range. Solo travelers get dedicated departures, and women traveling together have a women-only tour. People mainly interested in Uzbekistan or the Caucasus will find a much shorter list than the Turkish one, and anyone who wants cancellation terms up front should read the terms page before choosing a date.