Ayder Plateau

Ayder sits at around thirteen hundred metres at the head of the Firtina valley, a pasture that turned into a resort because of the hot spring beneath it. The water is piped to a public bathhouse with separate men's and women's sections and private rooms, and getting into it after a wet day on the hills is the main reason many people come at all. Around it are steep green slopes, streams dropping straight off the ridges, and cattle grazing in fog for most of the summer. Ayder is also the usual starting point for walks into the Kackar and for the higher, quieter yaylas above it, Pokut, Sal and Elevit among them, reached on rough tracks.

What you actually see

• The bathhouse - hot mineral water piped from beneath the plateau.
• The waterfalls - streams dropping straight off the surrounding ridges.
• The fog - cloud sitting in the pastures through most summer days.
• The higher yaylas - Pokut, Sal and Elevit on rough tracks above.

When to go

June to September is the season, with July and August the warmest and by far the busiest. Weekends bring more traffic than the road can take, and vehicle restrictions with shuttle transfers are usual in peak weeks. Rain falls in every month here, so pack for it rather than hoping. Evenings are cold at this altitude.

Honest expectations

Ayder has been built up hard, with concrete hotel blocks standing in what used to be pasture, and restoration and demolition work has been running in parts of it for years. Weekend crowds and generator noise undercut the quiet. It rains constantly. The bathhouse is functional rather than pleasant, and queues form in the evening.

Nearby

The Firtina valley, the Zilkale fortress and the Kackar trailheads.