Review of Turkish Airlines flight Kayseri → Istanbul in Economy

A look at the town of Goreme around our hotel.














The next morning, we went for the famous hot air balloon ride, a must do in Cappadocia! It was amazing beyond words!!












And landed safely and right on target on a moving trailer, with celebratory champagne and medal presentation after.




Rest of the day was spent doing the Green Tour. Visiting an underground city.




View of a beautiful volcanic lake.




Hiking along the Ihlara Valley.








Selime Cathedral








Pigeon Valley




More Turkish food. Even more pides.




Testi kebab. Meat cooked in clayout, a traditional Anatolian dish commonly found in Cappadocia.




Sweet endings with Baklava!




Waking up very early during sunrise to catch the magical sight of balloons floating across the town.










After relaxing for another half a day in Goreme, we proceeded to Kayseri Airport for our final stop for this trip, Istanbul.

Arriving at Kayseri Airport after another more than an hour's drive from Goreme.




Checking in for our flight to Istanbul. The flight was totally full on this leg, and our plane was downgraded from an initially scheduled A321 to a B738.




Boarding pass issued and I was allocated my pre-selected seat during online check-in.




The departure hall only has very limited amenities and seating areas. And this was only 2 flights checking in!






FIDS showing the departures for the rest of the day.




To escape the crowd at the waiting hall after security screening, we proceeded to the second level where there is more seating areas which were totally empty, as well as a view of the tarmac.

Our plane arriving on schedule from Istanbul and taxiing in.




Karaman would be operating our flight.




Anadolujet, which was scheduled to depart earlier than us to Istanbul Sabiha, was delayed and arrived late after TK.




After a quick turnaround of our plane and seeing some passengers walking across the tarmac, we realised that boarding has started. Thus went down where there was still a long queue for boarding.


21 August 2014
Turkish Airlines
TK 2015
Kayseri (ASR) - Istanbul Ataturk (IST)
B737-800
TC-JGL
Economy Class

Walking out to the tarmac for boarding.




Anadolujet being turned around.




Boarded from the rear stairs.








Welcomed aboard and proceeded to our seats at 22E/F. The cabin still featured the old leather-cladded seats. Business also had similar seats to economy, just with slightly more seat pitch and middle seat left empty.






Boarding in progress. It would be a totally full flight this evening.




Seat pitch felt ok and was more than sufficient for the short flight. Pillows were available in the overhead bins.




Skylife magazine and safety card in seat pocket.




At the parking stand, with some baggage still being loaded.




Aircraft doors were closed on time and we pushed back. Safety video was show on the dropdown screens. Flight time was slightly more than an hour.




Pushed back and starting taxi.




Had a rather long taxi to the runway.






Took from Kayseri's Rwy25, bound for Istanbul. Note in the video that a kid seated across the aisle actually got off from his seat and stood at the window throughout the entire takeoff roll, and the mum actually did nothing! Speechless!




Climbing out of Kayseri.










It was mainly barren land below us.






The only entertainment was the flight map that was being played on the overhead screens throughout the entire flight. Well, better than nothing on this short flight I guess.




Meal service started, with the carts starting from the rear and front of the economy cabin. 3 crew were working the economy today. A picnic box as well as hot/cold beverages were offered, which I guess is the standard TK offerings on domestic flights.






A Do&Co picnic box was handed out.




Contents of the box.




Starter: Kidney beans in olive oil. This was a pretty nice starter.




Chicken sandwich. Even though it looked boring, it was actually very moist and tasty!




Dessert: Homemade almond cake. Delicious! I could have more of this! Turkish Airlines did not disappoint in its catering, even for short-haul flights.




Freshly-squeezed orange juice to wash everything down.




Along the coast.




Soon, we were nearing Istanbul and started our descent.




The Bosphorus can be seen.




Into the sunset.




Coast of Istanbul can be seen here.




Passing Ataturk before making a 180 degrees turn back for landing.




Making a turn back to the runway.




And landing on Rwy05 of Ataturk 10min ahead of schedule.












Video of the landing into Rwy05.




Taxiing past the International Terminal, passing countless TK planes parked both at the terminal and remote stands.




Even more TK aircraft at the domestic terminal.




And we actually docked right at the domestic terminal with an aerobridge!




Disembarking.




Final look at our baby Boeing.




Baggage retrieval was a waiting affair due to the many evening arrivals and limited baggage belts. As can be seen, 4 flights were assigned to our belt. Baggage of the previous flight had just cleared while the other 3 flights flight had also landed after us. Guess it would be chaos soon at our belt.




After exiting the domestic terminal, we took the Havatas airport bus to Taksim, where our hotel was located. Journey to the city took almost an hour due to the rather heavy evening peak traffic.

Our hotel in Istanbul was Nippon Hotel, situated just opposite the airport bus stop and also very near Taksim Square and public transportation. As expected, hotel rooms in Istanbul are very small for the price paid, but our hotel was still rather comfortable and offers a great breakfast.