Review of Turkish Airlines flight from Nevşehir to Istanbul in Economy

a disappointing path

Hello! Welcome to another Flight Report!

This is the 2nd FR from my Turkey trip and will cover the return flight from Nevşehir back to Istanbul. Nevşehir is one of two airports serving the historical region of Cappadocia (the other being Kayseri) with tourists flocking to the area for its unique rock formations, history, and hot air balloon rides - I've attached a tourism bonus at the bottom. I highly recommend checking it out as it's one of the most unique places I've visited.

It's my 2nd flight with Turkish Airlines (the first being another domestic flight from Antalya) and I paid 2000TL ($61/€57) for a single, which is a pretty good price. A 15kg checked baggage is included, the norm for domestic flights here (including on LCCs like Ajet). However, seat selection isn't. You'll have to pay for seat selection, which is a shame.  

I aim to offset all of my CO2 emissions from flights. All emissions are calculated using the ICAO Carbon Emissions Calculator and I will be funding projects approved by The Gold Standard.

Video Report

Here's the video version of this FR, it's got pretty much the same thing content wise, 

Nevşehir Kapadokya Airport (NAV)

Despite being named after the city of Nevşehir, the airport is quite far from it. It took around 30-40 minutes by taxi from the main tourist town of Göreme. 

Photo of the check-in and main waiting area. Check-in desks can be seen on the right. Passengers are expected to wait in the landside area until their gate is announced, where they will then pass through security. 

View of the apron. 

Security opened around 20 minutes before boarding - it was one of the most laid-back security screenings I've seen at an airport. They pretty much allowed everything through, including bottled water and other liquids. 

Here's the tiny airside area with a closed shop on the left. 

Another photo of the area. 

the flight

Boarding started on time and here's our plane. 

Some information about our plane:

Type: Airbus A321
Registration: TC-JRK
First flight: 13 May 2008
Age: ~16 years
Config: CY215

Named 'Batman' (no, not the superhero, although that'd be pretty cool. Batman is a district in Turkey in Batman Province with Batman as its capital… confused yet?) she was delivered new to Turkish Airlines in 2008 with 194 seats. She was reconfigured to 215 seats in 2023. We'll soon see the result of that reconfiguration.  

Another shot of our plane.

Yup, it appears that Turkish is also adopting the ironing board seats popular in Europe. Here's the seatback pocket and tray table. 

Despite the super slim seats, legroom is really poor. 

First view out of the window with an AnadoluJet (rebranded to Ajet in April this year) heading to Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen (SAW). 

It's nice to see they've kept the fold-down screens after the reconfiguration, although there's no headphone jack for it (there was on my first flight on the A319 with the old cabin). 

Pushback on time. 

Takeoff! Bye bye Anatolia! 

Reaching our cruising altitude. 

Lets have a look at the contents of the seatback pocket, which includes a safety card…

… and an IFE guide (available via the onboard Wi-Fi). 

Let's have a look at the IFE.

There's a nice kid's section. 

And there's a limited selection of Turkish films and TV shows, although I can't seem to find anything Western. 

A moving map is also available, which is quite nice (but rather annoying to use). 

Somewhere over Turkey (obviously…)

Shortly after, the crew came around with a snack. It's a hot chicken sandwich, which is really nice for a short flight, especially compared to what you'd usually get in Europe (a cup of water and a biscuit if you're lucky). 

Approaching the Black Sea. 

Nice view of Istanbul with Atatürk Airport (the city's former main airport) on the bottom. 

This is an incredibly long final that flies over most of the city. 

Welcome back to Istanbul! We arrived on time. 

View of the terminal with a Thai A350 heading to Bangkok (BKK) on the right and an Aeroflot A330 arriving from Moscow (SVO). 

Two special liveries in one shot! You have a Turkish A330 in the 'Team Türkiye' special livery for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games right in front and another Turkish Airlines A330 in the UEFA Champions League livery taxiing in the distance. 

Arrived at the domestic part of the terminal. 

istanbul airport (ist)

Despite its massive size, the airport currently only has 1 huge terminal, making it one of the largest in the world. However, there's another terminal under construction, along with 3 more runways. This will take the airport to a massive 8 runways with a passenger capacity of 150 million. The airport can potentially handle 200 million passengers, which will involve the construction of a further 2 terminals with spaces for 500 aircraft… I mean, they may as well just turn the airport into a city, it'll be halfway there if those plans are realized haha. 

The walk to baggage reclaim takes around 5-10 minutes, depending on how far away your plane is parked. 

The baggage reclaim area. 

And here's the arrivals area outside. Departures is upstairs. It feels like a park with all the trees.

The metro is another 5 minute walk away. This is the problem with huge airports - everything is just so far away! 

There's a massive mosque in the distance, apparently it can handle 6000 people, which is crazy. As expected for a new airport, it's in the middle of absolutely nowhere and takes 1 hour to get to the city by metro. 

Photo of the huge parking lot. 

I'll end this FR here, there's a tourism bonus of Cappadocia attached below, so feel free to check that out. I'll be flying out of here again in a few days on a very interesting (and unique) route. Thanks for reading and I'll see you there!