The House of the Virgin Mary is a Catholic shrine located on Mt. Koressos (Mount Nightingale) in the vicinity of Ephesus. The house was discovered in the 19th century by following the descriptions in the reported visions of Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774–1824), a Roman Catholic nun and visionary, which were published as a book by Clemens Brentano after her death. While the Catholic Church has never pronounced in favour or against the authenticity of the house, the site has nevertheless received a steady flow of pilgrimage since its discovery. Christian and Muslim pilgrims visit the house based on the belief that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was taken to this stone house by Saint John and lived there for the remainder of her earthly life. And also a 'Wishing Wall' below the chapel is covered in bits of white cloth, paper, plastic or anything else at hand that the faithful have tied to a frame while making a wish.

It is one of Seven Wonders of the ancient world. If you visit Ephesus today, you can only see the ruins of the foundations of this marvelous construction of the Hellenistic Age, entirely made of marble and full of sculptured columns' capitals and shafts. The most beautiful remaining of this temple are today exhibited in the London British Museum. The oldest remaining found date back till the 6th century BC. It was surrounded by 36 huge columns, later enlarged upon the orders of the Lydia King, Kreisos, during the 6th century BC. The new Artemis has been rebuilt in the 2nd century BC. Located on top of the previous one, it had tremendous dimensions: 127 columns of each 17,5 meters high. Unfortunately this one has also been destroyed by fire, reconstructed and again demolished by earthquakes, rebuilt and at last looted by Goths one year later.

Lunch break.

Of Turkey's hundreds of ancient cities and classical ruins, Ephesus is the grandest and best preserved. A Unesco-listed World Heritage site, it is the best place to get a feel for what life was like in ancient times. Ephesus was a major port city, functioning as the main gate between East and West. This position of Ephesus allowed the city to become the most important political and commercial center of the era and to be the capital of the Asia province in the Roman period. Ephesus was an ancient Greek city located on the west coast of Anatolia, 3 km far from the present-day Selçuk district and it was an important Roman city. It was one of the twelve Ionian cities during the Classical Greek period. Its establishment dates back to 6000 BC.

Tour ends up around 04:00 p.m. and you will be transferred to the Izmir Airport so as to catch your flight back to Istanbul.

Upon your arrival in Istanbul or Sabiha Gokcen Airport late evening. You will be picked up from the arrivals exit and transferred to your hotel in Istanbul.