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Sümela Monastery clinging to the cliff above the forested Altındere valley 8 more photos
Photo: Rotadefterim / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0, resized

Culture · Trabzon · Maçka

Sümela Monastery

Sümela Manastırı

A Byzantine monastery built into a sheer cliff face high above the forested Altındere valley, with painted chapels around its rock church.

Today: sunrise 06:41 · sunset 17:30 (calculated for this spot)

  • Closed now Opens today at 08:00
  • Ticket €20
  • Visit ~2–3 h
  • Museum Pass

Directions See it on the Trabzon map

Build a day-by-day plan with closing-day warnings and ticket totals.

What to see

From the parking area a path climbs through the forest to a long staircase and the gate. Inside, the buildings step along a ledge in the rock: guest rooms, a library, an aqueduct, and at the back the cave church whose inner and outer walls are covered in frescoes of saints and scenes from the Bible.

Allow two to three hours including the walk up and down. Restoration reopened much of the complex, including chapels that were found during the works.

The valley is often in cloud, which is part of the magic; mornings on weekdays are quieter than summer weekends, when Trabzon day-trippers arrive.

Getting there

About 45 km south of Trabzon via Maçka, in the Altındere Valley National Park. Tours and minibuses run from Trabzon in season; otherwise by car or taxi.

Transport lines are general directions, not checked against the operator's timetable.

Open in OpenStreetMap See it on the Trabzon map

Watch

  • Sumela Monastery: A witness to religious harmony

    TRT World · Watch on YouTube (new tab) ↗

Videos by independent creators on YouTube; we don't endorse tours or offers in them. The player loads from youtube-nocookie.com only when you press play.

Nearby

Open now near me →

Also in this area

Featured in Viewpoints.

Straight-line distances.

Where to stay nearby

ilçemde shows no Ministry-licensed count for Maçka; its page still lists hotels and guesthouses in the district.

Hotels and guesthouses in Maçka ↗

How we rank: Nearby Ministry-licensed places first (matched to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism list), then other places by distance band (within 5 km, 15 km, 40 km; straight line) and public map ratings and review counts. A licensed place never jumps ahead of a closer band. Places more than 25 km away in another town are shown only when there are few options nearby. No business pays to be listed. A high score from a handful of reviews counts for less than a slightly lower score from hundreds. Ratings and counts come from ilçemde's data (source shown on each card, checked 1 Oct 2026); read the reviews themselves on the map services.

Accommodation lists open on ilçemde, our sister directory of Turkish businesses (new tab). We do not take bookings or commissions.

Pharmacies on duty tonight in Maçka ↗ The list changes every day; on-duty pharmacies stay open when the others are closed.

About this page

Location: Wikidata Q1419157 (P625). Ticket, hours and closing days: only from the operator's own pages; anything we could not confirm there is marked “Not verified”. Last checked 30 Sep 2026.