I took three half-day tours in Istanbul with this company, and they also offer other tours. I think they offer very good quality.

http://www.backpackerstravel.net/

I would try to fly from Ephesus to Cappadocia. Pamukkale and Aphrodisias are interesting, but Cappadocia is completely different. You might be interested in my trip report. Just click on my name to find it.

Just check some of the more recent questions and answers.

you can do all that without any tours.

Except for gallipoli and Troy, where the tour will save you some time.

You can always find and negotiate guides, guided tours at cappadocia and Ephesus if you wish, when you get there.

Istanbul is definitely a DIY city with the help of a guide book.

We used Argus www.argus.com.tr Our wonderful guide in Cappadocia was Edip Ozcan edip@argus.com.tr
It has been 4 years since we used them-him but what a nice young man-I got his name from this site-Chris

Will ditto Willitravel suggestion... We had great tours ( 3-1/2 day tours) with Backpackers. Our guide was Deliet (sp) a very pleasant, knowledgeable gal. We used Hello Ephesus there and again were very pleased. Although IST is a DYI place the guide takes you into places guicker and you can poke around on your own at other times. 8 days might not be enough with all you say you want to see.

I have just booked with cappadociatours.com. They have been very easy to deal with but are based in Cappadocia so would imagine they would recommend you go there! Now, I haven't gone on the tour yet so can't really speak so the quality of the tour or company but did read good things about them during my research. We will be flying from Istanbul to Cappadocia and from Cappadocia to Ephesus which will save long bus treks.

Hi,
you might want to check out http://www.trueturkey.com/ they have custom tours from Istanbul and from what I see they also have packages from Turkey to Greece as well.

Thank you so much for your info.
I shall look them up. Unfortunately we won't be traveling over that way now until next year some time. After what went on with Egypt my daughter got a little worried about traveling to Egypt so the whole Dubai, turkey, Egypt and Greece trip got put off. I have just booked Hawaii and the U.S. instead, but will definately check it out for next year,
Thanks again