PHOTO: Turkey's gorgeous Blue Mosque. (Courtesy of Turkish Tourist Office)

Later this year, Las Vegas will open the city’s homage to Istanbul, a replica of the Grand Bazaar, just outside of Bally’s Las Vegas Hotel. The bazaar, the real one in Istanbul, is just one example of what is so commonplace in Turkey, a country that is now the sixth most visited in the world. The Grand Bazaar began as the stables of the Byzantine Emperors and under the Ottomans became the center of trade in the capital and maybe in the empire. More than a cradle, Turkey is the king-sized bed of Western civilization, with the archeological remains of more than 25 civilizations sleeping peacefully in its soil.

Sleeping, that is, until the archeologists, who seem to be digging everywhere in the country, come with their spades and pith helmets. The past keeps barking up out of the soil as it did recently when Italian archeologists uncovered a statue of Cerberus, the three-headed guard dog of Hades from Greek myth. The five foot-high marble statue confirms that the cave found last year in the ancient city of Phrygia is the Gate to Hell described by Cicero and the Greek geographer Strabo.

 Right now there are 483 archeological sites in the country. To display these artifacts in the world’s biggest open-air museum. The United States has a good history of participating in the search for Turkey’s past and that tradition continues as New York University is at work on excavations in ancient Aphrodisias; the University of North Carolina is digging at Gordion (where Alexander cut the knot); Harvard is at Sardis, a Roman capital; Chicago University is digging at the Hittite and Aramean capital of Zincirli Hoyuk.

The archeological sites most visited by tourists  are in order Ephesus with 1,888,173 visitors; Hierapolis with 1,561,485; Goreme in Cappadocia with 956,966; Troy with 506,708; Nevsehir Kaymakli in Cappadocia with 469,638; Antalya Myra with 464,647; Antalya Aspendos with 380,432; Antalya Alanya Castle with 342,611; Trabzon Sumela Monastery with 336,766 and Nevsehir Derinkuyu in Cappadocia with 315,180.

Greco-Roman, Ottoman, Assyrian, Seljuk, Hittite, Uraratrian, Judaic, Byzantine and many more have laid foundations in a land where the edge of Europe and the Near East have collided and collaborated to leave a legacy of cultural fusion. Visitors can see the cave where Abraham was born in Urfa, the place where St. Paul was imprisoned in Ephesus, the first known urban city settlement of "çatalhöyük" near Konya and the beach where Homer’s heroes stormed the beach at Troy, not far from where the Anzac troops stormed the beach at Gallipoli during World War 1.

A visit to Ankara’s Museum of Anatolian History is an immersion into almost 10,000 years of human history. Turkey’s UNESCO World Heritage List seems a bit short at 11 sites and the Turkish government has submitted 37 more for consideration.

While the European traveler sees Turkey as a Mediterranean beach holiday, the U.S. traveler explores Turkey for cultural and historic reasons. The top visited museums in the country include Hagia Sophia (Istanbul), Topkapi Palace Museum (Istanbul), Mevlana / Rumi Museum (Konya), Topkapi Palace Museum Harem Section (Istanbul), Santa Claus Museum (Antalya), Istanbul Archaeology Museum, Hacibektas Museum (Goreme), Chora Church Museum (Istanbul), Anatolian Civilizations Museum (Ankara) and the Republic Museum (Turkey).

As Europe’s most powerful capital city for 1,700 years and spanning three civilizations, Istanbul’s historic riches are almost beyond comprehension. The city was recently placed among the “best of the best” at the 37th UNESCO World Heritage Committee session in Cambodia.

Not all of the amazing structures in Turkey are ancient — in fact some of them are still going up: Radisson, Fairmont, Wyndham, Holiday Inn and Ramada have all recently opened properties. St. Regis, Hilton, Four Seasons and Sheraton are all adding properties in 2014 and beyond to cater to the growing number of visitors. U.S. visitors grew by 6.5 percent last year to 785,957 arrivals. Some 34.9 million travelers overall visited Turkey in 2013 (a growth of 9.8 percent).