Staying in a cave isn't as great as we expected it to be - our initial awe of the cave room wore of quick as we realized it was a little moldy, since the bathroom had no ventilation and it turned out the minor amount of rain we experienced seeped down through the rock and started dripping into the room.... but i guess that's part of the charm.
other than our room - cappadocia is just amazing - we spent an afternoon exploring the landscape on our own, first at the Goreme open air museum, which is filled with rock/cave churches, covered in amazing frescoes and then hiking one of the valleys to the next town and up a rock castle - the highest point in cappadocia to have a view of the land. We had a lovely big dinner and drank a ton of cheap jug wine (again)made two more friends, Maui & Nasha)and did a little bar hopping, we found the local pool hall and got our game on (none of us were to good, but the next day we knew a lot more people in town)
we spent the next morning taking it easy after our night of jug wine and then met up with Walking Mehmet to walk several of the other valleys - Mehmet is the local walking guru, a free spirit who has an open air office near the town square, where he does a little big of gardening, cooking, and relaxing in his handmade hammock. A smoker (as pretty much every turk is) he effortless walks the hills, peaks, etc that we all struggled up. He led us through amazing landscapes and showed us views, churches, pigeon houses and just gorgeous nature. We capped off the evening with a turkish dinner and dance event - we saw dervishes, folk dancers and belly dancers (who seemed a little bit more like strippers then we expected - one came into the room from a red lit cage in the ceiling) We got back to our cave room only to find that the dripping had gotten worse - so I finally requested that we swap rooms - at least to sleep in - the gang shifted rooms into a nice dry cave the smelled fresh and clean - and actually had a ventilation shaft for the bathroom - so it turns out all caves are not created equal.
The next day we decided to be big tourists and took a bus tour to the underground city, the ihlara valley, and to see a couple more sights. The four of us were exhausted and enjoyed catching up on sleep between sights - i think our tour guide was a little put off by all our sleeping but we enjoyed a day of being carted around between activities. Jacinta, Russ and I left Ryan behind that evening and took the night bus back to Istanbul. We popped some sleeping pills and the 11 hour bus ride felt like 3 and we were in Istanbul before we knew it.
14 Haziran 2007 Perşembe
9 Haziran 2007 Cumartesi
Olympos to Cappadocia
We've been wandering all day through the valleys, caves, and rock churches of Cappadocia - an absolutely beautiful part of turkey - picutures to come soon when we get back to new york - we have seen so much but still there is so much that we want to see - it has only left us wanting to see more of turkey - our little gang is already talking about a reunion trip, one where we can hit the towns, landscapes, walks etc that we missed on this trip.
we travelled from olympos to egirdir in the lake country with Jacinta and Ryan - Jacinta and I hiked up a large mountain above the town and had lunch in a small farm village above the town and lake that egirdir sits on - the 3rd largest in turkey i believe. The boys spent the day hiking on the canyons about an hour away - they jumped off of numerous waterfalls and cliffs into the river - the also met a turkish tourism film crew that shot a little of them and invited them to a mock turkish wedding back in Egirdir. So that evening we joined in the festivities of the mock turkish wedding, actually it was supposed to be the evening before the wedding when the bride and her family and friends get her ready for her big day with dancing, singing, henna, feasting, and some crying... after our moment on camera dancing with the bride we left the crew and grabbed the 7 lira *5 bucks* jug of wine we had left over from our boat trip and got drunk on our way to dinner. The next day Russ and I made the plunge and purchased rugs before heading to Konya, the birthplace of the whirling dervish. Jacinta and Ryan remained in Egirdir for some mountain biking, more hiking etc.
Konya was an interesting town - definitely does not get the tourists the rest of the places we have been to get, but it was nice to have a little change of pace. We got in to late in the day to do the dervish museum so we had a walk around and had a nice big dinner and collapsed into bed early. I was feeling the burn of the rug as my bag is now almost twice as heavy.
The next day we were up early and off to museums - on our way to one a turkish gentlemen passed us and ended up showing us the way to the museum and telling us a little history of Konya and of the dervish - the museum was a private collection of artifacts that one man had collected and donated to the gov't, his house was also part of the museum so you could see a traditional turkish home from the middle of the 20th century - the gentlemen was also helpful at arranging for us to view the house - it turned out the reason he was so helpful was because he had a rug shop he wanted to show us - which turned out to be about a block away from our hotel - basically the man saw us walk past his rug shop and followed us across town in order to get us in his shop - we felt obliged to go and russ, after some orange tea (warm tang) and swapping pick up lines, was somewhat suckered into getting another rug - but it's a nice little piece and the story is a memorable one.
we made our way to the dervish museum, which is a site of pilgrimage during the month of december but also houses a hair of mohammad's beard so it is a site of much religious significance - so that was pretty interesting and exciting.
after the museum we found two really cool shops - one felt shop that actually has two exhibitions currently going on in the US - a husband and wife team that uses traditional felting methods (the ones used to make the hats the dervish wear) and new experimental methods to make blankets, rugs, scarves etc - they had some amazing pieces and actually teach courses in the US and turkey, so it's on my list of things to do.
we also discovered one of the wholesalers for ABC Carpet and Home (one of my favorite stores i can't afford) after unfolding many wonderful textiles from iran, uzbekistan, turkey and other places, and bemoaning my lack of funds (it would take being a millionaire to feel comfortable spending money there) Russ and I got back on the road and made our way to Cappadocia.
we travelled from olympos to egirdir in the lake country with Jacinta and Ryan - Jacinta and I hiked up a large mountain above the town and had lunch in a small farm village above the town and lake that egirdir sits on - the 3rd largest in turkey i believe. The boys spent the day hiking on the canyons about an hour away - they jumped off of numerous waterfalls and cliffs into the river - the also met a turkish tourism film crew that shot a little of them and invited them to a mock turkish wedding back in Egirdir. So that evening we joined in the festivities of the mock turkish wedding, actually it was supposed to be the evening before the wedding when the bride and her family and friends get her ready for her big day with dancing, singing, henna, feasting, and some crying... after our moment on camera dancing with the bride we left the crew and grabbed the 7 lira *5 bucks* jug of wine we had left over from our boat trip and got drunk on our way to dinner. The next day Russ and I made the plunge and purchased rugs before heading to Konya, the birthplace of the whirling dervish. Jacinta and Ryan remained in Egirdir for some mountain biking, more hiking etc.
Konya was an interesting town - definitely does not get the tourists the rest of the places we have been to get, but it was nice to have a little change of pace. We got in to late in the day to do the dervish museum so we had a walk around and had a nice big dinner and collapsed into bed early. I was feeling the burn of the rug as my bag is now almost twice as heavy.
The next day we were up early and off to museums - on our way to one a turkish gentlemen passed us and ended up showing us the way to the museum and telling us a little history of Konya and of the dervish - the museum was a private collection of artifacts that one man had collected and donated to the gov't, his house was also part of the museum so you could see a traditional turkish home from the middle of the 20th century - the gentlemen was also helpful at arranging for us to view the house - it turned out the reason he was so helpful was because he had a rug shop he wanted to show us - which turned out to be about a block away from our hotel - basically the man saw us walk past his rug shop and followed us across town in order to get us in his shop - we felt obliged to go and russ, after some orange tea (warm tang) and swapping pick up lines, was somewhat suckered into getting another rug - but it's a nice little piece and the story is a memorable one.
we made our way to the dervish museum, which is a site of pilgrimage during the month of december but also houses a hair of mohammad's beard so it is a site of much religious significance - so that was pretty interesting and exciting.
after the museum we found two really cool shops - one felt shop that actually has two exhibitions currently going on in the US - a husband and wife team that uses traditional felting methods (the ones used to make the hats the dervish wear) and new experimental methods to make blankets, rugs, scarves etc - they had some amazing pieces and actually teach courses in the US and turkey, so it's on my list of things to do.
we also discovered one of the wholesalers for ABC Carpet and Home (one of my favorite stores i can't afford) after unfolding many wonderful textiles from iran, uzbekistan, turkey and other places, and bemoaning my lack of funds (it would take being a millionaire to feel comfortable spending money there) Russ and I got back on the road and made our way to Cappadocia.
3 Haziran 2007 Pazar
come sail away
ah - what can i say - sailing down the coast was amazing - it has got to be the most relaxing experience i have ever had in my life - we were on a boat with 13 others - mostly from Australia and new zealand - although there were 3 other americans.
we had all our meals provided on the boat and slept up on deck under the stairs every evening. we spent our days swimming and sleeping in the sun as we sailed to ruins, small towns, and even a smugglers bar in a little cove (it felt like being in the pirates of the Caribbean ride - except you could drink, and there were crazy new zealanders dancing like maniacs and fire walking)
we have bonded with two other wandering souls and will now continue our adventures in the company of jacinta, who is from australia and ryan who is from oregon. we're not exactly sure our plan but we're talking about going up to the lake country, hitting konya (birthplace of the whirling dervishes) and then on to cappadocia.
right now i'm sitting in olympos - a most beautiful spot nestled in between the mountains on the southern coast of turkey near anatalya - the valley is filled with greek/roman ruins, a rocky strand of beach, and amazing mountains - there are only guest houses - no town - so it's just a little oasis of a spot for backpackers.
i'll load more photos when we get back to istanbul. we've taken tons - although mostly of ruins and old churches/mosques so i don't really know how exciting they will be.
we had all our meals provided on the boat and slept up on deck under the stairs every evening. we spent our days swimming and sleeping in the sun as we sailed to ruins, small towns, and even a smugglers bar in a little cove (it felt like being in the pirates of the Caribbean ride - except you could drink, and there were crazy new zealanders dancing like maniacs and fire walking)
we have bonded with two other wandering souls and will now continue our adventures in the company of jacinta, who is from australia and ryan who is from oregon. we're not exactly sure our plan but we're talking about going up to the lake country, hitting konya (birthplace of the whirling dervishes) and then on to cappadocia.
right now i'm sitting in olympos - a most beautiful spot nestled in between the mountains on the southern coast of turkey near anatalya - the valley is filled with greek/roman ruins, a rocky strand of beach, and amazing mountains - there are only guest houses - no town - so it's just a little oasis of a spot for backpackers.
i'll load more photos when we get back to istanbul. we've taken tons - although mostly of ruins and old churches/mosques so i don't really know how exciting they will be.
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