Days 93-96: Return to Istanbul

Grouping a few days together here, because honestly there isn't too much to talk about. My tour bus got back to Istanbul safetly, and after spending the night in one of their fancy included hotels I switched to a much cheaper hostel for a few more days. Again the process of finding my hostel was far more difficult than it should have been. The main problem was that the street it was on didn't have a street sign, and the hostel didn't have a sign identifying it. I eventually figured it all out, but it took a lot more effort and time than I had expected. I didn't really do a lot of sightseeing. One day I just went on a long walk following the coast and another I walked around a lot more in the newer part of the city, checking out parks and whatever else I came across.


I came across some sort of international cultural dance parade at one point. Unlike the parades I'm used to, this one wasn't fenced or anything. It just marched up the middle of the busiest pedestrian street in the city, pulling random people into their dancing along the way.




While in Istanbul I also picked up an overnight bus ticket to Sofia (Bulgaria), but I'll go into that further next post.

Day 92: Ankara

This was the last real day of my tour, and it was spent on the way to and in Ankara, the capital of Turkey. Since the tour was down to just me my guide felt comfortable to deviate from the itinerary a bit and stop off at some random towns along the way to check out things he'd never had a chance to see and thought I'd be interested in. We stopped at a museum of discoveries from an ongoing Hittite excavation and in another small town named after the mystic Haji Bektash Veli (who, among other things, was said to be able to speak to animals) to visit his mausoleum/museum.


Once in Ankara we had two major places to visit. The first we went to was the Museum of Anatolian Civilizations. It's a pretty small museum, but the only real history museum I'd been to in Turkey, so it was a nice change from all the excavations.




The next stop was the tomb/museum for Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. I'm not sure how familiar people are with Ataturk. Before visiting, I certainly knew the name and that he was the founder of modern Turkey, but not much else. How he is treated in Turkey is the closest thing I've ever seen to the ancient greek hero-worship, and he really is a fascinating and incredibly important person, so I'm going to spend a bit of time talking about him and what he did.

Ataturk began in the military and gained popularity after his tactics and leadership led to great success in WW1 and the Turkish War of Independence. After the war he ultimately became the first president and almost single handed created a modern, progressive, secular state. A lot of people in the western world think of muslim countries as old-fashioned, unfair to women, and with governments dominated by religion, and I think it's important to highlight what was done in Turkey as a counter-example to that view. With the founding of the new republic, Ataturk explicitly declared a secular government. Women were give equal rights in all things to men, which in the 1920s/30s was revolutionary even in the western world. This included giving the right for women to vote, but also opening up all schools, all professions, all political office to women as well. He discarded the Muslim law of the Ottomans and created a new legal system of secular law. Education was also redone to combat high illiteracy and to bring a fragmented country together by promoting a common language and shared history. I highly recommend looking up Ataturk's Reforms, since I can only cover a fraction here, and it really is amazing how he transformed the country with his vision.

In every town I've been in Turkey, no matter how small, there is a monument in honour of Ataturk. As expected, his tomb/memorial/museum is an especially respected place.

Day 91: Cappadocia from Alternate Perspectives

I'd already seen some of the interesting underground bits of Cappadocia - now it was time to see things from higher up. I got up at 3:00am for a 4am pickup that took me to Goreme, about half an hour away, in preparation for a hot air balloon ride. The balloon ride isn't part of the tour, and it is a bit pricey, but it was the one thing that other travellers had told me I should not miss. One of the others from my group was also doing the balloon ride, so I had some company as we headed to the meetup spot. The company we were going with is the largest in the area, and the breakfast with the others was quite crowded. After eating we were shuttled out to fields outside of town in our different groups for different balloons. We got the Mercedes Benz balloon and a pilot (Andrew) from New Zealand. We took off shortly after sunrise and the trip was about an hour over which we varied in altitude between several thousand feet and close enough to the rock that I could almost reach out and touch it. We drifted slowly over the most interesting of the Cappadocia landscape, getting a good look at the sandstone formations and the windows and pigeon holes carved out of the rock. Cappadocia is the most popular ballooning location in the world, and being surrounded by dozens of other balloons just added to the experience.







Once we rejoined the rest of the group we headed back to the Goreme area for a hike through Goreme Valley. Now I got to see the formations up close as we walked along the valley floor. The valley had lots of wild fruit trees - at least plum, cherry, apple and oranges that I saw, as well as small tended farm plots. In the middle of the valley a guy had set up a small rest stop where he sold fresh orange juice - probably from oranges picked in the valley. It was a neat place to chill out. There were also numerous pigeon holes carved into the rock. The pigeon holes are made to attract pigeons, and then the droppings left behind are used as fertilizer.




At the end of the hike we came out in a small village that had this amazing cliff full of dug out rooms. As the others waited for the bus I immediately took off and found a route up to the cliff, and eventually managed to climb up to the top level of rooms. Everything is abandoned now, and the interiors are pretty barren, but when it was inhabited it must have been such a unique place. Even empty I find it gorgeous.



All this, and it wasn't even noon yet. Through the rest of the day we visited the Fairy Chimneys, a handful of Christian churches (again carved into the stone) with frescoes painted on the walls and ceilings near Goreme, Uchisar castle - which is a town around a big hill of sandstone - more rooms carved out on the top, and probably a few other minor stops I'm forgetting.








We finally got back to the hotel, and the remaining 3 others in my group headed off to fly home a few days early to go get back to work - leaving me as the only person left on the tour along with the guide and driver. Even more awkward, not only was I the only person left on the tour, but also we were the only people left in the entire hotel. I have no idea how many rooms the hotel had, but the dining room sat 250 at the same time, so having an entire hotel basically just supporting me felt a bit strange.

Day 90: The Silk Road

From Konya we began heading towards Cappadocia - which is a region I'd been looking forward to all trip. Our road followed the historic Silk Road that connected trade from China and India with Europe. Because of the constant flow of traders travelling back and forth special buildings/enclosures for the trade caravans to stay and rest at were built along the road, and we visited one of the best preserved of these caravanserai.



We stopped for lunch at a town along the Red River that is famous for it's red clay pottery. One of the local specialties is the pottery kebabs I mentioned earlier, where they cook meat and vegetables inside of a clay pot, then when it's done crack the top of the pottery off and pour it out. They were a bit pricey, but there was enough food that we split one pot between the 4 of us and it was very reasonable.



After lunch we visited a local artisan who makes pottery and tiles out of red and white clay and hand paints them all. He spoke barely any english, but in addition to Turkish he was fluent in french so when guide disappeared for a bit I did a bit of translating for Q&A. His specialty is decorating pottery with ancient Hittite designs of geometric patterns and animals.



Once we were back on the road and getting deeper into Cappadocia we began to encounter the sandstone cliffs and formations that the region is famous for. I'll leave those pictures for the next post, as that's when we got to go back through the places we drove quickly past and visit them in detail.

The one big stop we had this day was to explore the Kaymakli Underground City. They first started carving the city out of the sandstone in early Hittite times, and expanded it over time. There were many of these underground cities in the region, and they served as a refuge to hide in when armies or mauraders attacked the regular towns. Archaeologists think the Kaymakli one could support 3000-4000 people. Despite them only having uncovered the top few layers of it, crawling through the complicated warren of tunnels and rooms is very fun.



I had a very early morning lined up, so after checking in and having dinner I went to bed early.

Day 89: Konya

The trip continued east towards Konya, which according to our guide is the largest (in terms of area) city in Turkey. Along the way we stopped at the Roman amphitheatre of Aspendos. The theatre was is quite large and in very good condition, which makes it stand out from the others we've seen and it is used for ballets and operas now.


In Konya we stopped to visit the Mausoleum of Mevlana (aka Rumi). If anybody isn't at all familiar with Mevlana, he was a Persian Muslim mystic and poet from the 13th century. In addition to being a Mausoleum the site also has a museum for the Mevlevi Order (the Whirling Dervishes).


Two of the people from our group had gone home the day before, so we were now down to 4 people

Days 87-88: Antalya

I'm grouping these days together since they were both in the same place and I didn't do much exciting on the second one.
On the way from Pamukkale to Antalya we stopped at yet another archaeological site - Perge. Back in its day Perge was one of the most prosperous cities around, and even though they are still uncovering more the site is a pretty nice one. I had some fun exploring tunnels beneath where the baths were, and climbing up over walls and towers - making my guide a bit nervous of my safety. The things here were all easy to climb though, and very stable - and the risk was pretty non-existant. There were also lots of lizards around. All through Italy, Greece and Turkey I've seen lots of little lizards, but the ones here were probably 30-40cm.







I had a nice sea view from the top floor of our hotel in Antalya, but as had been a recurring theme the service wasn't very good. Every night we've been staying at 4-star and 5-star hotels, but it seems like the rating is based on the extra services available than on service. The one in Antalya at least had a really good buffet, but they charge ridiculous prices for drinks, including water, and you're not allowed to bring any of your own food/water into the hotel. Our air conditioner didn't work very well, and you just got the feeling that none of the staff really cared all that much.


The second day in Antalya was a free day. We were a bit far from the city center, and there wasn't anything I overly wanted to see so I just wandered around the part of the city we were in and checked out some parks and shopping malls. I spent much of the evening online trying to catch up on things while I had internet access and just relax some.

Day 86: Pamukkale

By far this was my favourite day of the trip so far. Our first visit was to another craft shop that made wool and silk Turkish carpets. They did a great job of explaining how the carpets were made and the differences between types, as well as all the symbolism involved. They also seemed much more interested in teaching about the heritage and showing us how things worked than they were about selling carpets, so it was a lot less pressure.




Next was the drive to Pamukkale. Pamukkale was one of the places I actually knew about in Turkey, and one of the things I was really looking forward to. Before I explain it, let me show the pictures:





No, there isn't a big glacier in the middle of southern Turkey. Pamukkale is a thermal spring that has been used for theraputic bathes since ancient times. Thousands of years of the mineral rich water flowing down the hill has left deposits, mostly of calcium, that cover everything in cotton-looking whiteness. It is rather stunning. At the top there are pools of the thermal water you can relax in, as well as some of the ancient bath ruins.

From there there is a path down along the face of the hill, full of smaller pools in the calcium rock to bathe in. You have to walk down barefoot to preserve the surface, and one of the amazing things to me is how you have almost perfect grip walking down steep slopes with water rushing along your feet.



After that fun we headed to our hotel, which was backed by a lovely little range of mountains. It was only 5:30 by the time I was checked in, so I decided to do some hiking. I climbed up the nearest hill first with a few people from my group then when they headed back decided to try the much higher and steeper one further in. Going up was a lot harder than I anticipated, as there were lots of very prickly plants and the steep sections I had to scale up, and coming down was even more challenging. There were a few sections where I had to do maneuvers I probably wouldn't recommend, but I was as safe as I could be and ultimately made it back down in one piece. It was a wonderful workout and certainly got my adrenaline going, and the few new cuts and scrapes were well worth the feeling of satisfaction.




The building in that last one is our hotel. I did my best to pick the thorns and other clingy bits out of my socks, but they are still unwearable, so I've been wearing sandals or my other socks. I'll have to wash them and hope I can clean them up, or I might have to buy replacements!