A short flight from Istanbul is Cappadocia, a fascinating place in central Turkey. The transfer from the airport is over 40 minutes but we soon get distracted by the snow capped mountains on the horizon. Our hotel is in Gorome, a charming town in a valley full of fairy chimneys, cave hotels and carpet shops. Our room in the Kelebek Hotel is a cosy semi cave room and the hotel itself has great views overlooking the town.
Gorome Village
The following day we wake up a 5am for a balloon flight over the surrounding area. As well as the stunning landscape, the number of balloons where a site in themselves - 46 fly each day and they said there should be 50 by then end of the year!
I hope the photos speak for themselves!
After a glass of champagne, we return to our hotel for breakfast and then start out day tour organised through the Kelebek Hotel/Heritage Travel. The tour included a scenic walk through rose valley, thus called due to the pretty colour of the rocks. This walk ended in the town of Cavusin where we walked upon the ruined old town (the town was relocated after an earthquake destroyed it). We then went to Pasabag, to see the mushroom shaped fairy chimneys and then the underground city of Kaymakli. We explored 4 floors of this underground city, which consisted of many narrow passages linking different rooms.
Rose Valley
Rose Valley
The following day we did another tour. We had a few photo stops along the way before our walk through the Ihlara Valley. This was a beautiful walk through a canyon following a running stream, with pigeon holes and cave temples in the cliffs on either side. We ended our walk in Belisirma where we had a very average lunch compared to the delicious feast we had yesterday. After lunch we went to the biggest rock-cut monastery of Cappadocia, Selime Monastery and Kathedral. Then we drove to Guzelyurt where we explored another underground city. This one wasn't as extensive but it did involve some very narrow vertical passages that we had to climb up and down and a nasty horizontal one which removed skin from my back, ouch. We finished with a panoramic view of pigeon valley where we decided to leave our tour and walk home. Yet another beautiful walk through yet another different landscape. Budget dinner - doner kebab for Ben and a Turkish cheese pancake for me.
Selime Monastery
Pigeon valley
Our last day in Cappadocia we had a slow morning packing up and organising the rest of our turkey trip. We explored the Goreme open air museum for a few hours (full of interesting cave churches and rooms) and had a walk through the Zemi Valley before our dreaded 9 hour overnight bus to Antalya.
Inside one of the churches in the Goreme Open Air Museum
No comments:
Post a Comment