Another four-day weekend, another travel adventure. Andreas and I just returned from Turkey after three days in Cappadocia and a few hours in Istanbul.
Cappadocia wasn’t even on my radar until a few weeks ago when I was thumbing through the new Lonely Planet Turkey guidebook. The pictures were amazing. The area encompasses layer upon layer of history – Hittites, Persians, Greeks, Armenians, Romans, Byzantines, Turks – superimposed onto a bizarre, other-worldly landscape of “fairy chimneys” and man-made cave cities.
On a friend’s recommendation, we booked a room in the town of Goreme
in a charming cave hotel.
We visited a monastery carved into a hill
went on a walk through a pretty valley of ancient cave churches
toured an eight-level underground city where 20,000 Christians could (and did) hide from Arab invaders beginning in the 8th century
ate delicious food
including the famous clay pot stew
went to the outdoor museum to see another thousand-year-old monastery complex
and explored in the hills surrounding the town.
Sunday morning was Orthodox Easter. The 1000-year-old churches here were built by Orthodox Greeks, but their descendants were expelled from Cappadocia in 1923 and so there are no Easter services here anymore. We celebrated the holiday with a sunrise balloon ride instead.
On our last day in Turkey we had a 12-hour layover in Istanbul – enough time to take the Metro from the airport downtown to see a few things (to be posted tomorrow).
It was a great trip. I am sure we’ll be back.
Lorna of Arabia 