We weren't entirely sure what to expect from central Turkey, I just knew that I really wanted to take a hot air balloon ride, haha. However, when we arrived in the town of Göreme, as soon as we dropped off our bags and left the hostel to wander around town, Kris couldn't stop marveling and exclaiming, "This place is so amazing!!" And we loved the region more and more as the days went on. :) Here's what we saw in the magical land of the Fairy Chimneys:
Göreme Open Air Museum
This incredible museum is an outdoor conglomeration of early Christian chapels and living quarters carved into the rocks of the hillsides. Churches that are caves, hand-carved in the 11th -13th centuries. First off, WOW. To add to this, most of the churches are painted, some of them are painted freaking incredibly and have survived for almost 1,000 years. DOUBLE WOW. They wouldn't let you take photos inside the churches in order to preserve the paintings, but I snuck one or two photos and the rest of the most awesome stuff you can look up online. Be sure to look up the
Dark Church- that one was the most amazing! Our minds were blown by this incredible place.
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Pigeon holes cut into the rock! The ancient inhabitants would use the
pigeon poo for fertilizer for their fields and gardens. |
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| The inside of one of the churches |
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Kris sitting inside a hand-carved room, complete
with benches and a support pillar! |
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| You can see the scratch marks of the rudimentary tools used to carve these places. |
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| Stairs! Carved into rock! |
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| Another basic ceiling design |
Hiking through the Rose, Red, and Pigeon Valleys
After exploring the Open Air Museum, we spent the rest of the day hiking through the surrounding valleys. We easily hiked 7-10 kilometers and were continually stunned by the crazy geology and all of the caves and pigeon holes that were carved into almost every hillside. Other exciting discoveries included two incredible multi-story carved churches that we stumbled upon, one at the beginning and the other near the end of our hike.
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| Creating a plan of attack during a snack break. |
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| A view from the top of a big ol' pile o' rocks. |
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| More turtles!! I also saw several lizards. Hooray, Turkish reptiles!! |
Regional Day Tour
The following day, we joined four other folks from the hostels for a special tour offered by the hostel's owner. The tour guide, Hussein, was the cutest man alive (he was probably in his 80s). He was soft spoken, funny, engaging, very knowledgeable, and a veritable mountain goat! He was climbing all over the rock formations and hillsides with the ease and swiftness of a twenty year old. It was such a pleasure to spend the day touring his native region and learning about his life and culture!
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| Fairy Chimneys! These were called "Father, Mother, Child". |
We went into an underground city, climbed and descended some of the interior chimney 'ladders' that connected one floor to the next, explored many more carved cave churches, ate a fabulous Turkish lunch, saw the ruins and beautiful intact mosaics of an ancient Greek bathing complex, saw even more churches, saw lots of Fairy Chimneys, and had a blast!
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| These cave church paintings were from the 10th and 11th centuries. |
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| A Greek mosaic, intact under a farmer's field after 800+ years in hiding. |
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| I had to sneak a picture of our cute guide! Here he is with Kris. |
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| More church caves. Look at all the different levels! |
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| These chimneys look like cupcakes. Yum! |
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| What a beautiful place. |
Hot Air Balloon Ride
This was a big one. I added "flying in a hot air balloon over Cappadocia" to my Bucket List (a list of things you want to do before you die, or 'kick the bucket', as we say) several years ago and I definitely wanted to make it happen, since this was probably the only time I'll ever visit Turkey. After a very sad and frustrating failed attempt the morning of our full-day tour (there was some confusion by the balloon company about our reservation and no one ever came to pick us up!), we made new arrangements and were picked up by the company's shuttle on our last day in Cappadocia at 4:30AM sharp (yup, you read that right).
After checking in at the balloon company's offices and waking ourselves up a bit more with some tea and cookies, we loaded back into the shuttle van and headed off to the launch site. There were already balloons in the air and others firing up, and the place was a bustle of activity! Our adrenaline was pumping hard as they blew hot air into the balloons and we got closer and closer to hopping into the basket and taking off.
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| Blowing up the balloon |
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| Almost ready to go! |
Our basket was HUGE and fit 20 people plus the pilot and four fuel tanks. Big! Despite the heavy load, you could barely tell when we left the ground; we really were floating! It was such an incredible, smooth ride. There were well over a hundred different balloons in the sky, all flying at different altitudes and all looking just beautiful as we soared over fields and fairy chimneys as the sun came up behind a blanket of clouds. It was like a dream.
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| Just as we were getting into the air. |
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| Can you see the silhouette of the mountain in the background? |
When it came time to land after about an hour of flight, our pilot really showed off his parking skills: We were coming down on the top of a small plateau, and he very softly dropped the basket down onto the bed of the trailer that was going to carry the balloon and basket back to town! Just like that, no problem, no big deal. I think he had a lot of practice. ;)
The French were the first to fly hot air balloons, and as the story has it, they were so thrilled to have survived the maiden voyage of one of these giant balloons, that they toasted their success with champagne (how French!). The tradition has continued, so after we all hopped out of the basket and got back onto Terra Firma, we were given a glass of champagne to celebrate! It was the perfect end to a perfect flight. Kris and I loved the whole experience.
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| Kris with our balloon's pilot |
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| Here's to adventure and to LIFE! |
Soon to come: Kris heads back to the USA, my family arrives in Paris, and we enjoy two weeks in France before going out with a BANG! :)
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