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Hiking in the wonderland
Middle East » Turkey » Central Anatolia » Cappadocia » Göreme
October 20th 2009 by Tomek
Day 6
The second day in Göreme I went out for some 17 km hike with two women from Canada and California. Directly north of the town there is a rock massif consisting of several small and compact valleys, each of which is a little bit different from the others in terms of landscape and rock formations. I can tell you that you hike really slowly in this landscape - about every 100-200m you have to stop to take a picture of the rocks!
Actually those valleys have been populated by several thousand people until the 14th century. The inhabitants were Christian, they carved churches and living rooms into the soft rocks and planted grapes and apple trees which you can still see today. They moved out of the valleys into the nearby cities and villages due to - as I was told - economical reasons. Maybe also the Persian, Arab and later Turkish conquerors just wanted to get rid of a huge, autonomous Christian community prospering in a poorly accessible part of their territory.
I have to limit my explanations a little bit because I am lagging behind with this blog quite a lot. It is hard to find computers that can read the SD card or sometımes even a DVD here in the hostels. Now I am back to Istanbul already and here I have better opportunities. I am trying to catch up!
Hike 4
This view shows basically the same rocks as on the previous picture, but this time from the bottom of the valley.
Houses carved into the rock
This is only one example. You can see something like this carved in almost every second rock here. It makes you assume that there must have been thousands - if not tens of thousands - of people living... [more]
Grapes
Also the grape plantations are an indicator for a history of culture in these valleys. We wondered if the vinyards are still in use today. At least you can buy some Cappadocian wine in the shops in Gö... [more]
Fresco in abandoned rock church
Even though this church and its frescoes are not unter surveillance it is quite well preserved after many centuries.
Another rock church
This church was carved into a rock in another of the valleys. The amount of churches you find in this area indicates that there has been a non-negligable population living in the valleys for quite som... [more]
Rock castle
A so-called rock "castle" in the village of Çavuşin. They use this term to describe a numerous accumulation of houses carved into a greater rock.
Hike 9
Our final destination was a group of rocks of a particular shape not to be said loudly here. It is one of the places where buses of tourists are loaded off to take pictures for 10 min and buy some sou... [more]
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