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Published: November 9th 2007
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Breakfast here in Pamukkale seems to be a big deal. We had a typical Turkish plate of cucumber, olives, Tomato, grape but all from the hostel garden. The grapes were picked from the vines right above our head. During breakfast we were joined by the owner who chatted to us whilst we ate. We found out that he had voluntarily joined the army and had served on the border with Iraq which is currently experiencing a lot of problems. You have to do military service here but you can choose to join as young as twelve (they don't fight, only join military school.) The army is vitality important here because it acts as a counter balance to the government which is currently slightly religious. Attaturk stated that religion and politics cannot be mixed and most Turkish people seem to agree.
Pamukkale is famous primarily for its calcium pools which are extremely unique. They used to be better but the growth of tourism and hotels meant that most of them dried up. The Turkish government closed the hotels and swimming pools and the travertines are gradually improving but it will take time. Nevertheless it wasn't a wasted journey because the white
cliffs were a breathtaking sight and even better because you can walk up through them. You have to take your shoes off which is mostly nice because you walk up through the trickling streams, but ridges of calcium form and they were quite rough; even on our well used feet. The sun was way too hot and it was tiring work especially with the glare off the white surfaces. We stopped half way up and sat with our feet in the water which is always around 36°c.
Once we had dragged ourselves away from the travertine’s we got around to the more serious matter of Hieropolis, another ruined Roman city.
The best part of looking around Hieropolis for me was watching ants. It sounds slightly dull but we saw a long line of ants stretching to some seeds, so we walked half way down the line and dropped a jelly tot and some sugar. We sat on a stone and watched them for ages, it was actually really fascinating. We marked where it was and went off and walked over to the Odeon to have a look. It was a very impressive one and very well preserved. We
did our usual climb to the top and sit and watch stupid people clap, whoop and cheer. Once we had taken our pictures and got bored of people watching we went back to see how the ants had progressed. We sat down to watch for a while which caused some suspicion with the police that were around. One Guy watching us with binoculars radioed another guy to come check us out on his motorbike. We did eventually leave because Rob was desperate for the toilet and was dancing around like a clown.
We walked all the way around the edge of the cliff in the hope of seeing a sun set; however it was just too cloudy. When we reached the top of the travertine’s it started to rain. I took off my fleece and put it in the bag so that I would have something dry to put on later in the evening. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but it got quite cold and wet as we walked on.
We got back to the hostel and both dived under a hot shower before going downstairs for our home cooked meal. It was too
cold to sit out under the vines and I was too covered in mosquito bites to want any more, so we sat in the "common" room which is actually just the family living room. It was a bit uncomfortable because the whole family was in there, but the daughter of the family’s baby was there, so he kept us amused. My meal was substandard but we did both get tomato soup which was delicious. Rob got a beef steak which he thoroughly enjoyed, in large part because it was one slab of meat rather than meat balls or kebab style. After the meal it seemed proper that we sit around for a bit, however it got uncomfortable because when the owner left, his mother lifted out a basket of shawls/headscarf’s and tried to sell them to us. Eventually we managed to excuse ourselves and made a hasty dash for the internet which was as useless as yesterday so we retired to our room. We both read for a while and wrote diary entries etc and then got into bed for a relatively early night.
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Brian
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White Feet & Cliffs
Hi Steph could you tell where your white feet ended and the cliffs started, sound like fun walking up in the warm sunshine and warm streams and with entertaiment provided by ants what more could you want, nothing like the white cliffs of dover than??!!