Chambers of the Sun Part 12


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September 17th 2008
Published: September 19th 2008
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Heraklia


The Sunset-Touch



Agora Pension, Kapıkırı (Heraklia), Lake Bafa - September 17th, Evening

Genuinely a very brief entry, as I do not have any world-shattering thoughts to add to the guide book's account of Pamukkale. The bus journey from Kuşadası is, bizarrely, cheaper, faster and more fun if you break it up, and since getting from A to B by a geodesic would be anathema to me, I did just that. The road to Aydın ("City of Light" - I have come across few towns less appropriately named) snakes up into the Lydian mountains, following the southern Scamander, and I had the precipitous sides of the river valley as companions for the whole journey. From Aydın, you hop on a bus to the larger and even more disappointing city of Denizli, and thence it is a fifteen-minute trip to Pamukkale.

Pamukkale - "Cotton Castle" - is so called because of one of the most outstanding geological phenomena in Turkey, a country which holds more than its fair share of wonders: an entire cliff of travertine. Over the course of hundreds of thousands of years, a glistering sheet of water has brought flecks of Calcium Carbonate to the site, building up as softly as the fall of minutes until the whole half-mile of precipice glows with a whiteness so intense that it hurts the eyes. There is a track running up through the travertine, where you take off your shoes and feel the hard little ridges of calcium insistent against your feet, and plash through tranquil pools of rainwater. Sadly, word has got around about this place, and it is one of the indispensable destinations on the tour road, despite the difficulty presented by its location. Given the strangeness of the surroundings, standing in the straggling line of humanity as it wound its way up to the top like a mule train, I felt like a background character in some medieval painting of Judgement Day. Certainly I have never seen so much excessive flesh displayed so freely - I am not a prude, but I would like to be a man of taste!

Once you reach the top, you are confronted with the second blessing of the site - the Roman city of Hierapolis. As well as the absurd limestone formations, the plateau has a clutch of natural spa baths, and it began to become customary for the great and the good of Bithynia to take the waters here. Today they still bubble up in the same pool which the Romans built, although the Turks have thrown a few bits of column in for the sake of authenticity. For a steep fee, you can tear off your clothes and plunge into the water, which is almost exactly blood temperature and looks a little like Perrier water. It is terrific, and assuages every ache in your body. I drifted through the afternoon with a book, barely aware of what was going on around me.

Come sunset, by which time the majority of the package tours had spread their wings for climes with cheaper booze, the city was almost deserted, and the few remaining visitors wandered starstruck amid the honey-coloured stones. I can only refer the reader to the album of photographs, not because they are spectacular works of art, but because the quality of light in that enchanted hour was like nothing that I have ever seen before. I had the Martyrium of Saint Philip, where the apostle was crucified upside-down, to myself, and wandered lonely through the tombs like the soul of a romantic poet. I must confess that I took little notice of the scholarly value of the site, only of the golden beauty of the moment. There is probably an article on Wikipedia if you're particularly keen to know the date of the agora's foundation, or how many coins were dug up.

The family at the pension invited me to dine with them on a superexcellent şiş tavuk, and then I slept so well that I was worried I would make another Rip van Winkle, and wake up to find that Turkey had joined the EU.

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