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Published: August 12th 2015
Goreme Cappadocia
In the middle of Turkey about 1000 klms east of Edirne on the Greek Bulgarian border and 1000 klms west of the Iranian border.
Cappadocia has a moonscape appearance. Here in July its hot hot hot and as dry as a muslim wedding.
In this area many Christians dwelled in caves, underground cities and had churches and caves carved within the rocks. The 11
th Century was when a lot of this activity took place.
We camped on the panoramic rim overlooking the valley where the town of Goreme sits. In the mornings balloons would take off from just behind our camp and after rising briefly would descend into the valley below us. Some balloons would be piloted so that the basket would descend between the fairy chimneys and twirl in that space.
The fairy chimneys a vertical rocks rising from the valley floor. Called “Chimneys” because there is usually a pointy bit leaning to one side – similar to a whisp of smoke coming from a chimney on a still day.
We were fortunate in that we had a cooler spot above the town where hot July air sat in the
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Balloon descending into valleybottom of the baking valley surrounded by walls of hills.
As the sun set we watched the colours on rocky surfaces and when it rose we saw the colour of hot air balloons wafting around fairy chimneys. As they rose from the valley below, some balloon baskets came within just a few feet of where we sat in our camp.
During the heat of the day we went into some of the caves and saw how the early Christians built and decorated their caves. Photography is not generally allowed inside the cave churches. Decoration and square cross layout is long the lines of Orthodox Christian with similar icons. They were smart to get into such cool places and some caves are believed to be ancient wine cellars { “ Cave “ in French}. Some caves had long tables and benches carved from the rock with a long pew type bench along the long sides for people to sit at the table. This type of refectory cave would often interconnect by a passage way to a cellar on one side and a kitchen and other “rooms “ via other passageways.
Love valley is the name given
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Balloon taking a close up view to a long valley with phallus shaped chimneys. Mostly these protrusions of rock are referred to as “ fairy chimneys”. Well in Love Valley I think they are just “chimneys”. Nothing effeminate about these rods.
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John & Jean Moon
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Istanbul & Goreme Cappadocia
Amazing Blog on Istanbul, interesting read. Goreme Cappadocia looks amazing. What an adventure your having love Jean & John