Blogs from Cappadocia, Central Anatolia, Turkey, Middle East - page 30

This was like a trip back to the stone age - I stayed in a cave ala the Flintstones in a town called Goreme. The hostel was a series of rooms that had been cut into the soft rock of the surrounding hills to make rooms. This style of building was used throughout Capadocia to build cities underground which the locals used as defensive homes. They had rooms for livestock, churches and kitchens. The whole complex could stretch several stories underground. On the first night, we went to a 'Turkish Night' which was meant to be all you can eat and all you can drink with belly dancers and whirling Dervishes. It sounded good, but turned out to be really crap. The food wasn't unlimited and the booze definitely wasn't. The Dervishes were very dissappointing and ... read more

Through the gap in the hood in my sleeping bag I can see its still pitch black, and even inside the bag its cold now. I don’t need to pull my arm out to check my watch for the time though, as the second “Allah Akhbar, Allah Akhbar” (God is Great, God is Great) echoes across the empty steppe - it must be about half past five in the morning and time for pre-sunrise prayers. Not for us though and I roll over and bury my head in an attempt to warm up and return to sleep. The last line of the muezzin informs us in Arabic that being awake and in prayer is superior to sleeping, but right now the latter seems much more preferable. Waking again half an hour or so later I can ... read more

The 12 hour bus ride was madness. Oh I could really do with a full massage now! We had about 5 rest stops which were 30 minutes each. So we could have been there a lot earlier I reckon. We arrived at 8.30. My hostel in Goreme was the Flintstones Hostel (I have been waiting to use that title for something way before I even came to Turkey). My room was a cave with 4 beds in the first section and 4 more down a dark hole. I decided on a bed in the first bit. Light and noise is not going to affect my sleep now. I woke up about midday and had a 9 out of 10 shower. The only thing stopping it being a 10 was that the shower coil didn't reach the ... read more

Geo: 37.8091, 34.1348Quite a surreal place. Never seen anything like the landscape here. This is where many of the early Christians tried to build up the Christian Church faced with huge persecution. Now it's like a Mushroom fairyland!!Moonscape valleys and fairy chimneys.... read more

Pugner and I carefully weighed each word of the first travel agent who tried to set us up with a package tour. We cross checked all of the prices. We were dilligent. Then we checked our email, got tired, and bought the first package that the internet cafe guy (who possibly wasn't even a travel agent) mentioned to us. Without checking anything. We ended up with a cheap flight to the Capadocia region, which is famous for wacky geological formations and underground cities. The area has been inhabited for a long time by people wishing to basically be left alone. People would come here and carve houses, churches, even whole cities out of the relatively soft volcanic rock. The idea was that attackers wouldn't be bothered to try and dig them out, or climb up the ... read more