Goreme and Sumelia

---

Leaving Istanbul on a beautiful sunny day, I travelled across the big suspension bridge joining Europe to Asia for my first view of the largest continent. It looked pretty similar from where I'd just come, to be honest.

It took a couple of days to drive the 700 odd kilometres to Cappadocia, in Central Anatolia, passing through a varied mix of rocky farmland to high, snowy mountain passes.

You'll have probably seen pictures of the famous 'fairy chimneys' of Goreme in postcards or on tv, but they're a very strange geographical phenomenon formed from soft, sandy laval stone, eroded down to leave the harder stone behind, in large conical structures, which were then hollowed out and used as housing and storage buildings. I wanted to take a hot-air balloon trip over the valley, but unfortunately, the weather wasn't up to it - a not unusual experience of my trip so far!

To ease the pain of the missed ballooning trip, I went to a local Hamam, or Turkish bath, and had my entire body scrubbed by a fat, hairy man with a brillo-pad glove. He removed several layers of skin, as well as an embarrasing amount of dirt. No-one said overlanding was easy.

From Goreme, I travelled North to Sumela, near the Black Sea coast, to visit the hanging monastery there. Once again the weather let me down, and the valley was filled with misty cloud, but I climbed the step track up to the top anyway. The 9th murals were pretty amazing, if, to a greater degree, damaged by grafitti and vandalism.

I left Sumela in the snow, to head for the Georgian border. I was sorry to leave Turkey, the countryside was amazing and the people incredibly friendly, but vowed to return in better weather.

---

Photos

Blossom in Goreme
I got bored of photographing fairy chimneys

Fairy chimney
Hollowed out and used as housing

Cappadocia
The strange Cappadocian landscape