Meeting Jesus and hitch hiking with Hassan in Cappedocia

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Fortunately the bus did come.

After a few 10 minute intervals passed we got to Goereme around 12:30pm and found a decent hotel - Guven cave pension.


The unfortunate thing was it was super cold in Cappadocia in the evening. It was also pretty cold in our guest house and they did not turn the heater on when we arrived. So it was a pretty chilly sleep.

After breakfast the next day we thought about hiking pigeon valley - a 3km hike which dad thought would be doable.

However we then seriously considered the prospect of hiring some quads to see Cappadocia quad style. And therefore it was so that the Krunches did thier first day of Cappadocia on quads.

From the 75 turkish lira price - Ivan managed to get them down to 55 lira.

We ended up getting two quads - despite dads consistent upselling that we should get 3.

It was a nice ride - we took the bikes through love valley, up to pasabagi, rose valley and red valley. The scenery was spectacular. We witnessed fairy chimneys, red and pink and yellow coloured cliff faces. Our tour guide on the quads was Jesus. He let me have a few turns honing it around whilst dad took a more slow and steady approach behind.

We rode all the way to a church in a cave complete with Fresco’s. Here me and Ivan switched drivers.

Our final stop was the top of Goereme hill - which gave us an amazing look out vantage point to Goereme.

We also managed to score a dog that ran after us most of the way up the hill.

After our quadding we headed down for some lunch in Goereme town centre - dad and Ivan had some kebab’s ceramic style and I had Goulash. We all had some lentil soup and salad and a small black and white kitty - who was a bit stinky - but still cute - joined us for lunch. I fed him some bread and soup mix. He was in love.

After lunch I decided not to join dad and Ivan for tea and instead hurried to the Open Air Museum.

Along the way I was invited for apple tea by a Turkish fellow who gave me a map of Goereme to take with me. I saw pottery covered trees and beautiful horses. The entrance to the Open Air Museum was 15lihra. Inside there was quite a few churches with frescos in some. Others simply had black walls, chared from the consistent use of candles in the churches.

Ivan managed to sneak over the fence without paying. We decided to skip the black church (the most preserved church in the open air museum) which was 8 lihra extra.

After the open air museum visits and taking in the beautiful sunset me and Ivan decided to hitch back to Goereme.

We got a lift straight away - with a guy called Hassan.

Hassan invited us to have a drink with him so we agreed. He grabbed some beers and we first headed up to Uchisar where his friend lived before heading back to his home town of Avanos. We had some Turkish coffee and met his cousin, and cousins girlfriend a half Dutch Algerian, living in Paris and partially in Turkey because of her boyfriend.

His cousin gave Ivan a bracelet as a gift and me an evil eye necklace. Hassan decided to take us to the dervish show at 6pm. Unfortunately we missed the starting by 5 minutes and the dervish’s had already started whirling.

We had some Turkish Rakia (very potent Turkish Alcholic drink - like Greek Rakia) and some rabbit couscous and I realized the time was getting a bit late and dad was waiting for us in the hotel. So I asked Hassan to take us to our guest house.

We got back at 7:30pm and headed out to dinner where me and dad ordered some Turkish pide and ivan got pizza. Lekker!!!

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