Pamukkale

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Pamukkale (Hierapolis), 170 km or three hours by bus, east of Selcuk is our next leg.

It is with some misgiving that I have agreed to revisit this place. My memory is one of dirty pensions & large hotels plaguing the area, which is a reminder of what unregulated tourism has done to a once beautiful area. But, we are reassured that the place is, in fact, quite nice.

If looking at photos of Turkey, you will more than likely see a picture of what appears to be bright white chalky cliffs and pools of milky azure water. This is the picture I remember of Pamukkale and I had to work hard to get a shot just like it.

For this leg we have opted to do a tour, again not quite sold on the idea.

About half way, from Selcuk, we are bordered to our south by a large, snow-capped, mountain range rising more than 2700m. We are informed that this is called “Father Mountain” and that despite the area reaching around 40C in summer the mountains are permanently capped. It snowed here last week.

Fields of fresh young wheat are beginning to sprout and evidence of the recent cotton harvest is clear. Plumb trees are starting to bud and lambs run free.

As we near Pamukkale our guide, Nizam, points out a bottle sitting on a chimney, in one of the villages and narrates an amusing tale about the bottle. It would appear, he says, that Turkish girls are quite shy, so when they have met the man they wish to marry they place a glass bottle on their own chimney. This is how they go about telling their father that they wish to marry. It is then up to the fiancé to throw stones at the bottle & break it, thus the start of their wedding. With “tongue in cheek” he goes on that a big bottle means a big girl & a coke bottle means she’s rich. I don’t know about that, but if you’re one of the neighbours, you’d certainly hope the fiancé is a good shot.

So we reach Pamukkale and you guessed it, nothing like I remember. We are told that, about 10 years ago, the government came through and had all the hotels, built on the site, pulled down and moved to another location. The site of the ruins, which were nothing more than just that, has been restored and is now an active archaeological site.

Nizam proved to be a very capable & interesting, if not witty, guide and I was now more than pleased that we had taken this option.

History & geology time.

Rising around 330 m above the plains the calcium rich thermal waters would crystalize as they cool and ran over the cliff face. Thus forming the stunning white formations we see today.

During the Roman days, drawn to such a beautiful and enticing landscape, a population of around 200,000 once thrived in this township. Though there is evidence that this area was probably inhabited around the 5th century B.C.

A theatre that rivals Efes has been restored and between the theatre and the springs of Pamukkale (the old site of the Pamukkale Motel) are the ruins of the Temple of Apollo. As we make our way towards the north gates are even a stronger indication of the popularity of this area with the necropolis (cemetery) with more than 1000 stone carved sarcophagi littered along the walkway down to the base of the hill. Despite being such a large city Hierapolis didn’t enjoy the same political power as that of Efes.

Around the 7th century B.C. a large earthquake decimated most of the western Anatolian region of Turkey, destroying vast amounts of the architecture and diverting the thermal waters. New pools were opened, which many of the modern day hotels exploited (until recent times). That being said, we did have a swim in one of the thermal pools.

Today, with the intervention of the Turkish government, there are signs of rejuvenation of the “cotton cliffs”.

We have opted to staying the night in Pamukkale, at Mustafa’s Pension. Dinner is taken on a terrace, opposite the pension, overlooking the cliffs as the sun sest, a truly lovely sight.

Tomorrow we have a seven hour bus trip to Konya, a city of over 1 mil. people. This is to break down our trip before making our way to Goreme.

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Photos

Cleopatra's Pool
Thermal swimming pool

Sarcophagi
One of a 1000 hand carved cripts

Comments

[Mark]

M&M Thanks for the updates. Following with envy !!! Looking forward to travel tips when you get back. Mark