This is the home stretch everyone so brace yourselves for a long one. Our last week in Turkey included the best bus ride of the trip, underground cities, fairy chimneys, a language exchange, and the closest I've come to perogies and chewbereka (sp?) in many, many months.
Starting at the beginning, you would’ve thought that it was -40 outside the way they had the heat turned up for most of the night on our bus to Goreme. I think the temperature in the bus might have gotten up to 30 degrees, and I had the window seat, right beside the heater that was blasting hot air. At one point I had my socks and shoes off and, if it had been appropriate, would’ve been in a tank top. Instead I hugged the cold 1L bottle of water Josh bought at one of our stops while I tried to fall asleep. Early the next morning around 6 am I woke up to a blinding light and was a little confused…turned out it was just the glare of the sun off the snow…that’s right, snow, something I hadn’t seen since last spring when it was all melting away back home. At our hostel, we were reunited with Sonja and Murray who had arrived a day earlier because they didn’t stop in Antalya for the night. After a breakfast of French toast, a welcome change from Turkish breakfast, we set off to hike one of the valleys near by.
I should probably explain where we were a bit. The region is called Cappadocia, “land of beautiful” horses, which is a nickname that I don’t understand because we really didn’t see to many horses. The reason people travel there is the strange rock formations, fairy chimneys that have been formed by wind and water erosion of layers of volcanic rock. It was like nothing I’ve ever seen before. Back in the day people used to live in them and now when you walk through the valleys you can crawl and climb through the tunnels and caves they built. Josh and Murray had to explore each one including squeezing ourselves underneath the locked door of a former church to take a look inside.
The next day we took our first and only organized tour of the entire trip because there was no way we could’ve gotten around to all the places in one day on our own. We made a number of stops for views of different valleys, but the best parts were the underground city and the Ihlara Valley. There are something like 36 of these cities in the area and they date back 4000 years to Hittite times and were used when the people came under the attack of invaders. The one we visited had 8 floors and passageways so small I felt like I was crawling…not good for the six foot something French guy we were with. Our hike through the Ihlara Valley was the next stop. You can hike the entire 14km of path that winds along the stream through the valley but we only did 3 or 4 before having lunch. The last place we visited was a monastery that used to be a caravan stop on the silk route from China. We had a little while climb through the different floors of the kitchen and living areas as well as a church, which made Josh happy, although not as excited as the Korean guys were when a flock of sheep came by…you’d think they’d never seen them before in your life…then again maybe they haven’t??? For dinner we found a restaurant that served the famous pottery stews we had been hearing about. They fill a terracotta pot that looks like a vase for flours and then seal the top of with bread and cook it in an oven, sometimes for 2 hours. To break it open you hit it with the end of your knife at the base of the neck of the jar and it’s supposed to break off so you can pour out the food inside. Josh and I weren’t as successful as Sonja and Murray and our lids ended up in pieces…or maybe we just had defective jars.
On day three in Goreme, we rented a moped again since the public transportation is too infrequent during the winter to get places without waiting a long time in between stops. We spent the afternoon driving around, stopping at lookout stops, valleys, and anything else that looked interesting and then headed back, hoping to beat the dark cloud coming our way. We did pretty well until the last 10 minutes when it started to rain and we wished our helmets had had visors so we wouldn’t be stung in the face by the rain. We finished off our stay in Cappadocia with a horse back ride through the Rose Valley the next afternoon before taking a night bus to Istanbul.
Josh could probably give a much more enthusiastic description of our last bus ride but I’ll do my best to communicate how good it really was. First, Josh was most impressed that the guy’s pinstriped vest and dress pants matched up perfectly and he was efficient to say the very least. We got the standard glass of water to start, which was followed by coffee or tea. However, instead of the Styrofoam cup we were used to getting they actually wanted us to reuse our water cups…points there for being somewhat environmentally friendly. Then came the ever important cake. Also the best one we’d had on the trip it had hazelnut filling…hazelnut chocolate is my favorite, bueno chocolate bars are the best…and Josh thought about trying to charm his way into seconds but chickened out. Oh, and I didn’t nearly break a sweat trying to get to sleep which was an added bonus.
After 3 weeks we had come full circle, and were back in the same dorm room in Istanbul for two more days. Feeling the end of the trip around the corner we were both ready to relax a little and didn’t try to pack too many things in. We had planned on taking the public ferry on a day trip up the Bosphorus River, which would’ve taken almost as far as the Black sea, but the weather never cooperated. The second day we might have been able to do it, but since there would be no turning back if the weather got bad we decided against it. Our first night we were stopped at the reception on the way down to our rooms and were asked where we were from. I thought it was a strange question since you have to give that information when you book the room, but they guy was looking for native English speakers to help out a friend of his who runs language classes. We hadn’t made big plans for the evening, and we were going to get paid so we, along with an American guy staying at the hostel, jumped in a car around 6pm, not really knowing what we were getting ourselves into. It turned out to be a language exchange thing for a business association in the city and we basically spent an hour each with two different groups, having them introduce themselves and what they do and then just having them ask us questions to practice their English. It was a bit strange and somewhat entertaining and we got a free dinner out of the deal as well as the $40 they paid us the next day. On our last night in Istanbul we went back to the place we had dinner the day we arrived in Istanbul at the beginning of the trip. Having made some money the day before we had our most expensive meal of the trip. We started with these meatballs rolled and fried in dough that tasted like the chewbereka my grandma makes. The for the main course Josh had beef stroganoff…my last meal at home before I left for Egypt, and I had Turkish Ravioli which tasted almost like my mom’s perogies. Finish that off with some apple pie and we were both very full but very happy. Oh, and there was live music… a guy on his guitar playing some kind of Turkish blues music.
The next morning it all came to an end at 6am when Josh caught the shuttle to the airport. I left 5 hours later and was back in Cairo and out for dinner by 6pm. A week later it’s all starting to feel like a little like a dream. I’ve always wanted to go and Turkey definitely did not disappoint. If anyone is ever looking for someone to join them, I’m in! For now I’m back to adventures in Aswan for three more months where winter has come to an abrupt end with 35 degrees today…bring on summer!
