In a comfortable cave....

Up up and away.....Above the clouds...

In the caves...

And underground....

Night bus to Cappadocia was a 12 hour run, so we were glad to find that our hostel in Goreme had the most comfortable beds and the quietest rooms we have had since we left Creston. One reason for the quiet may have been that there were only two other quests in the place (it is the off season, after all ) or the fact that the room was in a CAVE! Whatever the cause, the effect was blissful, and we slept a long time the day we arrived.

Our stay in Goreme was arranged by a travel agent, so we got all the regular tours that are off offer, the trips to the underground city and the 1st century churches and the “fairy chimneys” and the cave villages that were abandoned in the population exchange between Turkey and Greece in the 1920’s. I must have learned about it in a social studies lesson or a history class, but I never registered much about the history of this area until I got here, and at least half of Faruk’s (the tour guide) explanations of events and situations contained references to it. The exchange was based on religion and involved moving the Greek Orthodox citizens residing in Turkey to Greece and the Muslim citizens residing in Greece to Turkey. A lot of the population of Cappadocia was Greek Orthodox and had been for generations, so it really devastated the economy and the local society.

After all the cave and underground visits we had to have the opposite extreme, so we signed on for a sunrise balloon ride. Actually, it was cloudy, so we did not see the sun rise, but we sure got a great look at the country side. My only complaint is that the hot drink offered at the start of the trip was Nescafe and the champagne at the end was fizzy apple juice. It’s an Islamic country, so I can accept the non-alcoholic champagne, but fake coffee? Why, in the country that claims to have invented the coffee culture, are we offered Nescafe at all the hotels and restaurants? It’s a shame! The balloon ride was great, though, and we had just enough thrills to make it exciting but not scary.

As well as taking us cross-country and underground, Faruk was very generous in answering our questions about military service (yes, all the men at age 20, 4 months if you are in university, 1 year if you are not), the difference between “Muslim” and “Islam” (we are still not clear on that) and the order of service in a mosque. He advised us to stay for an extra day to explore the caves and underground homes outside the park and museum areas. “Take a bottle of water and a flashlight, go in to a tunnel in the morning and come out in the afternoon. You can’t get lost” We would have loved to, but we’re on a travel agent’s time line now, and another night bus was scheduled. Off to Olympos….