The Magic of Cappadocia - Day 2

After a great night's sleep we headed for breakfast on the terrace.  Sunny with super views and a nice typical Turkish buffet with very good omelets to order.  Claudio and Simonetta had gotten up at dawn to see the balloons over the town.  Sunrise balloon rides are famous in Goreme but they are very expensive (near $200 per person) and did not interest any of us that much.

The beautiful blooming tree in the Kelebek Hotel garden

Balloon descending from its dawn flight over Goreme

Our room in the stone mansion at the Kelebek Hotel

Aged door to our room with authentic (and hard to us) iron key

Niche with historic clothes in the room

The first floor living area

The luxurious bathroom with claw foot tub and separate shower

The upstairs bedroom with fireplace

The TV and CD player were not even switched on during our stay - note the built in wooden cabinets in the wall

The fireplace where we enjoyed a wood burning fire the night before

An intricately carved niche in the bedroom

Splendid wooden ceiling in the bedroom

Randy at breakfast on the terrace

One of the friendly cats on the terrace - this one was quite fat

View over Goreme from the terrace

Walking around near the Kelebek Hotel - a mixture of restored buildings, buildings currently under restoration and unrestored buildings

A weathered doorway in upper Goreme near the Kelebek Hotel

One of the fairy chimneys in upper Goreme

We loaded the car and headed for the Goreme Open Air Museum - this is probably the most well know attraction in Cappadocia.  It is a national museum that is a clump of small tufa carved and decorated churches along with a few housing monks and nuns and their needs such as dining.  When we arrived it was mobbed with tour buses and we happened to meet a local guide in the parking lot, Mehmet Cingil.  He suggested we go to a few things off the beaten path and return at lunch time when the tour buses go to lunch.  He also offered to guide us to these wonders and at 60 TL we thought it was a good idea.

Our tour guide Mehmet explains about Goreme and Cappadocia to Justin

He first took us to an unrestored church in Goreme in an area where local families still live in the tufa homes.  This is the Yusuf (Joseph) Koc church (sign below).   As a native of Goreme he could tell us not only about the history of the churches and geographic features but also the life, past and present, of the town.  This church was entered by climbing a ladder and Mehmet had gotten the key from a nail at the nearby occupied tufa home.  It was an interesting set of frescoes.

The first out of the way church, the Yusuf Koc, named after a nearby family who lived there

Climbing the stairs to this unrestored wonder

Frescoes inside

Defaced but still colorful

The annunciation

The dome was impressive

Tops of columns remain inside

We listen intently to Mehmet's explanation of this 11th century church

Randy admires the frescoes and columns

Saints George and Theodore - the same two we saw the day before at the Saint John Church in Gulsehir

Next door was a still inhabited fairy chimney house with a flock of chickens

The next stop was the even better Durmus Kadir Church.  This is a different, earlier style with no frescoes.  It was large and more Romanesque in style.  It was also unrestored but in pretty good condition.  Like many of the churches in the region it was used after the Christian era for a pigeon home.  Pigeons are still abundantly keep in Cappadocia and their droppings are the main source of fertilizer for the people's crops.  In older times, people worried about their pigeons being able to find their correct homes so they painted primitive designs and figures (all different) by the entries to the pigeon homes.  These now adorn many churches on the outside, like they did this one.

Alice in front of this 6th or 7th century church

The cross inside is still clearly visible

One section of the Durmus Kadir church, also named for the family that had lived nearby

Mehmet tells us about the unusual and very early architecture of this church

The baptismal font

Simonetta sermonizes at the altar, an unusual stepped structure in the middle of the church

Justin preaching in Cappadocia

Mehmet and Claudio discuss history

Detail of the carving of the inside walls of this ancient structure

Paintings for the pigeons - as the building was repurposed to a pigeon house about 1000 years after its construction

Paintings for the pigeons as seen from below

More pigeon paintings

View from the church

Another view from the Durmus Kadir church

Mehmet explains more history to Claudio outside the church

Mehmet took us next to the Baglidere, or Honey Valley.  It is also known as the Love Valley for the reason that its fairy chimneys look like huge parts of the male anatomy.  Other hiker and biker tourists were also there.  We admired the area and then headed for Avanos, a larger town nearby.

The interesting (ahem!) shaped fairy chimneys of the Honey Valley

More views

Blooming bush detail from the Honey Valley

A village woman works her patch of grape vines in the Honey Valley

Wild flower detail

Abandoned eagle nest - the valley has become too touristic for these birds of prey

Simonetta, Randy, Alice, Justin and Claudio with a fitting background

Mehmet wanted us to see the local carpet school.  This is a federally funded endeavor to provide training in traditional rug making techniques to village women while making sure they had health care, a good wage and a future going back to their villages as skilled rug makers.  The most interesting part was seeing how they gathered the mulberry cocoons and transformed them into silk fiber.  It was notable that all of the cocoons die naturally because they could not get proper light in the tree.   Carpets for sale were shown to us (of course) and they were exceptional - of the highest quality including silk, wool, goat hair and mixed varieties from village styles from all over Turkey.  However, the prices matched the quality and uniqueness and we all resisted purchasing.

Wisteria in bloom at the Avanos carpet school and center

Two of the weavers

Ladies at the loom

Working on a difficult silk carpet

Where the silk is gathered and spun

The naturally dead cocoons from the Mulberry trees

The manager explains how the silk is processed

The spinning loom for the silk, which produces an extremely strong fiber

Some of the outrageously beautiful and very expensive carpets found at this center in Avanos

Mehmet next took us for a quick stop to a pottery factory.  Avanos is renowned for his pottery and this factory is family owned, and again, the wares were top quality.  However, also again, the prices were steep and we left without purchasing (poor Mehmet got no commission off of us but we gave him a healthy tip).  Back at the Goreme Open Air Museum, it was indeed much less crowded.  In fact, in most churches we were the only ones.

Entry to the family run pottery business just down the street in Avanos

The interesting doorway

Simonetta views the drying wares

The kiln was surprisingly small

The owner explains a design, all hand painted

Most churches did not allow photos and had guards posted either inside the church (if it was a special one) or outside who freely yelled at you if you took a picture.  Some photos were taken (see below) but you will have to consult a guide book or the internet to see most of the eight or nine churches in the area.  The weather was spectacular so it was pleasant just to be out in the sunshine in perfect temperatures.

View of the now uncrowded Goreme Open Air museum

Up first is the Chapel of Saint Basil

Covert photos were snapped of the frescoes

The classic Madonna and Child

Another Saint (Basil?) on horseback

Chapel of Saint Barbara was the next place we could take pictures secretly

The primitive but very appealing decorations

Jesus or a saint

More simple but exuberant designs

A view from the walkway that leads from chapel to chapel

One of the monk's rooms with hole in table supposedly for pressing grapes

Geometric design in a monks' refractory

Justin checks it out

Claudio also - photos were allowed in these lesser structur

es

Ceiling detail

Justin and Alice outside one of the chapels - a fair amount of climbing is needed to enter all of the structures

Justin, Simonetta and Alice sitting at one of the monks' refractory tables

The famous Dark Church where you have to pay extra to enter

The Dark Church entry seen from below

Another refractory - how much eating and drinking did the monks do?

Decoration in the refractory

The Sandals Church, the smallest of the chapels at the Open Air Museum

Jesus wearing - what else? - sandals

The nice fresco in the Sandals Chapel

Stairs to one of the monks' quarters

Decoration inside

More decoration

The big monastery or nunnery - not open but can be admired from outside

John Ash's favorite - the very large and expertly frescoed Buckle Church

Running late (as usual) we drove back to Uchisar, where Adnan's mom had cooked us a traditional village lunch of bulgar pilav, chickpea stew, cacik (the Turkish tzatziki sauce) and salad.  We ate again on the balcony and all enjoyed cold Efes beers.  It was a fitting and delightful end to our Cappadocian journey.   The ride back to Ankara was over a different road through Aksaray.  We saw some of the snow capped volcanoes that erupted so long ago and thus began the tufa landscape.  We also passed by the enormous salt lake (Tuz Gol) that runs many miles besides the road to Ankara.  This lake is extremely shallow and is used for salt mining and nothing else so far as we know.  No swimming, fishing or boating.

A handsome camel awaits pictures (for a fee) in Uchisar

Our hang out place in Uchisar

Adnan's mom serving us lunch on the balcony

Efes, cacik and bulgar pilav

Stewed chickpeas went over the pilav for  a fiber filled treat

Tursu - homemade pickles rounded out this super village style meal

The Arbibs enjoyed Cappadocia a lot

So did Randy and Justin

Alice with a self portrait at the lunch table

The travelers at lunch in a fairy chimney house in Uchisar - you can see why you MUST go to this region!

If you go to Turkey try to fit in Cappadocia.  Much of it is touristic but its charms are still hugely evident even in the crowded places.  And, there are plenty of interesting and beautiful sights and areas away from the bus tours.  As John Ash says it would take more than one lifetime to explore all that Cappadocia has to offer, and most of what was on Alice's list of sights to see during this trip did not get accomplished.  But we discovered several unexpected places and were relaxed and stimulated at the same time in this magic place.

Alice at the evocative and atmospheric Durmus Kadir Church

The gang with the iconic formations behind on a perfect spring day in Cappadocia