Chelle’s Travels

With the girls gone and no concrete plans for a good month, Thad and I headed to Cappadocia, in the centre of Turkey, famous for it’s crazy unearthly landscape.

The volcanic rock there is soft, and has been molded by wind and rain into all different shapes including valleys that resemble poured honey and “fairy chimneys” where a harder rock cap above has prevented a small circumference of soft rock from being eroded. Because of the softness of the rock, it can be carved and for many centuries the locals have carved their homes, churches and monasteries out of it. We stayed in a cave while we were there, our room completely made out of rock.

We had the best time in Cappadocia. The first day we took a walking tour with the hostel manager through the local valleys. We started off in Pigeon Valley, where there are pigeon houses carved into the valley sides (and sometimes decorated with frescoes) . For centuries people have been collecting pigeon droppings for fertiliser, also pigeons were symbolically important to the Christians living there so they liked to treat them well! We continued to White Valley, where the rocks were paler and many locals had their vegetable patches, complete with wells. Next was Honey Valley which looked like thick honey had oozed down the valley sides. Continuing from Honey Valley was Love Valley, the same type of rock was present, however in Love Valley there are some basalt rocks that prevented thin column of the soft rock from being eroded, leaving very phallic-like pillars dotting the landscape.

That night, Carl and Mono - friends we’d made in Istanbul, arrived in Cappadocia so we went to their cave hostel and had a traditional Turkish meal - lentil soup, salad, lamb casserole and rice - all washed down with (vast quantities of) the locally produced wine. The next morning we dragged ourselves out of bed early to go on a bus tour of the region, which was fanTASTIC! We visited an underground city - carved 8 levels underground, where people lived for up to 7 months at a time to escape any invading
armies that tramped across the land. We also visited a huge monastery carved out of a mountain, fairy chimneys and a valley full of cave churches with frescoes dating back to the 14th century.

We finished the day off with a Turkish Night - a touristtrapesque night where you get all you can eat food, all you can drink alcohol, and watch traditional Turkish dancing. It was lots of fun and interesting too - traditional wedding dances and whirling dervishes and music players as well as a belly dancer who invited Carl and Mono up to bust some moves on the dance floor. We had a great time and when it was over, our driver offered to take us out for a round at his cousin’s bar which sounded great, so off we went, but the bar ended up being closed so instead he bought us drinks at a local supermarket and drove us around to see different panoramic views of Goreme. It was lots of fun although he was being a bit of a stupid driver and veering around the tiny little mountain paths and making us scream.
Anyway, somewhere along the way we realised that a) he was WAY too drunk to be driving and mustve indulged in the free alcohol when we weren’t looking and also that b) somewhere along the way he had grown a dislike for Thad, partially due to Thad not wanting to share his beer and partially because he wanted to take me for himself. Interesting.

Anyway, after he made it perfectly clear that he intended to remove Thad from the mortal coil I managed to communicate the situation to the other guys and we refused to get back in the car, and told him to go home. He sped off angrily, and we waited for a while so we could make our way back to the town (about a km away). He came back though, and was pretty angry, mainly because he was told to bring us back carl and mono’s hostel and now he wouldnt be able to do that and also still adamant about the whole killing Thad thing. He left again, and this time we decided just to climb straight down the cliff/mountain into the town instead of following the road. Luckily we did, because he came roaring back up the road about 5 minutes later and we hid, and then ran the rest of the way. We jumped into someone’s backyard to catch our breath and decided to continue through the backyards so we avoided the crazy drunk guy. After going through 2 gardens we came to a sheer drop and thought oh no, we’ll have to turn back, but then realised we’d landed on the roof of our hostel! So we climbed down and went to bed! We talked to our hostel owner later and he said that he knew the guy and he was a bit weird in the head. Great. But we got out alive ha ha!

We spent the rest of our time in Cappadocia relaxing in cafes and restaurants, drinking apple tea and eating lentil soup. Aaahh. On one day we went to an open air museum - a whole deserted village of houses and churches carved out of the rock that had to be abandoned due to safety issues. It
made a great place to climb around and explore, with ancient frescoes and odd buildings. On our way we saw an old guy who was blind in one eye driving a horse and little old cart that looked like it had been made out of scraps.

When he saw us he stopped and waved to us to jump on the back, so we did and he took us down a little track, past a cave church and to his farm, gave us tomatoes and showed us the natural spring, carved out summer rooms and little tunnels through the rock that ran between the plots. It was great! He then drove us back to the main road and waved goodbye, continuing on his journey. We also visited a UFO museum which was odd and hilarious. Paper mache exhibits are way cool.

So last time I wrote we were in Selcuk, Turkey, awaiting our unplanned
journey to Olympos. We couldn’t get a bus direct so we decided to swing
through Pamukkale first.

Pamukkale was pretty cool - a natural wonder out in the middle of nowhere.
Because of the calcium-rich volcanic springs, the water running down the
mountain leaves bright white calcium carbonate as a precipitate, which forms
cascading pools down the mountain side. It gives the effect of a waterfall,
or as the name “pamukkale” means in turkish, like cotton. When we went
there, we discovered that the areas was quite badly damaged due to it being
changed into a resort in the 80s and people swimming and washing in the
pools and also walking and driving over the rock. Luckily, Unesco is
protecting it now and it’s being returned to its former glory.

Next stop was Olympos which I though was FANTASTIC! We were only going to
stay for 2 nights but, exhausted and desperately craving relaxation time,
Thad and I stayed for 5 while Claire and Beccie continued to Cappadocia.

Olympos is a valley surrounded by lush vegetation and huge mountains, and a
single road within it completely covered with tourist accommodation. Luckily
for us, there weren’t many tourists around so we didn’t get that resorty
feel. Our accommodation was in Treehouses, wooden huts on stilts among the
orange grove, and the common areas around the place included hammocks and
platforms full of beanbags and cushions where you could just relax. Aaaah.
The main attraction of Olympos is the beach, pebbly but still beautiful in a
bay with the valley’s river tumbling into it in the centre. The water, as
like most of meditteranean sea, was nice and warm. To get to the beach, you
had to walk through the ancient town of Olympos, a port town dating back to
200 BC and in use til the 1400s. The ruins have been reclaimed by the
wilderness and we were free to wander wherever we wanted, which was lots of
fun and much better than, say, Ephesus, where we had to stay behind fences.

On one such wander, Thad, Claire and I went for a long walk up the less
travelled side of the river. It was very beautiful and we saw lots of crazy
things - most of it was a necropolis so there were huge tombs and sarcophagi
everywhere, still quite preserved with lots of the relief sculpture and
writing still visible. Unfortunately, things took a turn for the worse as we
encountered a rather angry bee who, after a quick battle, stung Claire in -
of all places - the boob! The poor dear. As we turned around to go back to
get some first aid, i received an sms. Thad said it was probably Natalie
saying she’d had her baby. I laughed and said that I proclaim the new baby’s
name to be Beesting! I checked my phone and lo and behold, it WAS Natalie
and I was now the proud auntie of a baby boy. Sweet! She rejected my name
suggestion and instead settled on Tanner.

After more floating in the med, relaxing and playing chess, we headed back
to Istanbul to meet Claire and Beccie.

We visited a few more of the sights, including a trip to the grand bazaar,
Hagia Sofia museum and Topkapi palace. Hagia Sofia is pretty incredible -
monstrous and ugly really on the outside but stunning on the inside. Built
as a church in 537, when the Ottomans took over in 1400s they converted it
to a mosque. As Islam prohibits the depiction of living creatures, all of
Hagia Sofia’s beautiful mosaic murals were painted over. Surprisingly, in a
refreshing act of religious tolerance, the workers who painted over the
murals first preserved them, and copied the designs down. Why I’m not sure,
it’s almost like they knew they’d be interesting in a few centuries! But
good on them, because restoration after the mosque was turned into a museum
has revealed some of the murals again.

Probably one of the most crazy things about Istanbul is standing in between
Hagia Sofia and the Blue Mosque, one of the largest in the world, at prayer
time. To be between two incredible famous monuments facing each other, one
red and one blue, and to have the Meuzzins sing the call to prayer from each
mosque’s minarets, taking it in turns to sing in almost mock competition.

We also celebrated Beccie’s 21st in Istanbul, but I couldn’t drink cos I’d
made myself sick from eating 3 chicken kebabs in one day. The others had a
good time though, pub crawling in Taksim, the “new” istanbul where locals
shop, eat and party. Claire and Beccie left us shortly after - Claire to
Madeira and Beccie to the UK, which was sad to see everyone leave in
different directions.

The next day we took a bus to Eceabat, a town near Gallipoli, and the day after visited Anzac Cove. It was pretty incredible. We learnt a lot about the battle - from both our side and the Turk’s side. It was so strange standing there - Anzac Cove is so beautiful as well - and knowing that one of the most important battles in Australian history took place here. It was also strange because I felt so far away from home, and to think that these young men, many younger than me, would have had that same feeling, but died on this soil as well. Pretty horrible. We went to all the memorials for Aussie soldiers and also a major NZ one and a Turkish one. We also saw the trenches and some important landmarks in the battle. As we were walking along, the tour guide found 2 lead balls - which he gave to Thad and I - that had come from a rocket used in the war. Cool.

Now we are in Selcuk, after another long and painful bus ride - we forgot Turkey was so big! We went and saw Ephesus today - a very important city of the Roman Empire. The ruins were insane. Tomorrow we are heading to Pamukkale and, fingers crossed, from there to Olympos for treehouse accomodation and more roman ruins. Unfortunately because it’s the end of Ramazan, all the locals are catching buses everywhere for festivals, and almost everything is booked out, so we have to try and wing it. Eek.

Turkey is fantastic and refreshingly different to anything else we’ve seen on this trip. The people are very friendly (and slightly manipulative), the food fantastic, the landscape dry and very much like Australia. Because of Ramazan, Muslim people do not eat when the sun is up, so we’ve gotten used to being woken up at 3am by two men walking through the street banging big drums to wake people up so they can eat. Also, 5 times a day, the loud speakers crackle into action to tell people when to pray. Turkish people really are very friendly though. And they love Australians. We’ve gotten discounts and hand shakes and kisses and everything haha! Oh, and most Turkish people speak English with an Australian accent, especially around Gallipoli, where all the tourists are Australian. It’s hilarious. I actually asked one of the hostel workers which part of Australia he was from - his accent was SO THICK, but he’s actually Turkish. He’s becoming an Aussie citizen though in a few months, because of the passion he has put into Gallipoli and anzac cove. His citizenship ceremony is going to be held on the beach that the troops landed at. Wow.