We've been slacking in our blog posts. Sometimes that happens when you've been travelling for too long. It starts to feel like work to post a blog. Anyway, we left Turkey a few weeks ago and have already made it through multiple family visits in France (including a great wedding), have extended our trip an extra three weeks, and landed on the island of Lesvos, Greece until we return to Canada at the end of August. But, enough about that, this post is supposed to be about Turkey!
Looking back at the pictures of Turkey already bring back great memories. It's truly a fantastic country: varied and interesting natural sites like Cappadocia and Pamukkale, the incredible Mediterranean coast, and the ultra-cosmopolitan city of Istanbul. The people are very friendly and welcoming, food is great, and shopping is fantastic (best souvenirs we've seen on this trip). Again, we had the fortune of few tourists. We can only assume this was because it was Ramadan and tourists were concerned about things not being open. Unfortunately, with the latest news of terrorism out of Turkey (after we had already left), it is most likely a reality that the tourism numbers will drop much further.
We hadn't done much research on Turkey before leaving Canada as it was the last country on our itinerary and we figured it would be really easy to get around. We thought we had lots of time to plan while on the road but didn't realize just how much time and effort it takes to plan a trip to such a big country and we certainly didn't get to see everything we wanted. I think we did pretty well in the end but also do think a trip back could be in our future:).
From Northern Cyprus we flew to Kayseri, the closest city to Cappadocia, and spent a night there, rented a car, and headed to Cappadocia. We splurged and stayed in an amazing cave hotel and did the hot air balloon at sunrise experience. Totally worth the money spent (and the 4am alarm). Cappadocia is such a unique place, a UNESCO heritage site, filled with fairy chimneys and other exceptional natural wonders. Hopefully the pictures do it some justice. Besides the hot air balloon, we spent two days driving around the area, seeing the fairy chimneys of Goreme, underground cities, small hikes in amongst the odd formations, and magnificent views from the top of the Uchisar castle.
We then headed down to the Med coast, stopping in Konya on the way. Konya is one of the more traditional Muslim communities in Turkey and also home to the "whirling dervishes". We took part in a Ramadan dinner (ok we weren't fasting but it was still exciting) where we went to a restaurant half an hour before sunset and waited with anticipation with everyone else. Platters of salads, breads, and mezes were on the table and our main dinner order was taken. Then we waited, staring at the food, until we finally heard the voice from the minarets telling us to eat. It was a feast! After dinner, we went to a Mevlevi Sufi ceremony, which was very interesting to see as the whirling dervishes go into a sort of trance-like state as they whirled around in a circle. We only spent one night in Konya but it was one of the more culturally enlightening evenings that we spent in Turkey.
On to the Med coast....forget the Côte d'Azur, it's got nothing on the Turkish Riviera! Starting in Antalya, we got a taste for the fun old town and explored some of the nearby ruins of Termessos (very cool hike through "raw" ruins) and Aspendos' well-restored theatre. Next, we went to the former hippie-haven of Olympos, home of treehouse lodging and ultra-relaxed vibe. No, we didn't sleep in a treehouse but in a small rustic bungalow next to the treehouses. All accommodation was half board and the food was delicious Turkish home-cooking. This was THE most relaxing spot on our entire journey. This is exactly where I want to go immediately after my next big Go-Live at work (if only Turkey wasn't so far away). The nearby beach was beautiful and had the bonus of walking through ruins to get to it. Many people get on a "blue cruise" from here but we wanted to spend a few days in Kas so we made arrangements to get onto the next blue cruise at their stop in Kas...more to come on this.
Kas was a very pretty little city where we rented a well-equipped apartment. There's a great port that all the action surrounds. Fantastic shopping but probably the most expensive we saw in Turkey. We did a couple of dives here, the highlight being the Dakota plane wreck surrounded by more large Loggerhead turtles than we could count. Amazing! From Kas, we also did a day trip to the nearby picturesque Greek island of Kastellorizo (AKA Meis in Turkey) and went swimming in the blue cave. Very cool experience.
This is where we joined our Blue Cruise. We spent 3 days/2 nights on board a small sail/motor boat in the Med Sea, stopping every couple of hours to see ruins or go swimming in beautiful bays. The scenery was fantastic and we had a great crew. These tend to be party boats for young backpackers but we somehow ended up with a good group of people of all ages and met some great people. The cruise also organizes "extras" so we went paragliding one of the days and it was incredible to be so high over the bay with turquoise waters. It felt like being in an airplane with nothing to block your view. Unfortunately we couldn't bring cameras so they could sell us an overpriced cd at the end so there is no photographic evidence of this adventure...
After arriving back on land, we went directly to Pamukkale. This is one of my favourite places in the world...I was like a kid let loose in an amusement park. Pamukkale means cotton castles in Turkish and when you look at it from afar, it looks like snow-covered mountains (very surreal when it's over 30 degrees outside). It is made up of travertines, which are terraces of carbonate minerals left behind by flowing water. This was an ancient spa site and a Greco-roman city was built on top of it called Hierapolis. We didn't spend much time in the ruins (to Bert's disappointment) since they weren't nearly as fun as splashing around, bathing, and covering ourselves in clay mud from the travertines. I'm sad that well over half of the travertines are dried out due to human activity of siphoning the hot spring water which has since been stopped. I only imagine how amazing this place was back in the 70s or earlier when all the terraces were full of water and people were free to walk and bathe wherever they wanted. Most pictures in advertising of Pamukkale show it from that time.
From there, we made a requisite stop at Ephesus (Ephes), staying in Selcuk nearby. Ephesus had some greatly restored ruins and nice mosaics. It can get super touristy due to proximity to a port that cruises stop at specifically for the site but we escaped the madness by going early and against tourist traffic. Next day, we flew to Istanbul from Izmir. We spent 5 days in Istanbul and it wasn't enough. We didn't get to Topkapi Palace (we did attempt to on our last day but it was closed), but we saw many other top attractions like the Aya Sofya, Blue Mosque, The Gallata Tower from the outside, Taksim Square, a Bosphorus cruise, Dolmabahce palace, etc. We ate and drank very well. We saw a jazz festival concert. We shopped intensely (Bert finally bought his perfect nargile) at various bazaars and shops. We even did a cooking class! Istanbul was a great time and definitely a city we both see ourselves returning to.
Once again, I wrote a book but that's what happens when you wait too long to write. And, this is it for our main adventures. I expect we will have inspiration to write some retrospective afterthoughts and perhaps we will even write an entry on our three weeks in Greece:).
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