The first stop on our travels was Cappadocia. Cappadocia is quite a large area so we decided to stay at a place called Goreme. I had been there before and it is close to the things that we wanted to see. We bought our bus tickets from Istanbul before leaving and was assured that even though the tickets said Nevsehir (the town before Goreme) the bus did actually go to Goreme. Well it didn't, it stopped at Nevsehir. After having just woken up (it takes about 9 hours and so we took a bus overnight) we got off the bus and were immediately suckered in by someone trying to sell tours. I admit that this was my fault! I got off the bus first and someone told me where my bags were and grabbed mine taking me to what i thought was a service bus taking us into Goreme. Shailen got off the bus and followed me and of course we ended up in this guys office. He was talking to us about tours and so on and we thought he would tell us when our bus left. He didn't and when we convinced him that we did not actually want to take a tour with him he left us at a bus stop to get our own way there. Great start to the trip!
But we made our way in Goreme and managed to find some accommodation, getting a good deal on a private room rather than a dorm as they are quiet over winter.
Goreme's main square. It is a pretty small place.
The Roman Castle at Goreme.
And from the other side.
Our little stone room.
The view from the place we were staying.
The reason that Cappadocia is so famous is due to its fairy chimneys. Now i'm sure if you go into any Kebab shop in NZ there is a picture of this place on the walls. The Fairy Chimneys are formed when thin volcanic rock is eroded from the stronger tuff (consolidated volcanic ash) underneath until you are left with a hard cap resting on a cone shaped pinnacle of softer rock. You can see this clearly in the pictures. Shailen thought they looked like giant mushrooms or phaluses! LOL
Shailen and I with the Fairy Chimneys.
As far as you can see in each direction the landscape is the same. Its really stunning.
We decided that the easiest way for us to see the area that we wanted to was to hire a scooter. They are really cheap to hire and we used it for most of the day and when we filled it up it only cost us $3!!!! So we hired a scooter from the town and off we went!
Shailen looking cool on the scooter.
Us riding along :)
The first place we stopped at was the Goreme open air museum which is one of Turkey's world heritage sites. Now what you need to understand is that for many years cave dwelling people lived inside these fair chimneys and created rooms in them and also many churches and so on. The open air museum is a collection of Byzantine churches, chapels and monasteries. Some of the buildings are more than one storey high and in some of them you can see large dining tables. Also within the churches are beautiful paintings (frecscoes) which you can see in the pictures.
One of the churches at the open air museum.
Some of the beautiful pictures inside.
The Rock Chapel.
Shailen sitting on the dining table.
These were graves in the Chapel of St Basil.
Another stunning church.
View from the open air museum.
We finished the open air museum off by seeing the Tokali Kilise (Buckle church) which is one of the biggest here. In this one you are come in on one level but can go down another level. It is amazing to see how they must have carved all this out of the rock.
First level of the Buckle Church with all the columns.
Looking from the lower level up into the first level.
From the museum we headed off and passed the Cavusin church. We didn't go in but it looked quite impressive from the outside.
Cavusin Church.
We continued on to Avanos and then started making our way back stopping at Pasabagi. Here they have three-headed fairy chimneys and is a popular photographic place. Even in winter we could count maybe 4 or 5 tour buses.
Spot the odd fairy chimney?
Me at the entrance to yet another church. These ones you had to climb up ladders to get into.
The 3-headed fairy chimneys.
The view from Pasabagi.
We continued on to have a quick look at Zelve but there is not much there apart from another open air museum which we decided seeing as we had been to one we wouldn't go to this one.
We continued on our way back to Goreme stopping at the camel rock in the Devrent Valley (hmm wonder how this one got its name?) and arrived back at about 5pm.
Shailen with his camel friend.
By this time we were absolutely freezing. As you can see in the photos there was quite a bit of snow on the ground. With the sun shining it wasn't too bad but at it got later the wind rushing past on the scooter was so cold. I was lucky that i was sitting behind shailen so was protected a little bit so i can't even begin to imagine how cold he was!
Me with the sisters. (They have names for some of the popular ones)
Us looking happy but a bit cold!
A whole village is built into the rock in the mountain side so you can barely see it.
We got back to the office and the guy invited us in to sit by the heater and have a drink of apple tea which we gladly accepted! It's funny cause the only place you can get apple tea is in tourist areas. But they sell packs of Traditional Turkish Tea as though the locals drink it.
We had a pretty early night after not getting much sleep the night before on the bus. Our room was quite warm which was lucky (we would soon learn how rare this actually is!).
When we woke up in the morning it was snowing lightly which was nice. We had decided to do one of the underground cities today. So we caught a bus into Nevsehir and then another one out to Derinkuyu. Now these underground cities are absolutely amazing!! The city was built in 7th-8th century BC and could be closed from the inside with large stone doors that they rolled across. The doors often weighed between 200-500kg. The city was used by the first Christians who were escaping persecution from the Roman Empire.
Me at the entrance.
The round doors they used to close the levels off.
Derinkuyu has eight levels and goes down about 85m. They could shut off each level individually. The underground city has wine and oil presses, stables, cellars, storage rooms, refectories, chapels and even a religion school. A large 55m ventilation shaft was also used as a well and made long-term stay possible.
Looking back up the ventilation shaft to see how far down we came.
Showing a couple of different levels.
The church at the bottom level.
More rooms!!!
I tried to lose him in the Underground city but unfortunately he found me!
Only 10% of the city has actually been excavated. There is a total area of 2000 square feet and it could house between 3,000-50,000 people!!!!! It was quite scary going down especially in winter there wasn't many people around. Luckily there was another couple so we it made us feel a bit better. I am sure you could get lost and wonder about for days!!
We headed back to Goreme and just spent the afternoon reading or on the internet. We went to dinner at this little place we found the day before that was small and cute and you could play backgammon in there. So we went there for dinner and stayed until our bus was due to take us to Antalya. Another 9 hour night bus trip. Yay!
But we made our way in Goreme and managed to find some accommodation, getting a good deal on a private room rather than a dorm as they are quiet over winter.
Goreme's main square. It is a pretty small place.
The Roman Castle at Goreme.
And from the other side.
Our little stone room.
The view from the place we were staying.
The reason that Cappadocia is so famous is due to its fairy chimneys. Now i'm sure if you go into any Kebab shop in NZ there is a picture of this place on the walls. The Fairy Chimneys are formed when thin volcanic rock is eroded from the stronger tuff (consolidated volcanic ash) underneath until you are left with a hard cap resting on a cone shaped pinnacle of softer rock. You can see this clearly in the pictures. Shailen thought they looked like giant mushrooms or phaluses! LOL
Shailen and I with the Fairy Chimneys.
As far as you can see in each direction the landscape is the same. Its really stunning.
We decided that the easiest way for us to see the area that we wanted to was to hire a scooter. They are really cheap to hire and we used it for most of the day and when we filled it up it only cost us $3!!!! So we hired a scooter from the town and off we went!
Shailen looking cool on the scooter.
Us riding along :)
The first place we stopped at was the Goreme open air museum which is one of Turkey's world heritage sites. Now what you need to understand is that for many years cave dwelling people lived inside these fair chimneys and created rooms in them and also many churches and so on. The open air museum is a collection of Byzantine churches, chapels and monasteries. Some of the buildings are more than one storey high and in some of them you can see large dining tables. Also within the churches are beautiful paintings (frecscoes) which you can see in the pictures.
One of the churches at the open air museum.
Some of the beautiful pictures inside.
The Rock Chapel.
Shailen sitting on the dining table. 
These were graves in the Chapel of St Basil.
Another stunning church.
View from the open air museum.
We finished the open air museum off by seeing the Tokali Kilise (Buckle church) which is one of the biggest here. In this one you are come in on one level but can go down another level. It is amazing to see how they must have carved all this out of the rock.
First level of the Buckle Church with all the columns.
Looking from the lower level up into the first level.
From the museum we headed off and passed the Cavusin church. We didn't go in but it looked quite impressive from the outside.
Cavusin Church.
We continued on to Avanos and then started making our way back stopping at Pasabagi. Here they have three-headed fairy chimneys and is a popular photographic place. Even in winter we could count maybe 4 or 5 tour buses.
Spot the odd fairy chimney?
Me at the entrance to yet another church. These ones you had to climb up ladders to get into.
The 3-headed fairy chimneys.
The view from Pasabagi.
We continued on to have a quick look at Zelve but there is not much there apart from another open air museum which we decided seeing as we had been to one we wouldn't go to this one.
We continued on our way back to Goreme stopping at the camel rock in the Devrent Valley (hmm wonder how this one got its name?) and arrived back at about 5pm.
Shailen with his camel friend.
By this time we were absolutely freezing. As you can see in the photos there was quite a bit of snow on the ground. With the sun shining it wasn't too bad but at it got later the wind rushing past on the scooter was so cold. I was lucky that i was sitting behind shailen so was protected a little bit so i can't even begin to imagine how cold he was!
Me with the sisters. (They have names for some of the popular ones)
Us looking happy but a bit cold!
A whole village is built into the rock in the mountain side so you can barely see it.
We got back to the office and the guy invited us in to sit by the heater and have a drink of apple tea which we gladly accepted! It's funny cause the only place you can get apple tea is in tourist areas. But they sell packs of Traditional Turkish Tea as though the locals drink it.
We had a pretty early night after not getting much sleep the night before on the bus. Our room was quite warm which was lucky (we would soon learn how rare this actually is!).
When we woke up in the morning it was snowing lightly which was nice. We had decided to do one of the underground cities today. So we caught a bus into Nevsehir and then another one out to Derinkuyu. Now these underground cities are absolutely amazing!! The city was built in 7th-8th century BC and could be closed from the inside with large stone doors that they rolled across. The doors often weighed between 200-500kg. The city was used by the first Christians who were escaping persecution from the Roman Empire.
Me at the entrance.
The round doors they used to close the levels off.
Derinkuyu has eight levels and goes down about 85m. They could shut off each level individually. The underground city has wine and oil presses, stables, cellars, storage rooms, refectories, chapels and even a religion school. A large 55m ventilation shaft was also used as a well and made long-term stay possible.
Looking back up the ventilation shaft to see how far down we came.
Showing a couple of different levels.
The church at the bottom level.
More rooms!!!
I tried to lose him in the Underground city but unfortunately he found me!
Only 10% of the city has actually been excavated. There is a total area of 2000 square feet and it could house between 3,000-50,000 people!!!!! It was quite scary going down especially in winter there wasn't many people around. Luckily there was another couple so we it made us feel a bit better. I am sure you could get lost and wonder about for days!!
We headed back to Goreme and just spent the afternoon reading or on the internet. We went to dinner at this little place we found the day before that was small and cute and you could play backgammon in there. So we went there for dinner and stayed until our bus was due to take us to Antalya. Another 9 hour night bus trip. Yay!
The little place we had dinner in.
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