Kapadokya/Cappadocia

I am having an internet day today as Laura is down with a cold and my shoulders are sunburned and throbbing. I hope you enjoy the avalanche of posts. I have now been away from home and my computer for 57 days. I am getting almost too comfortable being on the road as my health has recovered and I stare into the aegean sea in Crete. Its very nice to have reliable internet connection/USB drives and fast computers as I can actually post more than just my whining insights into my failing health. In between colds and food poisoning I thoroughly enjoyed Kapadokya which is in central turkey. The rock formations were very surreal and I climbed down two underground cities which the Christians carved into the soft volcanic rock to avoid being attacked. Some of the rock formations were extremely phallic and they called them dicksville or the rude shaped rocks. I guess my tour avoided those rocks because I don't have many photos of them.

Pigeon valley. In Kapadokya they call the capped mountains fairy chimneys saying that persecuted fairies hid there and turned into pigeons. In this area of the world, people actually built homes for the pigeons and collected their droppings to use as fertilizer for their crops. Funny how in NYC and the rest of the world pigeons are considered rats with wings. The volcanic soil and tuff-like rock are the reasons for these formations. Many houses and cities were carved into the soft rock because it was so easy to carve. Its very interesting to see these images because it was like deja vu seeing the caves and houses. Several years ago on a trip to New Mexico I saw the same type of stone and similar cave carvings where native americans built their homes. I guess people really don't change much.

Just some of the strange formations in Kapadokya.

The pigeon valley from far away. You could actually see this view very well from the hot air balloon and it seems to go on forever. On the balloon we would actually descend very low and in and out of these valleys.

The underground city where the Christians fled and hid their crops and cattle. It wasn't completely persecution but in times of raiding and pillaging being Christian seemed to be a good reason to attack and pillage for food. How long they stayed in these caves at a time is unknown but the ventillation system and set up of these cities is very similar to each other. They go 5-7 levels below ground, are very tight and windy and gigantic stone wheels were used to block and attack invaders. Not a fun visit for those with claustrophobia.
The cave hotel in which I stayed. The entire back wall is a wall of a cave. The rooms are darker but cooler and AC is not necessary. It actually was sort of like my apartment in NYC actually in terms of darkness. The innkeeper went above and beyond and drove me to the dervishes, sent people out to look for me when they didn't locate me at night and made two of this employees stay up at night to wake me up at 4:15am to get on my hot air balloon. I could not believe he made the boys stay up.



To put the size of the rocks in perspective. Also to fulfill my big sister photo request quota.