27th June – Urgup

This morning our alarm goes at 3:45 as we are picked up in a mini bus at 4:15 to go on a sunrise hot air balloon trip.  It is still dark when we arrive at the balloons which are in the process of being inflated.

We have two balloons with 8 people in each one.  It doesn’t take us long to get on board and we take off as the sky is starting to light up with the first of the suns rays. There are 100 balloons taking off in the early session, with a further 50 taking off later.  The silhouette of the hot air balloons in the sky is magical. The sunrise is beautiful.

The views over this unusual landscape are fabulous.

We fly over townships and down the love and pigeon valleys. It’s just gorgeous.

Our landing in a field  is very smooth and once we are down the pilot takes the balloon up enough to drop it onto his trailer, which his crew then drives to a clear space where we can get out.  The crew pick wild flowers along with some gorgeous red roses from their garden they decorate the basket and serve us champagne (fizzy apple cider) which is a lovely way to finish our amazing balloon ride.

After breakfast we are picked up from our hotel in a mini bus and taken of a tour around Cappadoccia.

This area has several volcanoes and millions of years ago the ash from eruptions built up with different  layers of minerals that give the rocks their different colours.  Over the years natural erosion has created the unusual formations that now exist.  It is believed that the caves that are carved into the rocks were built by early Christians to hide from their enemies, they did not live in them, they lived in nearby villages.

We visit a local pottery that make very intricate designs which take weeks to produce 1 piece.  We resist the temptation to buy anything, we don’t think it would survive the journey!

 

We have lunch at Avenos and wander along the Red river that has gondolas and speed boats on it.

We visit Ozkonak one of the many underground cities that are a series of tunnels connecting rooms that can be sealed off by rolling grinding stones across the entrance, just like in Indiana Jones! They built a ventilation system up to the surface to provide fresh air. Like the caves these were only used to hide from enemies not for daily living.

We visit a Monastery in Goreme that was built by carving out the rock to make churches, refectories where the students would have their lessons and a kitchen etc. The churches are decorated with murals of various saints and scenes from biblical stories.

After a very long day we freshen up and wander into the main square through lanes and past some lovely houses and enjoy some very nice Turkish wine with dinner.