Call to prayer
The muezzin echoing throughout the valleys surrounding Uçhisar in Cappadocia.
Cappadocia
Staying in one of the cheaper hostels in Göreme, I met Tony, a Frenchie from Savoie. His traveling began three months ago, as he set off à pied to traverse the Alps, as far as the Italian/Slovenian border. The next couple of days were spent with him as we rambled around the volcanic-formed valleys of this part of Cappadocia, exploring caves & the rock-cut houses whilst picking quinces, apples & grapes.
The valleys are immense, the landscape like nothing else I’ve seen before. There was some dodgy climbing going on to reach some of the dwellings carved into the rock, as well as some tight squeezes to fit through some of the passages! After having hiked up onto the big plateau which borders the edge of the region, a tactically placed cart provided tasty tasty pomegranate & orange juice on the road below. Further down the valley, amongst the labyrinth of these fingers of volcanic rock, a farmer had set-up a little make-shift café, where his dried apples provided the base for the most delicious apple çay I have ever tasted.
Come evening, we were happily chowing down on the local börek - pastries filled with roasted aubergine & peppers, or spinach and the Turkish feta.
We tried hiring mountain bikes to get out a little further, but within half an hour, two bikes had four flat tyres. A ramble up to the caves & castle of Uçhisar provided a picturesque alternative.
Back in Istanbul
It’s been a little over a year since I was in Istanbul; the last time, battling to get my visa for Iran.
It was a somewhat shorter and more relaxed affair on this visit. I’d already seen my fair share of the sights, so concentrated less on feasting my eyes on the mosques, and more on feasting: lokum & baklava were a welcome return to my taste-buds.
Feeling a slight longing for Paris, I decided to check-out the Istanbul Modern (the Modern is in partnership with the Centre Pompidou) It would possibly be my last opportunity to see some art from the current period, before I immerse myself in that of civilisations gone by.
Instead of hitting the Modern, I stumbled across a series of exhibitions — the Istanbul Biennial — that were taking place throughout the Beyoğlu district, and so spent the day trundling around the back-streets, searching them out. The title was “What keeps mankind alive”, a question particularly pertinent to my current frame of mind as I start this journey. There were some really interesting pieces based-on the military operations in Bosnia and the work of the UN Peacekeepers across the globe. I really enjoyed the collection of posters charting Lebanon’s Civil War - (Signs of Conflict, Çatişma Belirtileri) - both from a political, and graphic design, point of view.
I finished my time in Istanbul as I had a year previously: a ferry across the Bosphorus to Haydrapasa, where a night-train waited to take me off east. This time, I would stop in Ankara, before heading south to Cappadocia.
Ihlara Valley, Cappadocia
After checking into a hostel in Göreme, Cappadocia, I swiftly met an Ozzie overland (who, admittedly, was very hard not to meet) and we plan to leave the next day to head down to the Ihlara Valley. Most people seem to have traveled there just on a day-trip, taking-in just 2km of the route to visit the carved-out churches, but after having spoken to people who have taken these tours, it seems a real shame not to explore the valley in its entirety. (How to get there.)
The trail snakes 14km or so between the cliffs of the valley, running from Ihlara, via Belısirma, to Selime. The valley dives down into the landscape as though sliced from the rolling plains in which it sits, the sheer cliffs of its sides dropping down as if a waterfall. There are several churches which line the route along the valley, all carved into the rock-face, and are decorated by seccos, although they are almost all heavily damaged by graffiti.
Upon starting the hike, I was glad that we wouldn’t be whizzing through. This place is stunning. The valley floor is surprisingly green at the Ihlara end; we followed the river along, picking wild blackberries, occasionally having to cut our track through where it is overgrown. Not many people take this route, it seems. Near the start of the valley the water is deep enough to swim in, and so we felt compelled to oblige, stripping down to undies for a quick dip.
We arrived in Belısirma as night was falling, hoping to find a place to eat. There were two restaurants, although both offered over-priced food which tempted little - wallets replying with a firm “no!”. We headed a little out of the valley & up into the village, sharing the dirt-track with cows & chickens, and after exhausting all the synonyms for “shop” in any language we knew (before discovering the Turk to be simply “market”) we found the local shop to be closed.
It would be a night on the hillside with empty stomachs. The call to prayer, however, bouncing off the rock-faces from the minarets of the village mosque, added a wonderful soundtrack as I set-up bed for the night, consisting of my sleeping-bag laid down on the dirt, under a clear, starry black sky.
I was dreary-eyed when the morning muezzin echoed through the valley; despite day-time temperatures upwards of 30°, it gets pretty chilly here once the sun disappears, particularly after not having eaten the previous night! But the view, as the sun rose over the valley, made it all very much worthwhile.
We continued our hike up towards Selime, watching the landscape & flora change, and taking another dip in the (freezing) river in lieu of a shower, if not for my sake, for that of the people with whom I’d later share a bus!
I got the adrenaline pumping a second time as I climbed a bit of the rock-face to reach one of the caves, the rock crumbling as I gripped it, several metres up. Muchos respect to the guys who, several hundred years ago, carved-out these caves.
More farmland appeared as we approached Selime, with fields of pumpkins — littered with their fleshy remains after having been raped of their seeds — and the odd apple tree providing a little breakfast.
As the valley opens out, there are some phenomenal cones protruding from the dirt, some of which have been carved-out and were used for dwellings. This volcano-formed landscape is like nothing I’ve ever seen before.
It was market time when we reached Selime, so plenty of opportunity to stock-up on fruit as we waited for the bus back to Aksaray which, incidentally, holds the record for the cheapest chicken kebabs yet - 1TL (~ 0.50€).
If you visit Cappadocia, I would highly recommend making time to come & hike this valley. It takes a bit of effort to get here (unless you spend the money on a tour), but to escape a little, the valley offers great seclusion, and is simply beautiful.
Traveling to Ihlara from Göreme
A bus (15TL) links Göreme to Aksaray, and from here it is possible to get another, local, bus to either Ihlara or Selime, both of which are around 2TL, and run every couple of hours. To hike the entire trail, without having to speed through (thus giving time to explore a little), involves an over-night stay. Campsites exist in Belısirma (half-way up the valley), although we decided to just take sleeping bags and bivouac under the stars.
The Next Adventure
It is past midnight, the check-in for my flight opens in three hours, and an all-nighter (and a wee bottle of sloe gin) will see me over until I next lay-down my head in Istanbul tomorrow.
It’s time to go wandering.
All the posts on this pseudo photo-blog up until now have been back-dated, just to see if this works as a concept. From now on, I’ll see if I can make it work for real, out on the road.
I’m not yet sure where that road will take me, but it will end in Kenya. En route, I should pass through Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Sudan (visa depending) & Ethiopia, with possible detours into Lebanon & the West Bank.
If I do manage to keep it updated, I’ll also post more photos on my flickr stream. We’ll see.
P.S. The gin just ran out.