Speeding Along
I think I don't like mutabal. The gallayah was good, but nothing to write home about. But I guess good enough to blog about?

So after Chimera, I spent morning lazing about, mostly trying to work on a tan. To get to the beach, I would've had to take a ten-minute walk through some ruins (and pay money for them), so I just hung out at the hostel, alternating between hammock and picnic bench.

I think I've actually managed to sunburn my forearm. But it looks like it skipped pain and went straight through to peeling.

Anyway, I took a shower and headed to Antalya for the afternoon. But all I really did was go to the hamam and get some [Turkish] fast food. I've managed to not eat anything "American," or any of the foreign cuisines that are now mainstream (e.g. Italian, Chinese). Although I am sometimes weak when I pass a McDonald's, which isn't frequently. And American fast food doesn't really cross my mind unless I see it.

So I bathed and ate, and then I got on a bus bound for Cappadocia, or land of the "fairy chimneys." The fairy chimneys are geologic phenomena that resemble misshapen penises. Much of the land is soft and volcanic in origin, so it readily erodes. But where harder rocks were on these beds of soft rock, they prevented the erosion of the clay directly beneath them. This resulted in towers of this soft rock, with a large rock perched atop. So then the whole penis thing.

I got into a town called Göreme at 6:30 in the morning, not having continuously slept for more than two hours all night. And nothing was open. So I sat on the curb for half an hour, until the bus company offices started opening. I found a bus for the right time and price, and they let me leave my backpack in the office for the day.

I headed across the town square to ask about moped rental prices. Two of the three agencies were open, and they offered the same price. I tried to find breakfast, to get some calories in me, but nothing was open. So I just got cookies at the market.

And then I drove around on a moped for eight hours. Well, I stopped along the way. I hit many of the tourist sites in the region, including Zelve (where people carved cave dwellings but were forced to relocate in the 50s), Devrent Valley (clusters of fairy chimneys), Özkonak (one of the underground cities, but small in scale), the towns of Avanos and Ürgüp, and Kaymaklı (one of the larger underground cities). Notably, I didn't have time for the Göreme Open Air Museum, which is like Zelve, but more impressive and with intact frescoes.

And while the sites were interesting, it was also nice zipping down the roads, watching the scenery pass (I think the moped is part of the reason my forearms are peeling).

I tried to go to the local hamam, since I was feeling gross, but they were at capacity with a tour group. So I just treated myself to a steak dinner (oops, American!) and then got on a bus bound for Antakya.

The ride was uneventful; I passed out pretty hard, and I had to be woke up after everyone had already disembarked.

And then the story picks up with the Attractive Man and the Syrian border.

Labels: bar trip, Göreme (TR), Olympos (TR)

- posted by roger @ 8:18 PM