Nomad Cave Hotel Goreme

... valley of Ihlara valley, where the 100
or so cave churches are almost miss-able compared to the divine scent
of pistachio trees and wild flowers.



This potent mix of nature and
spirituality seems to have attracted a distinctly hippy crowd to
Cappadocia. Everywhere you look you find graying ponytails reliving
their travels in the 60's (when it was so much more 'real' than
today) and their 20 ...

... est un village historique, classé au patrimoine mondial de l'humanité par l'Unesco, où pratiquement toutes les maisons datent de cette époque ottomane. Ca ressemble un peu au pays basque mais sans les frontons de pelote. J'ai eu la chance de loger chez une famille très accueillante et de profiter tous les soirs de petits concerts privés de Baglama, un instrument de musique turc qui ressemble à une guitare obèse, que jouait à la perfection le fils ...

... to an Aussie girl. We were all in a good mood and it was a good time, though my pool playing ability really really has disappeared over the years.

The place was great, but not perfect. The DJ, who I later found out was the Aussie wife, put on a mix of Nelly's "Country Grammer" (the best song ever written about drive by shootings...) and Lynard Skynard's "Sweet Home Alabama" (the best song ever written about being a Southerner...), in which the rap lyrics of Nelly ...

... Michael's moped decided it no longer wanted to start up, so we had to call the rental company and wait for them to bring him a new one. When they arrived, they took one look at his moped, smiled and said "ahhh, this one". Apparently it breaks down frequently. We hoped that his replacement would fare better, and we were on our way! We made our way towards Urgup through the Devrent Valley, also known as the valley of fairy chimneys. After stopping and taking a short hike ...

...

... than the rest of our group with the other couple close behind us. But there was still two people missing. Let's think about this...who could it be? Any guesses? Clue: Rhymes with 'Moobs McBilligy' and 'Flonde Sambition'. You guessed it! Boobs McGilligy and her trusty sidekick, Blonde Ambition were no where to be seen. We waited about 10 minutes, blasted the horn of the bus multiple times before the guide had to go up the side of the ...

... cave cities of Cappadocia. They have identified 36 different underground cities in this area and most have been dated back 4000 years and some say they were occupied as early as the 7th century BC. When invaded, the people took to their troglodyte dwellings where they could love safely for months at a time. We had the best hike of our lives yesterday when we hiked from Goreme to Çavuºin through the Rose Valley...just exceptional. And ...

... In fact most of the clientele were backpackers, mainly Australian and American. The food was cheap and we ate sitting opposite each other, one with a view of the Blue Mosque (the minarets changing to cool ice-pops in the thickening light) and one with a view of the Bosphorus with all its long ships. Roof-cats were the beneficiaries of flying pieces of kebab meat, surreptitiously tossed down by Michelle when the waiters weren't looking.

By the time we left Istanbul we had ...