Saturday, 11 July 2015

The Wild East

It was incredible to wake up to the town we had only seen in the dark while sitting on the deck drinking Nescafe and taking in all the sights and sounds.  The place we're staying at  looks much larger in the photos than it is but it was very quaint and comfortable.  The main host is a wealth of information on things to do and is incredibly efficient at all he does.  He was here til after 12 last night and was the first face I saw this morning....not sure if he actually slept or not?


After breakfast on the rooftop we decided to head to the Open Air Museum which was walking distance from the town.  Houses and hotels are actually stacked on top of each other and we discovered how difficult it could be finding your accommodation as everything is a Cave Hostel or Hotel.  Shoestring Cave Hotel, Old Cave Hotel, New Cave Hotel, the list just keeps on going.  There are these fairy chimneys everywhere you look, most of them are abandoned but some are still in use.

It was a pretty warm walk but once you get into the shade, it’s actually a really nice temperature.  So we leapfrogged between shade patches up to the museum.  There were a number of houses with every other one appearing to be a small church.  A number of these had burial chambers and one even had a skeleton displayed to show how they worked.  It’s pretty incredible how these domes were carved out and arches constructed purely by excavation.  You’d hate to screw up at the end of all that work and cut too much!

We sat snacking on ice drinks watching a guy trying to sell his camel rides.  A number of people showed up asking to take a photo of the camels and he proceeded to say, “oh yes, no problem, no problem” and grab their camera while encouraging them to climb on.  The second they got on he gets the camel up and they’re screwed!  He walked the camel around ten steps to get another camera angle, to the person’s distress, only to set them back down on solid ground.  Immediately, the hand goes out and he expects payment.  The only catch is payment is 15 Euros (which is ludicrous) as he shows the person the sign hid behind the tree!  Good thing we saw it before it happened to us....

On the way back home we realized that our day of exploring was going to be short and everyone was getting tired so we decided to head back and sign up for an evening, sunset horseback ride.  At 5:30 a little Volkswagen Golf shows up and this skinny Turk jumps out in jeans, plaid and a big cowboy hat.  He introduces himself as Irfan and herds us into his vehicle.  After driving through town he takes us up this crazy dirt path to his little farm amongst the fairy chimneys. Its has his farm and horses but best of all he’s got dogs and chickens to the girls delight.  Best of all he’s got a 4 month German Shepherd puppy that the girls fell in love with instantly.  He informed us he had to go pick up one more guest and took off to leave us with the horses, dogs and chickens.  Once back we were introduced to the horses and off we went.

We toured the Rose Valley and Irfan was incredible with the girls, making sure they were taken care of.  Rachel (Aussi woman we went with), Shannon and my horse were definitely a bit hungrier and took a few stops before we made them see who the boss was (apparently we weren’t at first).  It was a great tour and what a great way to get orientated and see the area.  On the way home we had to put up with the endless ATV tours that were coming back from their time but overall it was awesome.  Irfan even took a bunch or pictures and sent them to us later.


After we got back it was time for dinner.  The girls wanted to eat at the same place as yesterday as the waiters were pretty funny and the food was great, cooked right in front of you in their wood oven.  Orhan our waiter was hilarious and had an in-depth conversation with Alyssa about her favourite character in Pitch Perfect.  I’m guessing he had young girls too as he was well versed in the movie  and Alyssa became his “princess”, nickname number two for her!  After, we were off to find the Turkish gelatino for our new favourite desert.

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