Life of the Mayers: October 2014

Tuesday, October 28, 2014

Turkey: Istanbul, Final Day

The Blue Mosque

Hagia Sofia

The Hagia Sofia has had many identities over its lifetime: Starting out as a church, transforming into a mosque, and now stands as a museum. Since it is no longer a religious institution, you pay an entry fee to explore it. It is one worth paying for the experience and knowing that the expense goes towards the upkeep of this incredible structure. The lines for this place were rumored to always be insanely long, so we queued up about 30 minutes before opening and had no issues. You can bypass the line if you buy into a tour group, but we tend to enjoy the experience more without someone talking at us and leading us around at their pace.

Hagia Sofia

All over the Hagia Sofia, if you pay close enough attention, you will find runes carved into the marble of the floors, spindles of the railings, walls, everywhere. I did not notice them until Adam pointed them out, but once he did, I started seeing them everywhere! Some are from the Vikings raids in the 9th century and Ancient Greeks.

Hagia Sofia

Hagia Sofia: Passage ramp to the second floor

Hagia Sofia

Walked by, doubled-back, and walked in

We spent the rest of the day casually walking around parts of the city we had not explored yet. WE came across this tiny "restaurant" that had a man carving up some tasty looking delights in a window and we could not resist. I don't know the name of them, but it is was many layers of overly (not in a bad way, other than my cholesterol level) buttered philo dough of either spinach and cheese, meat and cheese, or plain cheese. We got some of each, of course. It was incredible. I say "restaurant", because it only had 3 small tables and seemed to do more of a take out service. There was a constant stream of people as we sat and ate, and a rapid turnout of these baked delights from the kitchen to the man chopping them up in the window. I only wish I knew what it was called to tell you to search it out and try it!

Blue Mosque

I had to resist coming home with SO many different lights. They were absolutely beautiful!

Turkey is a beautiful country that we definitely will be going back to explore more. While I don't feel the need to return to Istanbul or Cappadocia, but there are other incredible regions that we must see: Ephesus and Pamukkale.

Saturday, October 25, 2014

Turkey: Cappadocia Region, Day 2

After the return from our balloon excursion, we cleaned up and packed up before enjoying a fantastic breakfast and a leisurely morning at our hotel. The pictures below are at the hotel and the view from the hotel (our cave hotel) itself. Yes, it was as amazing as it looks.

Grape arbors everywhere, the grapes were delicious

Hotel entrance

Relaxation in the garden

After a nice morning, we headed out for a nice hike through the mountains that we had floated over i the hours previous. It was a beautiful day for it.

Adam loves climbing things

Hiking humor

More climbing

Success!

Grape garden!

Our hike ended in an ancient town where the entire hillside had been one massive carved community. People had lived in up until a large earthquake destroyed it in the 1960s, when they all moved down to the valley and built modern houses to live it. This town is free to be explored and climbed, and that we did! All of the forthcoming pictures are from traversing all over this fantastic hillside.

One of my favorite pictures from the trip

Adventuring love

Our day ended with touring through an expansive underground city, Kaymakli, that was built to support the population during times of raids and conquests and another local castle. Kaymakli was quite impressive from the standpoint that it could hold an entire city population and sustain it for prolonged periods of time, and the networking rooms and tunnels that were all carved and hauled out by hand. This city was lost to history until early last century when a shepherd followed a straying sheep into an underbrush and found its entrance.

Can you find Adam?

After this, it was time to depart to the airport to head back to Istanbul. It broke my heart to leave this beautiful and peaceful spot in the world. We could have easily spent significantly more time here, exploring and enjoying all of the sights, so if you do make it there, plan on more than 48 hours.