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.
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| Grape arbors everywhere, the grapes were delicious |
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| Hotel entrance |
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| 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.
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| Adam loves climbing things |
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| Hiking humor |
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| More climbing |
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| Success! |
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| 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.
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| One of my favorite pictures from the trip |
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| 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.
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| 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.
