Jacob takes to the skies, Sarah flees the underworld

It's hard to believe less than three weeks have gone by since we left Toronto. It's been terrific so far and we are still feeling enthusiastic 

despite two flights and two overnight buses, although that enthusiasm may wane if we end up doing another all-nighter. Paul spent the last one white-knuckled after he woke at 3 am feeling the bus was discomfitingly vertical as it zoomed down switchbacks through the mountains, pausing only for a stop at a security checkpoint when machine-gun toting jandarma boarded to make sure the passed out passengers weren't posing any threat. I was grateful I slept the whole time.

That was the bus ride we took to leave Goreme, reluctantly, after seven days of hiking with Kate and Wim and the kids. It's difficult to choose which photos to post, because there were so many breath-taking vistas: the views from the ridge tops,

 the many winding paths,  

the expansive plateaus,

the cool walk through the Ilhara Valley gorge

and the paths through the fairy chimneys and other fascinating rock formations.

The kids loved the cave houses, both the official ones (such as the vast Selime monastery and the open air museum in Goreme)

and those that just dotted the landscape and provided opportunities for exploration on most hikes we did.

They also adored clambering up the rocks,

and were all around great hikers, even the little ones

though the dads helped out when the going got tough...

Kate took a turn with Theo on her shoulders too, and I was on duty when we did the rope rappel down the sandy slopes.

If we wanted a view we didn't even have to leave the amazing cave house Kate had found us online,

we just climbed the staircase to the terrace and there it was, all laid out for us. 

It wasn't always easy herding nine people but we managed to mostly stick together,

and found frequent picnic breaks to be a big help in keeping everyone going.

We had terrific food as Kate and I took turns making dinner from primarily local ingredients. Mornings we would have amazing breakfasts of fresh bread, oranges, and delicious Turkish yogurt with dried apricots, honeycomb and walnuts. We enjoyed shopping at the markets in Goreme and Avenos and paying super low prices for some local delicacies - Kate picked up a kilo of unbelievably good olives for around 8 lira (about 4 Cdn) and the kids loved their 50 cent churros, dripping with honey.

Our only mis-step was buying a 3 pound block of delicious looking cheese that turned out to be butter - discovered only upon tasting back at the house. We were forced to eat lavish amounts of butter on our bread (we bought at least four loaves a day, fresh baked for around 40 cents a loaf), fluffy butter biscuits with our lentil soup one evening, and buttery mulberry cookies. The mulberry cookies we had for dessert after a meal of Turkish lamb chops and a few pounds of roasted potatoes (which were good but possibly not worth carrying for 8 km on our hike home from one market - I couldn't resist buying them but realized the ones at the corner shop near our house would probably have been almost as good!). 

We had fun hosting guests for drinks one evening: another Canadian family - Michelle, Steve, Therese, Lea and Amelie. We met them in town and after hearing that they were completing a ten month journey around the world we asked them over to tell us about their adventures and experiences - they gave us some great tips for travel in Turkey as they had done much of the coastal route we are planning on following. The kids were happy to have even more friends to play with that evening.

Our final day in Goreme held the most extreme experiences. In the morning Jacob and Kate went for a hot air balloon (side story - it was arranged by the nicest man in Goreme, who had helped Kate recover her wallet by mobilizing the entire village to be on alert for it, sending Wim off with one of his mountain bikes - no charge - to the tiny juice stand where she had inadvertently left it behind, and in general doing anything and everything he could to help) at sunrise over the village. Kate and Jacob left at 5:45 for their shuttle to the take-off site, and back at the cave house the rest of us got up on the terrace (wrapped in blankets because it was freezing!) to watch the amazing sight of balloons rising all over the town, first in the fading remnants of the night,

then in the pink of the pre-dawn sky,

 

and finally with the full break of day.

of course capping the viewing off with a cup of coffee to stay awake for the rest of the morning. 

Jacob and Kate loved every minute of their experience, both on the ground

and up in the air.

Later in the day we went in the complete opposite direction, visiting the underground city of Kaymakli, a rabbit's warren of hundreds of tunnels, historically used as a refuge for the Cappadoccian inhabitants fleeing persecution from the Ottomans. It was hard to imagine that people would live down here for days at a time, and using tunnels to travel fairly large distances. I was enjoying the visit until we journeyed downward through one particularly tight tunnel. I thought it was so cute the way Tom fit just perfectly in and so snapped a photo of him and the girls.

I looked at the photo immediately after to see whether it turned out and something about seeing photographic proof of how small it was and realizing I was inside that made me feel a rising claustrophobia. Coupled with the fact that a) we were continuing to angle deeper underground b) there was a large tour group in front of us blocking our way, and c) that there was no way of going back but only forward, was enough to make me feel the beginnings of a panic attack, not good in such a space! Fortunately we emerged out of the tunnel into a holding area that was actually at the lowest point, where I was able to barge (politely-ish) through the crowd and make a beeline up, up and out to the fresh air, taking my slightly less nervous nephew Theo with me while the rest of our group enjoyed exploring for awhile longer. Moral of the story, don't go tour an underground city that goes four stories down via narrow tunnels if you have any claustrophobia! Other than the underground city I would happily recommend every hike and experience we had in Goreme (though Tom might say he doesn't want to walk 10+ km every day).