Sunday, May 17, 2015

Cappadocia

Allie and I made it to the Istanbul airport and had a brief "Amazing Race" moment where we had to jog to our connecting domestic flight. Ultimately, we made it with time to spare. We flew right into the plateau region of Cappadocia. It is known for its bizarre, moonscape rock formations, some of which are idyllically called "fairy chimneys." I've been making up stories about Allie the tiny fairy since we arrived.

We are staying in the town of Goreme, which is built into a hillside with hotels and homes carved out of the stone. We are in one of the many "cave hotels." When we drove up at night, the hillside was alight, but otherwise all was dark. We decided to start our journey off this morning with a hot air balloon ride! We left the hotel at 4:10 am, which was really no problem due to the time change (and my working nights the past several days anyway), and rode into the darkness until we joined up with a massive group of tourists and were sorted into groups of 20.

Our first view of Turkey in the sunlight? An aerial view slowly coasting over valleys, rock formations, and a few small towns, not to mention the 80+ other balloons dotting the morning sky. Unreal.



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