The cave city – Goreme

22nd May 2008

Today was our first day in Cappadocia. We are staying at Shoestring Pension, which doesn’t sound all that fancy, but it’s actually an authentic cave dwelling. So you guessed it, I’ve gone from living in a Tree House in Olympos to a Cave in Göreme.

We had a 9am start this morning, thankfully after our night at Pacha Bar, and then we went on the Cappadocia Southern tour. Our first stop was the underground city and we went 80m underground! It was amazing to think people had hidden in this place from fear of persecution for years. They had everything down there, a school, church and on the bottom floor they even had a morgue! I actually went and laid down in one of the holes in the rock they used for storing dead bodies. Naughty Kristina.

After the underground city we went for a bit of a hike in Illarah Valley and saw the old church of St. Daniel. The valley was more like a massive gorge, and it was amazing to walk through it. We had lunch there and then moved onto the old castle built into the rock, originally by the Hittites, which was truly a sight to see.

Cave church Goreme
Me in the cave church in Goreme

We got dropped back at the hotel just in time for Turkish night. ‘What’s Turkish night?’ I hear you ask. WELL…..Turkish night is a night of dancing, music and drunkenness. We got to see whirling dervishes, but that was the only serious part of the night. There was belly dancing and of course out of a crowd of hundreds, I was one of the ones to get picked to get up and belly dance. Bridget also managed to get picked. I managed to do alright, the belly dancer seemed quite impressed if I do say so myself.(I’ve had enough practice)Turkish Night by the way is an all you can eat, all you can drink affair also.

After Turkish Night finished, we all went back to Pacha Bar and stayed there until, what I fear were the wee hours of the morning. I actually managed to set myself up as DJ and Nigel was behind the bar with me mixing drinks. He’s got some great pictures on his phone I’ll have to get them somehow. They also had 5 Lira Absinth shots, which probably weren’t the best of ideas at that point. There was more drunken dancing, before people slowly started to disappear. Nigel, Cat and I were the last ones standing and yet again Cat and I were dragged from Pacha Bar and I somehow woke up on a top bunk, even though I had managed to get myself a bottom bunk for once, god only knows how I managed to get up there!

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