But, they ask, What's It Like in a Cave Hotel...

It was time to leave Istanbul, as you know, so we drove to Istanbul's airport to get on Turkish airlines to fly the hour time to Cappadoccia.  Well, actually, you don't fly to CAPPADOCIA.  You fly to some other unpronouncable name town where there is an airport near to Cappadocia.  And then you drive on, actually, pretty good roads to the caves.  The landscape looks like a moonscape, with pinnacles, ravines and mushroom shaped huge rocks made out of tufa.  Never heard of tufa?  Well, it is the ash that volcanoes spew before the lava comes out -- and all the rocks and hills and caves and hotel rooms are made of tufa.  And because there are other rocks like granite mixed in, the weathering is uneven and leaves these really strange eerie statue-like hills and dales.  We have lots of pictures and we had plans to post pictures.  But we are having such troubles just doing the writing part that I'm not sure we'll be able to do the pictures.  My job-- to paint pictures with words, I guess!

In any case, we went through these ancient doors into the courtyard of the cave hotel and there was a modern hotel with tufa rooms -- with tv's, jacuzzi tubs, separate showers, bidets, fireplaces and beds whose "box spring" was really a rock.  No air or heat.  But pretty modern.  And as the cave rooms were made out of tufa.  The smell in our cave was overwhelming and, without air conditioning, we opened our two windows and hoped.  Finally, we asked about the smell and they said it was the tufa and that was what tufa smelled like!  Those poor early Christians!  I think I might become a muslim to move out of the tufa land!  They cave rooms were up many many steps and even the steps were tufa.Some were up and some rooms down, but all different!

  See, history lesson:  this is an ancient Christian kingdom where early Christians escaped to when they were being persecuted and carved out these caves in the valleys where noone could find them.  Now, as you look at these caves halfway up and all the way up the mountains, you wonder how they had the stamina to soldier their way up into their "houses". No gym memberships necessary here!  Just go get water and you had your day's exercise!!   And lived their centuries.  And carved churches into the rocks.. and even had monasteries and nunneries carved out of the rocks.  Even painted frescoes inside their little churches -- and there are tons of little churches there.  Now it is an open air historical site.  But we were breathless from climbing up and down the little bit of climbing we managed! And I promise you we refused to go to the two underground cities these little Christian "busy beavers" dug to hide totally underground!  The cities went down 7 stories into the earth and were totally hidden but somehow connected.  When Janset said she would take us there, but we would have to crawl, climb, and duck under doorways, we kindly begged out and said we'd tell you about it anyway,Joanie!
Food part One:  While the cave hotel had a buffet breakfast, it reminded me of all the pictures you see of tura/whitewashed balconies in Greece, as you had to climb up a stairs to a rooftop dining area.  What are breakfasts?  Well, some of it is hard to tell what it is.  But the one thing we both agreed on was the luscious fruit we ate all over Turkey.  The fruit, which is grown in Turkey, is so juicy and luscious compared to U.S. fruit -- nectarines, watermelon, cassava melon, grapes, some kind of other melon, figs, -- and interesting breads.  Lots of rolls with honey.  And yogurt.  But not our kind of yogurt.  Much thicker and smoother.  And cheeses, mostly feta. And, as Muslims do not eat pork, no sausages or bacon!  And really we didn't see much breakfast eggs either. One interesting aside.  We saw field after field of pumpkins and squash just laying there.  Janset said they do not eat the pumpkin or squash.  They open them for the seeds to eat and throw the rest away!  Awful waste!  So we told her how we eat squash with brown sugar and butter! Wonder if she'll try?!  But more about food later, Colleen.

Also we saw lots and lots of cats.  Janset told us cats were favored by Mohammed, so they are protected and fed all over the country.  And I must say we had cat friends under our tables, on our tables, crossing streets, in temples, meowing all the time.  Not as many dogs.  But the dogs are those big yeller dogs and they too wander hither and thither.

We stopped at a pottery place on the Red River.  It was a place where the Hittites, who predate the Turks, made pottery and they use original Hittite patterns in the red clay.  Saw pottery being thrown and had to get out of there pretty much unscathed from the salesman.  They had a cheap room, a middle price room, and a very expensive room.  Of course, he took us to the very expensive room and really worked hard to get us to see the value in the "expensive room".  Then on to lunch...and Food Part 2.