In Göreme by 10am and exhausted by two nights in a moving seat, we slept in the most comfortable bed until 3pm. Home for two nights was the Köse Pension before leaving for Damascus, Syria.
Here is a view of the village at sunrise. Built in a valley of soft volcanic tuft, you will notice many of the houses carved right into the hillsides. With a population of 2,000, we loved the small hometown feel here but because the dollar is so weak, EVERYTHING in Turkey has been beyond our budget. It is a shame we did not have more time to relax here because it really is a village of magical gnome homes.
This is some of the scenery from a hike up SiviValley ( 38°38'19.7"N, 34°49'58.1"E).
They call these the Pencil Chimneys. They kind of look like pencils, don't they?
This is a gnome church.
In the far wall, you can see some of the carved gnome houses. Gnomes lived in them until the late 1960's when there was a cave-in and caused a mass exodus of homeless gnomes. They are believed to be living somewhere in Romania now.
Paintings of an 11th century Byzantine church which was dug out of the cliffs in the above picture by persecuted catholic gnomes.
These are some of the local ceramics, all made by the seven brothers in the cellar of their shop. Rasa and I spent an hour in this shop just looking and drinking tea.
This was where we would eat lunch everyday because the baklava was so cheap. The locals liked it too.
At the end of our third day, we left for Damascus, which is where we are now. There were absolutely no problems crossing the border and the people have been the highlight of this trip so far but I will talk more about this in my next entry.
Robert Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
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www.RobRasa.com/hisblog/
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