Turkish Delight

After an 11 hr flight we arrived in Istanbul late on the 1st of March. We stayed with an old friend of Noelles mom, Jennifer and her husband Celil. It was nice to stay with people instead of in a hotel room for a change. It was quite shocking going from 30c weather to 10c and drizzley. Despite the weather, we had a grand old time exploring Istanbul. It is a huge city (something like 20 million) and there is so much to see.

The Blue Mosque

Inside the Hagia Sophia

This picture sums up how the weather felt here.

We flew into the Cappadocia region after 3 days in Istanbul. It is amazing here! Thousands of years ago people carved homes and churches into the hills. We stayed in a hotel that  was carved into the hillside in the town of Goreme. We spent 2 full days here wandering the hillsides and Valleys.

Noelle jumping for joy near the Goreme open air museum

The picture doesnt quite show it, but I am super high up and on a super sketchy, slippery cliff. This was as upright as I could get.

huge rock formations

Uchisar, there are hundreds of houses carved precariously into these hills, it blows my mind!

up in a cave

Noelle up on the 3rd or 4th floor. The rest had collapsed, so it was as high as we could go.

Noelle dipping her foot in the lake

Not! It is really the valley that we hiked back to Goreme from Uchisar. We were pretty sure it was a lake at first though.

Hiking Pigeon Valley back from Uchisar. "Fairy chimneys" at the top right of the picture (the towers with the little hats)

In the Underground city of Derinkuyu

Derinkuyu was pretty crazy. We went down 8 floors, but it once went down 16 to 20 floors, supporting 5000 people!

We spent two days in the south of Turkey, in Antalya. We rested here for the most part because the weather was pretty sucky. We got a traditional turkish bath, where we got scrubbed and slapped around by old turkish people. They rub super hard with an abrasive cloth and take off all your dead skin (and some not so dead skin). Then they lather us up with this big pillow case of soap and bubbles, so many bubbles. Then we got the full body oil massage, it was very intimate.

Noelle got rubbed raw by the old turkish lady.