Old Greeks

July 7, Tuesday: Cappadocia: Today my photo documentarian and I did our tourist duty and climbed in the bus just after breakfast so that our lives could be run by competent professionals for the next eight hour or so.

The Hotel here arranges a three day cycle of tours. One day it is the old Greek cities and sites around here, and the next is the open air museum at Goreme and the pottery city (Avonos), then there is a nature day with a walk down by some lake. We went on the Greek sites trip – and I think we got the best of the three.

I think there were about five or six stops during the day. The first two were the best. We first saw one of the underground cities. These are these amazing descending tunnels and chambers sinking straight down into the ground. I think we got about a hundred feet down (which was plenty) but one could go a lot further. They really are uncertain about who used these when. They might go way back to Assyrian and Hittite times (1800 BCE?) or may be more recent Byzantine things. Essentially, they were a way that entire towns could simply go underground and hide when the war armies over ran the place. Quite a bit of work squeezing down those tunnels and up back out of them.

The next stop was an old Greek city – Soigner(?). The Greek city was lived in up until the big population exchange between Greece and Turkey in 1924. Then Turks lived there until erosion and stone falls seemed to pose problems. So, the old city was abandoned. Our tour involved walking on a path around a high mesa/mountain climbing up to look at some of the old churches or communal kitchens, descending down into valleys where people still grow crops. The place was a combination of cave dwellings with stone construction as well.

The remarkable thing is how the landscape shifts between sandy, sunbaked dust and scrub then down into these beautiful green valleys and canyons. In about fifty steps you can be either in Vermont or Arizona, as you please. During the afternoon there was also a visit to an archaeological dig where they found a small Byzantine town buried in a farmers field. The a visit to a cave monastery – again, cave construction – and too an above ground (finally!) town that used to be the center of Greek wealth and religion in the area.

In the middle of it all, lunch was a simple four course event, starting with a kind of hot tomato salsa, olives and bread, then salad, and a main course of beef in a sizzling dish with peppers and tomatoes. Desert was a simple plate of apricots, just off the tree. Ads I wrote last night, the dinner at the hotel is also very nice – we'll probably do that again tonight.

The tour was nice. You get to meet a few other people from around the hotel, and with only seven of us in the van, it was a nicely paced affair. I don't know if we'll do it again tomorrow. The sites (the open air museum at Goreme and the pottery places at Avanos) are ones I have seen last year, and I suspect my assistant gets the basic idea of the old Greek stuff and cave construction. I also doubt he would particularly enjoy the pottery places – but we shall see. A day of relaxation, reading, walking might be just the thing about now.

Most Remarkable Thing: I think I need to give up gardening. The old abandoned Greek cave monastery we visited this afternoon rises up out of this Turkish families extended garden. Imagine these paths winding through these old lava stone outcroppings with caves cut into them (religious images painted on the walls) – and all around this they have planted vines, flowers, fruit trees and vegetable gardens – watered off the spring that was the center of the old monastery. Today they sit under canopies and pergolas in their gardens and collect the admission fare from the tourists who happen to roll by.

Photo: Carpets! These ones being sold out of a shop by the underground city we visited.