Pamukkale

Pamukkale, translated as "cotton castle", is a series of accumulated carbonate terraces near Denizli, Turkey.  These terraces have been a place to come and bathe for thousands of years.  On the top of these terraces are the remains of the ancient Greco-Roman and Byzantine city of Hierapolis.  The terraced pools are protected these days.  There is a cycle of draining and filling different groups of pools to maintain their condition.  Only the artificial terraces which lead to the top of the castle are accessible for open-air bathing.  The more luxurious pools at the hotels and spas can also be accessed for a fee.  The pools accessible with general access passes are wonderful in themselves.

Cappadocia and the Underground Cities

Cappadocia is an area of beautifully eroded and carved sedimentary rock.  Naturally eroded pillars mark the landscape.  Some of these rock spires were used by Byzantine Christians to create cities and monasteries.  There are several narrow valleys of intricately carved rock houses.  Stacked on top of each other in the cliffs, these houses are a blast to explore.

"Fairy Chimneys"

This area became a center for monasteries during the reign of Theodosius I, who began a policy of anti-paganism and made Christianity the official Byzantine religion.

A beautiful church in the monastic center of Göreme.  These carved habitations were formed by Christians, so there are many ancient churches.

The pillars are created because erosion of the softer rock below is minimized by the harder rock above.

In Cappadocia there are 36 different underground cities.  Many of these were initially excavated during Hittite times, and slowly enlarged over many centuries.  We visited two of these cities.  One called Derinkuyu and the other Kaymakli.  The first one we visited is the largest of all the cities.  Derinkuyu is approximately 60m deep and could hold during its occupation 20,000 people.  These cities also held food and livestock for the people who inhabited them.

These cities were inhabited for the majority of their existence by Christians.  During periods of different rule - like when Muslim kings grew to power, or when the Mongols invaded the area - these cities were used as hideouts for the Christians.  Basically anything that was done above ground - minus agriculture - could be and was done in the cities.

The first city we visited was very touristic and packed with people exploring its many levels.  The second was almost completely empty.  We were basically the only people there.

This deep shaft provided air ventilation between the different levels of the underground city and the surface.  Even with these shafts the air below must have been horrendous.  With fires, metal works, livestock, and thousands of people, the air should have been thick.

Their are endless stair cases meticulously carved through narrow passages.

This stone has many depressions in its surface.  Maybe for cold copper processing?

Here is an air shaft of the second city we went to.  You can see it is not as perfectly carved as the previous air shaft.

When Javier and I came to this room, he started to go into the tunnel on the right.  I - being a nervous person - told him not to go in.  He of course ignored this.  Within ten seconds he was coming out of the tunnel on the left.  We couldn't contain our laughter.

This room is actually marked as being a "school".

Lake Tuz: Turkey's Great Salt Lake

Rather by accident, on the way from Ankara to Cappadocia, we came across an enormous salt lake - Lake Tuz.  There were hundreds of people walking its shores as the sun set.  Our feet became encrusted with salt.  With the light reflecting off the shallow water, it looked as if we were walking on top of the water.

Yediggoller: Our adventure with a broken oil pan.

40 kilometers outside of Bolu, Turkey is a small National Park called Yedigöller.  The park itself is a series of small lakes surrounded by dozens of campsites popular for weekend picnics and parties.  This story is not really about the park; it is about our three day long adventure to get there.

You might be thinking: three days to get 40km?  How slow were you driving?

The problem is that we were driving a little too fast.

We left Bolu in the late afternoon, and because we wanted to get there before dark we were driving a bit faster than we should have been.  As we came around a corner on the dirt road we hit a rock in the road and busted a hole in our oil pan.  I knew immediately what had happened.

We pulled over to the side of the road and threw a bowl under the oil pan to capture most of the oil.  Upon inspection the oil pan had a hole approximately 4cm in diameter.  It was clear the car was not going to be moving without a tow truck or a patch-job.

We were pretty stressed.

With the help of a young couple who passed by shortly after, we got a ride out of the forest.  They were not going back to Bolu where we were staying, but we did not want to risk getting stranded in the forest with no supplies.  They took us to a town to the north on the other side of the mountains from Bolu, where they handed us over to the Turkish National Guard.  The National Guard did their best to try and help us with our situation.  In the end they even got us a free hotel room for the night.  The next morning the bought us bus tickets to Bolu.

Once in Bolu our troubles were far from over.  We now were able to get our stuff from our couch-hosts house, but we still needed to get back to our car and figure out how to get it running.  We did not want to pay the money to have a tow-truck go the 30 kilometers there and back, so we had to come up with another plan.

Javier immediately thought of something he had seen so many times in Mexico.  What if we plugged the hole?  Could we then make it back to town?  We set off to buy a few supplies.  We figured that with some sheet metal and metal epoxy we might be able to cover the hole sufficiently.  The next problem was getting back to the car.

There is very little traffic to Yedigöller, but our only reasonable option to get there was to hitchhike.  We got to the edge of town and started thumbing.  The going was VERY slow.  We had to walk many kilometers between rides.  We were lucky to have a few phrases written down in Turkish explaining our situation.  People felt bad for us when they read our paper, which helped our chances.

The last 10 kilometers or so were in a car with a family going to picnic in Yedigöller.  They dropped us off at our car and wished us luck (at least that's what we gather considering they spoke none of the same languages as us).  

The afternoon was spent covering the hole in the oil pan.  We cleaned off the oil, sand-papered the outer surface, and began the process of closing the holes and cracks.  Using the epoxy I attached carefully cut pieces of the sheet metal to the pan.  I used copious amounts of epoxy making sure that all the cracks were covered.  All that was left to do was wait overnight for the work to dry.

We awoke the next morning and examined the earlier day's work.  It seemed well sealed and was completely dry.  It was time to put in the oil and hope it would work.

After filling the engine with oil and starting the car, we took our time monitoring the oil pan.  There was no rush.  Only when were were confident that the patch would hold and was not leaking too much did we move.

Since we were only a few kilometers from Yedigöller we decidedwe might as well go and check it out.

We walked around the lake exploring the plants and wildlife.  It was beautiful - maybe not so beautiful to be worth the trouble - but very nice nonetheless.

After only a couple hours we returned to the car to begin the drive back to Bolu.  We were happy with the condition of the patch, but we decided to go slow and check it periodically.  Over the 40 kilometers, we stopped several times to check the pan.  There was a slight leak, but we were not overly concerned about it.  We got to the final ridge overlooking Bolu, and we knew that we were  going to make it.

This is when we started to notice that there was a car following us.  This car had been behind us on the dirt road for a while, but we did not think anything of it.  Once we were in town and this car started to take the same turns as us, we became concerned.  Soon a police car joined and signaled for us to pull over.

We pulled over and the officers came to speak with us.  They did not speak English, so the two men from the civilian car that followed us translated for them.  They first asked Javier what he did for work - to which Javier responded, "I am a researcher."  The two civilian men seemed very happy with this response.  They then asked me what I do for work - which at the time was studying at university.  They asked me what I studied, and I told them forestry.  They were very happy about this answer as well.

At this point there was nothing that could have prepared us for what came next.  They told us they would need to search our car.  We did not really care about this, but we wanted to know why.  What did they tell us?  They told us that they knew we were foreign biology researchers, and they knew we were illegally collecting biological samples. 

This was too funny to handle.

We let them search our messy car filled with pasta and Swiss cookies while we tried to explain that we were not researchers.  We showed them our oil pan, and we explained the reason we were at Yedigöller was not to collect samples.

In the end, the police were so upset with these two civilians (who were university professors of biology) that they made them take us to get help fixing our oil pan.  They spent the next couple hours translating for us and helping us get a good deal on repairs.  They felt like idiots.  We were smiling from ear to ear.