North Africa ‘Plus’ Travel Diary

2011

 

The blame for this morning’s early start was entirely mine.  The alarm rang at 4:30 am, I woke Tim at 4:47 am, and at 5:00 am we were standing outside our cave hotel for the Ürgüp Balloons bus.  I had booked an early morning hot air balloon trip, and hot air balloons demand pre-dawn starts to catch the still air with the coolest temperatures.

Hot air ballooning is one of the ‘must do’ activities in Cappadocia.  Each morning, more than 50 balloons take off, each loaded with 16 to 18 people, to glide over the fairy chimney studded landscape around Göreme.  The routes taken vary according to the wind, but the companies guarantee a trip of about an hour.

Having made such an early start, it was disappointing to see that the weather did not look at all auspicious.  There had been a thunderstorm overnight bringing heavy rain, and the pre-dawn glow revealed a thick, heavy layer of dark grey clouds - hardly ideal hot-air ballooning weather.

Nonetheless, we set off to the Ürgüp Balloons base camp where a group of about 80 people had assembled.  The fact that Göreme has some 20 or 30 hot air ballooning companies gives some idea of the scale of this industry.  We were invited to have a light breakfast of tea of coffee and bagel while we waited for the pilots to make a decision whether or not they would be able to fly in the usually brisk morning breeze.

Several announcements were made, all of which were along the lines “we will make a decision soon”.  Finally, at about 6:20 am, the decision was made that we would fly, and we set off in a fleet of minibuses to the Zemi (Love) Valley, an open area a few kilometres to the north-west of Göreme that is famous for its rock formations.

When we arrived, we saw that our company (Ürgüp Balloons) already had four semi-inflated balloons, and nearby there were several other companies with balloons in various stages of inflation.  Our hearts sank, though, when at about 6:45 am it was decided that all the balloons should be deflated because the breeze had become a little too strong.  And so it was that in a forlorn state, we just stood silently in the open field looking at the large deflated balloons lying on the ground, while at the same time, the balloons of some of the other companies were taking to the skies.

But all was forgiven when at 6:55 am the decision was made to re-inflate the balloons, a process that took surprisingly little time.  At 7:00 sharp, we climbed into the baskets and took off.

Unfortunately, the thick grey clouds overhead meant that the countryside lacked the golden glow and long shadows we had been hoping for, but this disappointment was minor compared with the thill of seeing Göreme’s spectacular landscape from above.

Our flight lasted exactly one hour and three minutes, and covered a 15 kilometre track to the east from Zemi Valley, flying low over the village of Çavuşin, with its many abandoned houses cut into the sheer rock face, and then over Güllüdere (Rose Valley) and Kizilçukur Vadisi (Red Valley) before ascending up to 600 metres above the ground and into the thick of the cloud mass (which did not make for brilliant sightseeing), before descending onto a grass field just to the west of the town of Ürgüp.

Upon landing, we were given a glass of champagne before being put onto minibuses for delivery back to our hotels.  Tim and I arrived back at our hotel at 8:45 am, which gave us time to enjoy a proper breakfast before setting out on the day’s drive to Safranbolu.

We had a choice of routes to Safranbolu.  The more direct route offered little in the way of sightseeing, and was a distance of 512 kilometres with an estimated driving time (according to Google Maps) of just under 7 hours.  The alternative route was estimated to take 10 hours, but offered the change to visit Hattuşa, which was the ruined capital of the ancient Hittite empire.  In the end, we decided to take the shorter, more direct route, and keep an eye out for spontaneous sightseeing opportunities indicated by the brown road signs that point to areas of interest to tourists.

Sadly, there was none on the entire trip.

Actually, that is not quite true - there was one brown sign towards the end of the day’s driving pointing to Safranbolu, our destination.  And so it was that our only break in the day’s driving was to fill up with fuel and enjoy a coffee and baklava at a petrol station’s cafe - a very welcome stop but hardly the stuff of great sightseeing.

We thus had quite a quick drive, arriving at our inn in Safranbolu at a little after 4:00 pm.  Our hotel is actually a 160 year old house in which the family living here lets out some of the rooms as a type of B&B operation.  The house is a magnificent example of Safranbolu’s main attraction, which is the old Ottoman style houses made from sun-dried mud bricks,wood and stucco, that still dominate the town’s heart to such an extent that the town has made it onto UNESCO’s world heritage listing.

Despite its beauty, Safranbolu is a largely untouristed town, as Tim and I found when we went for a stroll through the streets in the late afternoon light.  The old buildings were magnificent, despite their various states of disrepair, and it was a joy to wander through the narrow laneways, past mosques, bread shops, street stalls and children playing happily in the streets.

We stopped for a light dinner of koftë followed by Turkish tea in a cafe frequented by local people.  The food was great, although the aroma of the shisha smoking started to become a little overbearing after a while.  Still, it was a very relaxing end to a long day.

I am hoping to sleep in a little tomorrow, as our hosts have told us that breakfast won’t be ready before 9:00 am.  Excellent!

Day 6 - Göreme to Safranbolu, Turkey

Saturday

18 June 2011

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