Days 1 through 3

Hello from Türikye! From my Twitter and Google Buzz feedback, I know at least Kevin and Louisa are checking this, so this is for them (and for D's mom after she sends her the link). After the wedding, Max & Emi were crashing with us in Boston, and their flight left later in the day on Tuesday. Our flight left Boston at 11am, so we gave them a key to lock up and told them to mail it back to us.

We changed flights in New York and took a Turkish Airlines flight overnight to Istanbul. D tried to get us a free upgrade to first class for our honeymoon, but Turkish Airlines was unmoved. Apparently they get asked that several times a day. Turkish Airlines is the highest-rated carrier in Europe, and aside from the upgrade thing, I can see why. Every seat has its own TV with over 200 movies on demand. The food was good, and most importantly: we didn't crash into the Atlantic. Always a plus. We arrived at TAV (Ataturk) around 9am and it looked just like Logan or JFK. We had to buy 90-day visas for $20 each, and then we collected our bags. While in line at Immigration, we noticed a few other Americans and some Europeans, but lots of tourists from nearer to Turkey. A few Arabs in white thawbs and gutras bought visas while we were waiting. A few Kazakhs were in line ahead of us, as were some Iranian businessmen. It was that moment that I noticed we had left the US.

Immigration was a nightmare. There was the typical winding line that you see at any airport, but there were two separate lines for non-Turks. Our line had only two windows open for hundreds of people and it took an hour to get through with our passports stamped. We then collected our bags and had to pass back through security to get to the domestic terminal. We had three hours to get through immigration and to our next flight, but everything took so long that we arrived 20 minutes before boarding. The flight was great, and we were fed a full meal even though it was only an hour to Kayseri. When we exited the terminal, we had a driver waiting (holding a white placard with our names). That was pretty pimp. It was 30 minutes to Urgup and we were able to check right in. This hotel is fucking spectacular. We're staying at Esbelli Evi and it's the nicest place I've ever stayed. It's larger than our apartment in Boston and it's carved out of the hillside. D and I took a video of our suite and I'll post that later. We've spent most of our time here, and when the video is up, you'll see why. We were even given our own laptop, on which I'm writing this post. The hotel has wireless, so I've had internet access with my iPhone as well. We ate at Ehlikeyf on the first night, which was a 10 minute walk down the hill from our hotel. I'll post pictures of the food later. The waiter told us that he loves Heroes, but NBC isn't broadcasting season six in Turkey yet. We told him that we don't watch Heroes, so he said he loves House, too. Apparently new episodes are broadcast in Turkey only 2 days after they're shown in the US. Dinner was $26 not including tip.

Thursday was our first day of sightseeing. We ate at our hotel and Arda, the hotel manager, gave us a ride to the Goreme Open Air Museum. Cappadocia is surrounded by three volcanic mountain ranges that filled this whole area 50 meters deep with lava over millions of years. The volcanoes became inactive 2 million years ago, and water has carved steep valleys and created interesting formations in the soft rock. The early inhabitants of this region built their homes into the hillsides, using simple tools to build multi-room homes. The Goreme Open Air Museum is a collection of preserved homes and early Christian churches to tour (including one church with an intricately painted ceiling [the Dark Church], that would look identical to the day it was decorated, were it not for later invaders having scratched all of the faces off). We took a walk through the Rose valley nearby and grabbed lunch in the town of Goreme. We got borek (a flaky bread filled with meat and cheese) and some other dishes at a place recommended by our Lonely Planet. Then we took a local bus to see the Uçhisar citadel nearby. It was a castle built into a mountain to protect all of the surrounding valleys from outsiders. It wasn't particularly effective, because there are extensive caves in Kaymakli that were used by the local Christians to hide out when the Romans, and later, Arabs, invaded. Dinner was at the Ziggy Cafe and Restaurant, and it's the highest rated restaurant in the whole area. It was incredible. Photos to follow.

Finally, that brings us to this morning. We got up at 5:30 to take our hot air balloon ride over the province. The ride was 800 TRY for the two of us, and it lasted about an hour and a half. Please see my earlier post for pictures. We finished our ride with a champagne toast in the middle of a sugar beet field, and then got a ride back to our hotel. We ate breakfast around 10am and then came back to our room to plan the day. Instead of doing that, we took a three hour nap and it was awesome. We had been given a bottle of local wine when we checked in, so we took a bath and drank our wine at 3 or 4. I worked on some stuff for grad school and then we got dinner at Dimrit (the worst of the three places we ate while in Cappadocia). However, we saw this cool method of cooking where food is prepared, stuffed into a clay pot, and placed in an oven -- then the clay pot is smashed open to serve the food. I realize this is a long post without most of the details a reader would want. We were most excited about the food when we were planning the trip, and I haven't included any of that here. Apologies. I'll try to post pictures and descriptions later. It's 10:15 here (3:15pm on the East Coast) and we have to get up early to fly to Izmir, in the southeast. If I can find a camera cord (we forgot ours) or a card reader, I'll mention the food before I get home.