The next morning we had an opportunity to go to the Mevlana Museum. We paid and went on the organized tour, but we should have just done it ourselves.
The Mevlana Museum is about the rite of the Whirling Dervishes. The rite consists of readings and special music and a group of dervishes who spin around in a kind of trance. The format of the spinning represents their ties to both heaven and earth and the spinning ritual takes the dervishes through a demonstration of faith and love.
At the museum we learned a
bout how applicants are selected into the order. They go to the center and apply, then they pray in a small side room while the Dervish clan debates the worthiness of the applicant. The applicant must demonstrate specific abilities to be accepted. As the applicant prays their shoes rest in a niche beneath the praying platform. If the applicant is accepted to the order their shoes are turned toes out. If not accepted the shoes are turned toes in.The museum displayed many beautiful examples of caligraphy and included the sarcophogi of many famous dervishes. Link to our pictures of the museum.
After the museum we boarded our bus and headed out for Cappedocia. It was a beautiful day and the scenery on the drive was very pretty, with blue sky, green fields and trees, salt lakes and snowy mountain peaks along the way. After awhile we began to see caves in the hillsides, and eventually many cave dwellings carved into the soft tufa cliffs. We were entering the land of troglodytes.
As we moved farther into Cappedocia we began to see interesting formations, similar to the hoodoos in Bryce Canyon. These hoodoos are called Fairy Chimneys here in Turkey and they are quite a bit taller than the thin ones in Bryce--up to 200 feet high. They are capped with a "hat" that withstands the effects of rain and protects the tall column that rises up from the earth.Soon we pulled into an area called the Kamaliki where we visited the underground city. This is a rabbit warren of
cave dwellings that are all interconnected and. at one time, housed 8000 people. We carefully picked our way down the narrow passageways from room to room, going deeper and deeper into the cliff. We saw how storage bins were cared out of the sides and a church. When the city needed protection from invaders they would roll big round discs of stone in front of the openings. It was an interesting tour, but I am afraid I might get claustrophobic living 8 stories down into the cliff. Don's Pictures
After the visit to the underground city we continued on our bus ride. As we neared Neveshir Salih got a telephone call from the hot air balloon company. They proposed that our group take their balloon ride that afternoon rather than wait until the morning. So Don and Cheryl and several others were dropped off and the rest of us went on to the hotel. When the ballooners returned they were raving about their experience. The weather was sunny, blue and beautiful. The balloons took them right down into the canyons of the Goreme Open Air Museum, where they floated among the numerous cave dwellings and rock formations. They ballooned for an hour and then had a champagne toast before returning to the hotel for dinner. None of the ballooners could stop raving about their experience.
I have 10 mins of nice video of the balloon flight. http://youtu.be/jy4l0JgMK0M
In the morning we woke up and looked out the window at a snowy fairyland. Overnight the weather
had changed and big, fluffy snowflakes were drifting down from the sky. After breakfast we bundled up in every piece of clothing we brought and then we all got on the bus and off we went through the snow to the Goreme Park to see the rock formations and caves for ourselves.
The Goreme Park is a protected area now. In a spectacular landscape, entirely sculpted by erosion, the Göreme valley and its surroundings contain rock-hewn sanctuaries that provide unique evidence of Byzantine art in the post-Iconoclastic period. Dwellings, troglodyte villages and underground towns – the remains of a traditional human habitat dating back to the 4th century – can also be seen there. This settlement was a monestary and convent for early Christians. The many cave churches and frescoes attest to the use of the region.
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