Saturday, April 17, 2010
We managed to avoid all the volcanic ash which has frozen air traffic in Europe and arrived this morning in Istanbul. Instead of the “short” northern route which crossed England, the pilots took us the southern way over Spain, Southern Italy and up to Istanbul.
We made our way from the international terminal, retrieved our visas, and dragged our sleepy selves along the long hallways towards the domestic terminal for our flight to Kayseri, for our excursion to Cappadocia.
Somewhere along the way, we lost Joanne. It’s 9:30 at night as I write this and no one has seen nor heard from her. I’m sure we’ll hear tales tomorrow at breakfast of her great adventures, the wonderful meals she has partaken in, the treasures she found filling the time with shopping, and the interesting people she met. That’s Joanne --- there’s always a story.
After an hour bus ride, we arrived at our hotel, the Dedeman Cappadocia. We were given an hour to rest and told to meet again at the buses at five pm for our first visit to the cave city. Augie and I made it on time, only to find Karen and Dave, the only other members of our group of 12 who didn’t fall asleep and miss the trip.
We were taken to the Cappadocia Cave Resort, perched high on a hill overlooking the rock-carved houses of Cappadocia. The hotel has 79 rooms, many of which are actually caves. They also have a beautiful spa. We sampled wines and snacks and enjoyed the spectacular views.
Next, we were taken to another area where we enjoyed a cliff side view of a large valley of more rock-carved houses and villages. There were also many vendors lined up to meet us. How clever of them to ply us with wine and then take us shopping!
We arrived back at our hotel just in time for our buffet dinner. Still no sign of Joanne, and Rhonda and Shelli didn’t wake up even for dinner. We enjoyed a wide selection of vegetable dishes, yoghurts, chicken, fish, and pasta. For dessert, there was plenty of baklava. Yum!
Finally, it’s up to our rooms for some much needed sleep, and a sleep in day -- wake up call at 0730!
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