I would be lying if I told you if I didn’t come to
Cappadocia because of all the photos of rising hot air balloons that filled the sky. In fact, I’ve actually been saving my hot air balloon experience for this exact moment.
You would think that there isn’t much to do in this remote area of the world, but that’s actually the beauty of it all.
Cappadocia is generally a stop in one’s Turkey itinerary solely for this purpose, but
I’m so glad I made it our only destination for a full 5 days.
We stayed at a pretty cave hotel called
Sultan Cave Suites in the town called
Goreme. It was conveniently located to the
Open Air Museum and a few other attractions (
Underground City,
Uchisar Castle, and
Pigeon Valley).
While we were there, we were lucky that our hotel's restaurant,
Seten, is actually one of the best in the area. We ate at the dining place on the first night and for the rest of the trip, we discovered that they were able to bring the food directly to our room. Nothing like being able to fine dine in your bath robe underneath the open sky.
It was probably not the best place to stargaze, but that’s what we did every night we were there. We would set up dinner on our cave hotel balcony and shared some food with the stray cats that came by, while the stars replace candle lights.
I've actually already shared
most of the stories along the journey via Instagram, so I won't bore you with them again. But for the most part, we were there during a time right when Ramadan just finished, meaning everyone had returned home (elsewhere) for the holidays. We had the whole town practically to ourselves and although the sky wasn't filled with balloons, we still saw some of the best sunrises we've ever seen thanks to the valley landscape of the town (especially from
Sunset Point). It was actually really hard NOT to wake up every day just to witness and have a humble Turkish breakfast at our hotel's rooftop that's covered with beautiful rugs and featured the best balloon view in town.
Goreme itself is quite quaint and charming in its own way. The people are so just so lovely and kind (I know, so opposite of the things the media will tell you about
Turkey). Like every tourist location, people will ask you to come visit their shop and check out their restaurants, but no one was pushy or was I ever overwhelmed by people approaching me. In fact, it felt safer than Europe in my opinion.
I had the magic carpet shopping trip of my life at
Galerie Ikman. I do have to say, I got really lucky because Shun and I left a great impression on the owner and his father, so we ended up getting a really good deal on a silk carpet. I highly recommend just coming to a shop being very respectful and genuinely curious to learn about the crafts of the people. We also got the whole place to ourselves to photograph and
they even brought us tea to enjoy while we looked at a million carpets.
By now, it should be clear that I plan all of my travels around the restaurants and food places that I want to try. For
Cappadocia, it was no exception. We discovered a cute homemade clay pot restaurant called
Dibek for lunch, but some locals also recommended
Sedef. In our short trip, we also got to fit in
Lil'a, one of the top restaurants in
Cappadocia located at the
Museum Hotel in
Uchisar. But having experienced a real local meal cooked and shared with some locals the day before, we definitely didn't see much of a difference in taste.
Wearing: Madewell top, Amo Denim jeans, Common Projects sneakers, Ray-Ban hexagonal mirror sunnies, and Proenza Schouler PS11 bag.
Personal growth is something that's hard to notice. Although I was only in
Cappadocia for a week, I learned so many new things and discovered some pretty interesting things about myself that made me feel like I grew a lot in just a short period of time.
On the morning of my hot air balloon ride (we went with
Voyagers Balloon), my stomach was quite queazy. I wasn't sure if I was actually going to be able to do it, but it was actually so peaceful. You could hardly tell you were that high up and it literally feels like you're softly floating despite the wind changes at different altitude layers. It was as magical as I hoped it would be and one of the highlights of my life so far.
I found my new calling for
pottery spinning in the town of Avanos near
Goreme. When I quit my job last July, I remember signing up for a class and somehow forgot and never made it. So this was something that really made me feel like the past year had come full circle.
Although I'm not much a nature activity person, the rock formations and the views from the top of many of the attractions in
Goreme and
Uchisar opened my eyes to the thrill of hiking.
My ability to connect and communicate with others who are different than I am have also improved drastically. As someone who speaks really fast and doesn't have much patience, I've learned to observe a little more and be more mindful of the way I talk so that I can better express what I'm saying when having a meaningful conversation with a local.
Going to
Turkey was a pretty last minute and serendipitous decision for Shun and me, as it was the only location between New York and Tokyo that we could meet up conveniently. This trip to
Cappadocia wasn't just another check off my bucket list, but a fulfilling one that I'll cherish for a while.
