Christmas in Turkey, Paintball, Cappadocia and the infamous "Dead Sea Desert"

We spent the day after my birthday (the day that I have always classed as the WORST day of any year, which turned out to be a pretty good day) wandering almost aimlessly around Aleppo, which has lived up to the description of beings a ‘pretty cool town’.  First stop was the citadel, yep another citadel! This one was set on a small hill and boasted great views of the city; most of the citadel was pretty ordinary, except the views and the impressive entry gates which contained underground passages. From there we headed through the souk (local market) in an attempt to find some grub for lunch, grub there was a plenty, but for a vegetarian and a ‘try hard vegetarian’ (Spencers attempt at humour) there was little. I wasn’t even taken by the camel carcass that had been butchered and was hanging in the narrow alley of the souk, “now there’s some spare ribs!” the poor animals head and neck were hanging from a meat hook which just did not seem strong enough for such a huge chunk of meat!

Aleppo Citadel, Syria

Spencer looks professional, Aleppo

Myself, Aleppo

Donkey in the Souk, Aleppo

We found a little bakery which served some great pastries, the standard of bakery food has improved the further  north we have travelled. After the ‘try hard vegetarian’ has picked the chicken off her pastry we continue on in the search of an internet cafe. We didn’t get very far before we were stopped by a couple of university students who needed some help with an English exercise in a workbook, we sat in a park whilst Spencer did his best with what appeared to be a pretty ordinarily written book before being offered ice cream to thank us for our efforts. Always a little wary of accepting food from strange men in foreign countries we decline but ask for directions to an internet cafe instead. They did better than just give directions, they actually walked us there, although we did wonder if they actually knew where one was or did just walk around until they found one!

After a couple of hours of sorting out issues from home and sorting out money and uploading photos and blogs and trawling through the ridiculous amount of emails which seem to accumulate between countries we headed back to our accommodation at the Spring Flower Hostel, upon which I could possibly fill a whole blog entry....but here is the condensed version...

The place was the inspiration for the television show ‘Fawlty Towers’, but Basil Fawlty at the Spring Flower Hostel is the most anal person to have ever walked the planet, and someone who is actually more security conscious than me, like even to the point where the dodgy home made soap was even locked up! And the fridge! And the only person to have the key was the manager, who doesn’t arrive at work until lunchtime! In all the random places I have stayed this year I have not seen another place with their bookshelf locked up! And not only is the book shelf locked up, they charge a fee to borrow a book! AK tried to trade an Africa lonely planet guide for a Turkey one, the bloke wanted 15 euro for the trade and the book! and the bloke put on white gloves to handle second hand backpacker books? Basils two employees both spoke little English and between them didn’t have enough brain cells to rub together,, one had been the inspiration for ‘Where’s Wally’ and the other was just a waste of space, oxygen and food! Oops! I forgot this was supposed to be the condensed version, I’ll cut to the chase...The useless bastards held my Birthday Cake remnants for hostage...well not really...but it sounded like a good story. The left over’s of my cake ended up in the fridge, which is kept locked and the manager keeps the key, and only works half days, ‘no key’ says Where’s Wally, ‘Can you get key?’ says me, ‘No manager’ says Where’s Wally....hmmm... over three hours of hostage release negotiations the cake is freed! My advice....never stay at a place where you have to ask for toilet paper each time you go to the toilet or a place where you buy internet hours and the dic^&*ads keep changing the password every hour to kick you off the net! 

The following day we had a relaxed start as the agent who was to take us across the border was not available until about 1pm to take us across (By using an agent we get a cheaper rate and supposedly an easier passage through the border) The Syria-Egypt border would be better suited to Africa, no processes or systems. You take your passport to the desk, they take it and give you a recept for it, but take so long about this and serve anyone who has pushed in, that you walk off and have to be called back for the receipt, you then carry this receipt about 400m away, through he duty free shops, past the toilets, money changers and ATM to pay for your visa, then walk the 400m back through the shops, etc etc with the visa sticker to get it stuck in your passport, then have your passport returned to you and walk the 400m back through to the shops etc etc! I needed to go to the toilet, I figured it was far too easy to spot a WC sign and be able to use it free! Hmm, well I did see the price sign on the way in $1USD, crazy, even with the strength of the Aussie Dollar currently! With no one at the desk I took my chances, the man caught me on the way out, I acted as though he was a money changer...."No, I don't need money changing", "No, no, money, thank-you", "No my husband has the money". From there we loaded back into the truck, the sun had gone down and so had the temperature, drastically! I huddled up in two jumpers, thermals, beanie, and scarf around my face and my Maasai blanket and we waited, waited and waited to get out of the border gates, another wonderful legacy of the border designer is the five lanes of traffic that must merge into one lane to exit the gates, it took us about 40 minutes. During this time, unbeknown to us, kids have tried climbing up on the cab, they swiftly had their fingers bent back, so they reverted to throwing stones at the cab, in retaliation to this Gab got out and chased them down.

After a couple of hours in the truck we make camp at a truck parking bay, Pat and Kim were on food group that night and did extremely well to get dinner on laps before an hour had passed. I look into the distance and see the burn off of a local refinery, the flame must have been 20m in the air, I wish to camp under that flame! Mark tells us how he camped in the same place last year and it was too hot for people to put their tents on the bitumen, I went to bed in my thermals and a beanie!

We have a 5.30 get-up for a 6am departure on Christmas Eve, after a few hours in the truck we stop at a town for Christmas dinner shopping and a grog roundup. We arrive in the town of Goreme in the Cappadocia region, which is an old ancient city, consisting of rock chimneys and towers which have dug out caves and houses which used to be inhabited. The landscape looks a little eerie, sort of like the outline of ghosts. We check into the nicest accommodation that Spencer and I have seen in many, many months, it’s warm and dry and has clean toilets and showers and a great lounge area with fire and free wi-fi, uh, oh! We make a ban on the overuse of Internet and start hitting the grog. (Yep the Rock Valley Pansion (Turkish word for Pension which is like a backpackers, but better) is so cool, that they even let the overland trucks drink their own grog in the bar!) I get stuck into my $1.50 for 750ml Syrian Vodka, which seems to have even less taste than normal vodka, I am worried that it is watered down, but still take my time lest it comes back and kicks me in the ass later that night. Spencer falls asleep on the couch, others wander off one by one, I head up to bed but the sound of Spencer and Burbs snoring scares me back out of the room with computer in hand for some internet time. Internet wasn’t very successful, not due to any technical error, more so the dic^&ead man who though he was super fantastic and started bagging the s*$t out of Australians, despite himself holding an Australian passport! He is a Turkish man who has lived in Australia for 7 years but who claims that ‘all Australians are racists’, ‘all Australian men are as&*%les’ ‘Australians are idiots’ and ‘anyone can get an Australian passport, they give them to everyone’ I cracked at the stage that he called me a racist and said I was scared of people from other countries moving to Australia! I yelled at the dic%#@ad and said something like “well send your Australian passport back’ etc etc (I went on for a good 3-4 minutes) loser! I have no problems with anyone from outside Australia immigrating so long as they are proud to live there! And for those of you who know me, know that I have a lot of friends who were not born in Australia. So the next morning when I wake up with the worst hangover ever (I totally blame the cheap Syrian vodka) I am still filthy cranky that some asshole would hate Australians so much, that in between vomits I attempt to tell everyone about it, later it turns out that this loser is actually the brother of the owner of this place. (I finish vomiting at 1pm....Just in time for lunch!)

Cappadocia

On account of being close to death from my affair with cheap Syrian vodka I miss breakfast and wait for Christmas lunch, Italian style. Gabs, an Italian and our driver Mark who has an Italian Nonna cook up a fantastic lunch of lasagna and ravioli. Many others (not me) help out with salad, potato salad and trifle. 

Later that night we assemble for the opening of our Secret Santa gifts, the previous day I have a sneaky feel of my gift and announced that it was a pair of donkey slippers, I was close and super impressed to see a pair of fluffy, stuffed lion slippers and a donkey fridge magnet! Thanks Kyle! Great choice, they have hardly left my feet since receiving them!

Spencer and I headed out on Boxing Day for a stroll around town and through the valleys of chimneys and rock carvings, Spencer tells me that on Christmas Eve he received an email about our unit, more issues, two of our new tenants have been into the office and told the agent that the third person has done a runner with the rent money, the agents have given then until the 6^th to pay up or the eviction process starts. I start crying, after loosing close to $4000 in rent and paying a $600 re-letting fee and $500 of advertising costs I really hoped that the tenants would stay longer than a month. Shall have to wait and see what happens, I can assure LJ Hooker that when we get back we will be closely looking into what has happened and both rental checks, background checks etc.

Myself, Goreme

Feeling pretty down in the mouth we wander almost aimlessly through the hills and meet up with Pat, Tanja and Ish and decide to walk to the next town to go wine tasting with them at the Turasan tasting centre, turned out to be a good day, with ordinary wine. I didn't particularly like any of the tastings that I had, so took a punt on the merlot, which was quite good and well enjoyed over dinner that night.

Pat, Tanja, Ish, Spencer and myself 'cheers' during wine tasting

The next day most of the group decided to go paint-balling, as a virgin paint-baller I was a little apprehensive (I have seen way too many bruises on others in the aftermath). As we had 15 people playing and only gear for 10 at once we had to play in two groups. I sat out the first game to check out exactly how it is played, after watching for half an hour I had decided that the aim of the game was to run around, crawl a bit, add in a couple of commando rolls and shoot as many people as possible. Soon enough I was kitted up and running around, crawling a bit, no commando rolls for me though...way too old for that rot....and trying to shoot as many people as possible (not so easy as the only things I have ever fired in my life have been a water pistol and a cap gun! I get hit first in the knee; it didn't hurt as much as I had expected, then instantly I am hit in the head, the culprit? Spencer! So I spend my 30 seconds out before restarting and getting hit in the head again! Another 30 seconds out and then bam, hit in the chest! More time out and I see AK running towards our flag, I hunt him down, gun in one arm firing, and maybe hit him, but at the same time he hits me a little more convincingly (it’s amazing what two hands on your gun can do) I am out again and sometime around this we win the game and start again. This time though Mark changes teams (he has his own paint-ball gun which is much more powerful and a whole lot more accurate than our dodgy guns), this makes a big difference and Son, Kim, Gabs and I are soon in dire straights. A hit on my upper chest is luckily exploded by the tyre I was hiding behind first so no pain, sometime around here I am out (again) and restart the game and shortly after realise that I am crouching behind a pile of sandbags beside Ronald (who is on the other team), he is shooting at Kim, I look at him and figure that there is a mutual truce here....hmmm. Yeah until he shoots me in the thigh at point blank range, now that hurt! After we lose the second game Spencer and I have a shoot out to use the last of our balls, I hide behind a tyre and move to a barrel before my gun runs out of gas, Mark tells me to use his gun, which is a whole lot better, after a shoot out with both of us hiding behind tyres, Spencers gun runs out of gas, if not egged on by everyone else, I may have found the compassionate side of my heart, but still seething from my head and knee shot I was out for revenge so ran behind his pile of tiles and pelted him with paint at close range. From there we headed back to the Rock Valley Pansion, Son had offered to cook tea and Ish had offered to help so I figured I would join them, it turned out to be a very interesting few hours of my day. Veggie tarts, roast veggies and salad followed by a sticky date pudding. Sounds easy? Hmm, all went according to plan, the tarts were topped with pastry leaves, salad was dressed and veggies soft when the desert sauce failed to thicken, we start a search for the corn flour, no luck, turn the truck inside out no corn flour, turn the heat up, no thicker? Hmm, I cannot understand what the issue is, I have used the same ingredients as last time, ‘maybe it’s the shape of the saucepan?’ I say...After 40 minutes of boiling I am back out at the truck searching for something else to save the situation when Ish comes running out saying “it was salt, it didn’t set because it was salt!” Instead of using 1kg of sugar I have added in 1kg of salt! It had been inadvertently purchased as sugar (it was labeled in Turkish and was the biggest grained salt I have ever seen, with the exception of rock salt!) Ish heads down the street and I head back into the kitchen laughing my ass off, he buys nutella and we try to resurrect the pudding, luck has it that it turns out a treat! I start thinking scientifically and start sprouting words such as saturated salt solution (where you cannot dissolve any more solid into water), and start saying that it is 3X more salty than the Dead Sea! The nutella desert is fantastic and I learn the lesson of taste testing as you cook! I also take  moment to check out my leg, I already have a round ring of bruising from my thigh shot!

Gab under fire during paintball

Before the war began

Myself, paint ball

I won!

The following day Son, AK, Burbs, Ish, Pat, Tanja, Spencer and I hired scooters and headed out for Derinkunu Underground City which was a good 30 odd kilometer away from Goreme. I was a little nervous that I was not going to like scooters as it has been a long time since I have been on a motorbike. The first couple of kilometers were a little wonky, but once I realized that speed equaled steadiness I was away. I even hit 90km/h at one stage! We had a few stops and had to wait for a couple of people who were still getting used to their scooters. Some of the little towns that we went through were very cool, it was also very cool where we stopped to play in some snow on the side of the road (I mean cool as in cold, but not as cold as we had expected!). Eventually we arrived at the underground city and were not disappointed, it was 50 odd meters underground and contained a wine cellar, food cellar and even a school room (although i would never want to teach in this room!) Possibly the best part of the day was realizing that I got to ride my scooter home again! It was getting late and the sin sets at about 4.30pm so there was little dilly-dallying on the way home, although we did find the time to hit some gravel roads and Spencer did take some time to get airborne over a median strip (he claims that it was the accelerator that stuck on!). We stopped at Rose Valley to watch the sunset, yep, we had actually missed sunset, but the colors in the sky just got better and better the longer we waited. From there we headed back into Goreme, not an easy ride as it was pretty dark by then. Upon returning to the shop we had our good day shattered, Ish had had a 'mishap' on his bike, caused byt eh fuel gauge not working, the man at the shop wanted 250 TL (about $170AUD) for the damage, and this is despite no condition report being completed and them having absolutely no proof that he had done the damage. i was standing around a little nervously at this stage as I had a 'little spill' on my bike, embarrassingly so it was in the main street of a town and i hadn't had an issue all day, I was hardly moving when the back tyre spun out on gravel and I couldn't hold the weight of the bike, i sort of jumped clear but got a foot stuck underneath and two very sore kneecaps where they slammed into the cobblestone roadway (oh, and a little bit of a bruised ego after several men came to help and told me to drive slowly!) The bike had started leaking fuel and the mirror was bent and there were a few scratches...hmmm, maybe i will put off buying a Harley for a little longer yet!

Myself on my scooter

Scootering! Whoo hoo!

Fisheye in the mirror

Burbs, Ish, AK, Spencer, Myself, Son, Tanja and Pat

Myself, underground city

Underground city

Sunset at Rose Valley

Scooter view sunset