Fairy Chimneys and Such

On our first day we went to an  underground village museum a good couple bus rides away. They are natural caves built into the sides of formations that remind me a lot of Badlands in  S. Dakota. The rooms are not large, some have been enhanced, shaped and decorated,  with stone-cutting tools. People actually lived in  these many many caves as early as the 11th century and probably well before. The underground village museum was a pretty complete example. It had rooms they call stables for a few horses, rooms for cooking, food storage, study, worship, and I suppose they had rooms to sleep in. There were many small tunnels from room to room, some with huge round stones that were rolled into the walkway in the event of attack. They are said to all move completely underground in the event an invasion. Ventilation and drainage tunnels were also built in to these underground complexes as are burial spaces.

This morning we went to the open air museum which seems to concentrate on churches, tiny ones. These have domes cut in, columns, naves, crypts, and icons. Some of the churches have designs drawn in red and yellow ochre. Most of these are pretty primitive: symbols, zig zag borders, often a cross in a circle design. The icons are frescoe, much more primitive than those in the big Orthodox churches I visited in Eastern Europe. Some are faded but others are still fairly bright. What seems sad is the destruction to them. There are the usual initials carved into them for who knows how many centuries. A lot of the figures have had their faces scratched on or completely scratched off in what seems to be a very deliberate manner. I asked about it but was unable to get any answers as to why. I wondered if it was encouraged by the coming of a different religious group. I think these little chapels were Orthodox churches, probably Greek judging by the lettering. 

In the evening we took a bus up to Kale Castle, actually a large cave with lots of 'apartments' in them and housing built all around. It is actually a tiny town but I can't recall the name. We walked downhill back to Goreme taking pictures until the shadows were too deep, arriving back at the hostel after dark. The next morning we walked across the road into the formations in search of 'fairy chimneys', tall, more needle like formations, many with little caves in them that once served a function rather than being simply caves. We found one that was a chapel where a little dome had been shaped above and a couple other tiny rooms. This one had designs of ochre painted inside. We turned back when the trail got too steep for the little old ladies among us to navigate. Off to a good lunch and an afternoon bus to Pammakule.