CHRHAD World

The main reason for tourists to visit Cappadocia is the seemingly well-formed rock formations in the region. Some unique features of the rock formations are naturally created, but to add to its uniqueness, people also carved dwellings on the rock formations, giving historical aspect to the place. These dwellings are called cave houses, which still exist until now and even turned into cave hotels and cave restaurants. But for the housing purpose, (Turkish) government seems to have encouraged dwellers to move to more modern houses in the town areas of Nevşehir, the province where most of our point of interests to visit are located. On Wednesday, 4 July 2012, we woke up at 4 a.m. to catch the hot-air balloon flight tour, which always start early in the morning. We were picked up by the balloon flight operator company van at our hotel, not by our usual tour bus. As said before, this flight tour was optional so not everyone of the group joined the hot-air balloon. It costed 200 U...

Monday, 2 July 2012 (second half) After lunch that day, we got into the bus and continued our journey for about three and a half hours to the town of Pamukkale in another province, Denizli, famous for its Hierapolis historical site. Pamukkale itself means "The Cotton Castle" and it is named so because of the long-established textile industries within the area as well as the natural features formed by hot springs and the limestone formation from its mountainous area, shaping what is called white travertine. Meanwhile, Hierapolis (in Greek,  hieron : holy place, temple;   polis : city) is the name of an ancient city built by the hot springs area on the hill during the Hellenistic and Roman period. The city was important for worship and of course, for spa, on which ancient people used for relaxing and for medical purpose. Ümit posing in front of the bird-eye view map of Hierapolis site Remains of the ancient city inside the historic site In the modern day, ...