How an 11 hour trip turned into a 20 hour trip.

Yesterday we packed up and left for Cappadocia!

We jumped on an evening bus (otobus) ready to have some real adventures.

The bus ride was scheduled to be 11 (on bir) hours (saat).

Luckily the buses are really nice with tvs (televizyonler), right?

2 hours in we stopped in the middle of the highway.  There was an accident.  An animal ran into the road and a car filled with people hit it, flipping three times.  I felt sick to my stomache and prayed to God that those people were okay...

I don't know how possible that would be though.  Especially since most Turks don't wear seatbelts...

We drove again passing a ton of mountains and I couldn't help but be amazed at how beautiful the scenery was.  I realized that Noah's ark was found about 200 miles from where I was at.  That made me remember that the whole World had been flooded.  It is really amazing to look up at a mountain that high and know that Noah and his family may have passed over it.  God really is amazing!

8 hours in.  Our bus broke down.

The wonderful employees apparently felt that it was none of out concern so they didn't share much information with any of the passengers...

until the 3rd time we broke down at a gas station.

We then broke down a 4th time in the middle of no where.  When I say no where, I mean it.

I should be taking photos of underground tunnels right now, instead I am photographing a broken Metro bus.

They told us they fixed it.

We broke down a 5th time at a rest stop... where we sat with no news for over an hour.

We are officially 4 hours late.

Damper... yes.

But Michael and I continued to have fun, kind of.

A lack of sleep tends to put everyone a little on edge. (speaking for myself)

"Cay! Cay!"

(Tea! Tea!)

The waiters walked around serving tea while we waited.  I sincerely felt bad for them having to deal with 40 cranky customers.

Finally we were able to load back on the bus and continue on our... adventure.

We finally made it, just 6 hours late.

We realized that people in the area apparently don't know what they are talking about because they said that the area we would be staying in would have nothing around for miles except bars.  They also said that there would be no way for us to get to any attractions.

Hmph.

Well that is quite the trip ruiner.

Good thing they were completely WRONG.

After our bus breaking down 5 times, a shuttle, and a domus (another type of bus) later

We finally made it to our desintation.

Unfortunetly, our spirits did not make it at the same time.

We were nearing 8 hours past our original arrival time, exhausted, hungry, and carrying some very heavy back packs.

There was not too much in the cards for the day anymore since most of the tourist attractions were nearing closing time.

I can say that the area we stayed in was honestly one of the most beautiful places EVER.

My pictures can't really capture the view.

Everywhere you turned there was something else interesting to look at.

The town was so cute and a ton of interesting shops to look in.

The only thing it lacked was some water to go swimming in.

I still have yet to go swimming... I NEED TO SWIM.

For the rest of the day we walked around exploring Urgup (the town we stayed in) and we ate some yummy food.  We were between mountains so we climbed to the top of the middle of them (very steep hill) luckily it was paved.

When we got to the top we walked down the road... even further (we walked a total of 2.5 miles to get there and back).

once near the top of the first road we saw, what I thought was, a bunch of sand.  Sand = water right?

We climbed the mountain of "sand" to find it was solid rock.

Once we got to the top, we realized that there were some very interesting stones further up the mountain... climb we did.

What did we find?  I'll let the photos explain.

Uc Guzeller (Three Beautifuls)

Mom, Pop, and Child

It is really...really high up.  If you look to my left at that road and down between those hills/mountains, that is where we walked from.  I was, quite literally, on top of the World.

Camel!!!

Me: "It's a camel!"

Michael: "No. It's fake."

Me: "No... I saw it move, why would they have a fake camel?"

Michael: "It's fake."

*Camel moves head*

Michael: "AH! Look it's a camel!"

Me: "Oofah!"

End of day 1 in Cappadocia/Urgup