Previous Day (Hot Air Balloon & South Cappadocia)
Destination: Greece & Turkey
Duration: 18 Days 17 Nights (Aug 06~Aug 23, 2012)
Day 4: Cappadocia –> Konya –> Pamukkale
After breakfast in the hotel, we checked out from hotel
and depart for Konya in a van with strange seating arrangement with Peter and
Robert (the 2 Australian guys). If you look at the picture, you would notice
that the seats were face to face. It was actually inconvenient especially for
long distance ride due to leg room issue.
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| Breakfast Time, Turk loves their hard-boiled egg |
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| The Van |
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| Long hour Ride... |
We were told that today would be a long day mostly due to
long distance drive from Cappadocia to Pamukkale. After 2 hours ride, we
arrived at Konya to visit our 1st destination of the day - 13th
century Selcuk caravanserai "Sultanhan". Our tour guide explained
that this was one of the ancient Silk-Road Caravanserai where trader stopped to
rest. The Silk-Road ran from Europe, Central Asia and China so a Caravanserai
was kind of like an ancient ‘hotel’ to provide safe shelter.
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| Sultanhan!!! |
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| Entering the Gate... |
It was built like a fort and there were bath area, mosque, courtyard and covered area inside. The courtyard was used by traders in warm weather but the covered area was used during cold weather. It was quite dark in there thus the blur photos.
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| A Mosque in the Middle of the Courtyard |
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| The Bath Area |
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| Covered Area |
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| A Dome in the middle of the Covered Area |
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| It was dark!!! |
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| Mosque at 2nd Floor |
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| View from the Top |
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| Hi from 2nd Floor!!! |
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| Covered Area beside Courtyard |
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| Goodbye Sultanhan! |
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| Look at all the Carving! Amazing huh? |
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| Look like a Fort from outside... |
We then continued to visit the Mevlana Mausoleum, Mevlana
was a great mystic poet and Islamic spiritual leader, who founded the sect of
''Whirling Dervishes''. We 1st visited the tomb room where shoe cover
was required for all visitors. Unfortunately photography was not allowed inside
this room. There were coffins and sarcophagus for Mevlana and his followers and
descendents and the room was decorated Ottoman calligraphy. There were also Korans
(Al-Quran) in various copies and one was so small under it was written with
hair. There was also a box containing the Holy Beard of Muhammad.
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| Mevlana Mausoleum from the Garden |
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| The Garden |
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| Entrance to the Tomb Room |
We walked to the other side of the mausoleum to visit the
17 dervish cells with stories and life-size models of dervishes depicting their
lives.
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| The side with 17 cells |
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| A Close Up |
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| This is the Whirling Dervishes |
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| Their Study |
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| Some Artifacts.. |
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| Music Instruments |
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| Ancient Books |
After the visit, Peter noticed that he lost his mobile
phone, we were all trying to call his number so that we might hear the ringtone
in case it was still in the van but to no avail. The phone kept ringing, we
didn’t hear any ringtone and no one picked up at all (just in case someone
found it).
We had lunch in a restaurant at the highway – potato soups,
salad, Turkish pizza, kebab and some desserts. The Turkish pizza was a nice addition after
kebab in every meal. =)
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| Ozkan Restaurant |
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| The Interior |
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| Bread & Salad |
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| Potato Soup |
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| Turkish Pizza |
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| Main Course of Chicken and Beef Kebab |
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| Dessert |
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| Playground beside the Restaurant, Sammy was there! |
After 4 hours ride, we finally arrived at Richmond
Thermal Hotel at Pamukkale. Pamukkale literally means cotton castle in Turkey. The
hotel looked very luxurious and it was actually the most striking hotel during
our entire trip – unfortunately we only managed to stay there for 1 night. =(
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| View on the Way to Pamukkale |
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| Cute Doggie at one of the Rest Stop |
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| Beautiful Sky |
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| The Sun behind the Cloud |
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| Another View |
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| Arriving at Richmond Thermal Hotel |
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| The Room |
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| Basin |
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| Nice Bathtub Design! Half Embedded into the floor |
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| Special Design Key Chain |
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| The Lobby |
We explored the hotel facilities as it was mentioned that
thermal pools were available for free for guests. There was an indoor thermal
pool – the room was very hot and basically deserted. I guess it’s not logical
to have thermal bath during hot summer indoor. =P There was also another outdoor
thermal pool as well and we could see people soaking in it.
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| Sammy was at the Indoor Thermal Pool! |
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| I wanna go home! |
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| The Outdoor Thermal Pool |
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| The Swimming Pool |
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| Panoramic View from Hotel Courtyard, there was a path to walk down to the farms |
We had our dinner in the hotel (part of the package) and it
definitely provided the most varieties out of other hotels in Turkey. The dining
room looked and felt luxurious as well. There was a free belly dance show as
well.
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| Care for some Wine? |
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| They were waiting to go inside the restaurant! |
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| Desserts! |
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| Some Foods.. 1st Fish dishes in Turkey |
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| Unlimited Fruits! |
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| Nice Carving! |
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| Tomato soup was very thick! Yum! |
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| Tons of Desserts and Rice Pudding! |
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| Belly Dance! |
At around 10pm++, we decided to try out the outdoor thermal
pool. The water was lukewarm at best, not as hot as the hot spring in Sungai
Klah (link) in Malaysia. Anyway, it was still a surreal experience to soak in
thermal pool with strong wind and beautiful surrounding.
Next Day (Pamukkale & Aphrodisias)
Masterpost (Click this to get to day by day link)
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