HEY, HEY, GOREME

Staying in an amazing hostel called the Rock Valley Pension. Upgraded to a huge private room. which is full of rugs and wall sconces and frescoes/murals on the stone walls and a giant bathroom with hot water and a good drain so you are not walking in water all day. Love it. The staff is amazing and very helpful, the town is totally sleepy and cute, and the weather has been AWESOME and sunny during day, although very cold once sun dips. It's apparently very rare for it to be this hot at this time of year and they expect snow in a couple weeks!

We've crammed a lot in, although I had to forego the hot air ballooning due to fear of heights. Everyone who went LOVED IT, with a capital LI. Walking in the Ilhara Valley, Selime Monastery, underground city, Pigeon Valley, all-you-can drink Turkish night with dinner and Dervishes and belly/folk dancers and drunken shenanigans, Turkish carpet presentation, lots of delicious food . . . I look like I am growing a hot-air ballon because I've been eating so much AND stomach has been good for a welcome change.

Went to a Hammam here a couple days ago with one other female pax and five of the guys. I guess they think we have no shame as we're not Muslims and they put us all together in the bathing room with very brief little towels for us women, which led to very strategic rolls from front to back while being washing/massaged and rinsing. Wasn't so bad when it was just our group, but a large huddle of Chinese men came in toward the end and got a couple good eyefuls. Felt so good though, and very woozy after.

Which probably contributed to me buying two Turkish rugs at the carpet lecture/dinner. MAN, they are beautiful. A runner and an old beat-up tribal kilim. They'll ship them from here and should arrive by the time I get home. I have a bit of buyer's remorse, which one of the other pax keeps reinforcing by telling me what a great deal HE got on his rugs, blah, blah, blah, annoying cakes.

That's not all that's annoying about this trip, which now consists of 15 passengers and two drivers (who are great, by the way). There are:

 * Four Americans (including me, one of the drivers and an older couple)
* One Irish guy
* Two Canadian girls
* Six Brits (including three guys, an older couple and one of the drivers)
* One Polish woman (who just joined us here in Goreme due to problems getting her Ethiopian visa earlier)
* Four Aussies (three guys and a woman who will not be continuing the trip with us because she hurt her leg quite badly a couple days ago)
* One twenty-seven year old truck named Daphne

I am on the younger side of the group, with many in their mid to late 60s, but also two 20 year olds. Other than the knee injury, we have also had someone spend the night in the hospital on an IV drip here in Goreme due to a raging bacterial infection. We have someone who can not handle their alcohol and becomes a raving loon after a few too many (and NO, it's not me). We have a couple uber-awful people that make me cringe whenever they open their mouths. Which is a lot.  But, overall, it is a good group, it has jelled, Turkey has been amazing and I am having a blast.

Only one bush camp so far, although we missed one last night due to staying behind in Goreme. Oh yes, that's right. This brings us to the only potentially bad thing on the trip so far. Us three Americans had to send our passports back to Washington DC to get Syrian visas. Why did we have to do this, you might wonder? Well, because Drago repeatedly assured us that we did NOT need to obtain in advance and would be part of the group visa. But then we found out in Selcuk that was not the case. So back to the U.S. The last FedEx update showed them on a plane from Paris at 10:14 PM last night, so we are hoping to get them today or tomorrow so that we can take an overnight bus to Aleppo and have a chance of catching the group. If they don't arrive tomorrow, we're totally screwed and will likely miss Syria altogether. Needless to say, PISSED won't begin to describe how I'll feel if that's the case since the Syrian sights are the main reason I'm on this trip.

Such is life.

Off to the Open Air Museum and some lounging by the pool . . .