We've just arrived in Kayakoy and we have a lovely lightfilled (but fairly basic) room in one of the small family run hotels in this ghost town. It's been a long morning travelling on a public bus - at one point another passenger was practically sitting on my lap.
I had expected to see amazing sights on this tour; I hadn't expected Pamukkale to be one of them. It looks like a couple of pools and a great big tourist trap in the pictures. It is full of tourists, even at 4pm when we headed out. It is basically a huge mountain of limestone in which pools have formed at various intervals. Ozan says that they have formed naturally, but they look very man made to me. You have to take off your shoes and then it's a gentle walk up the hill with a stream of water flowing down the rocks. People in their swimming costumes are littered about the place as they let the water run over them or wade through the pools. I set off to explore and was promptly told off by the guard for going off the path. Back to the straight and narrow for me. We spent quite a bit of time taking pictures and taking in the scenery. It's like nothing I've seen before.
At the top of the hill, a sprawling Roman city once looked out over the pools and plains. Bits of it still remain - the largest theatre in Asia Minor (very impressive), a graveyard (I didn't venture there) and the tomb of Philip the Apostle has recently been found there. I instead decided to take the waters in a pool. It is rumoured that Cleopatra bathed here and the wrinkles on her face just disappeared. I can confirm that the story is true as I look at least 10 years younger ;)
Unfortunately, I took too long in the pool and missed the sunset, but it was a nice walk down in the light of dusk and then dinner by the pool at the hotel.
No comments:
Post a Comment