Anne and I have completed our tour of eastern Turkey today, and we fly to Baku, Azerbaijan, tomorrow to begin our tour of the Caucasus. We enjoyed our time with Orhan and Murat, we learned and saw so much. We wish them safe travels. Thank you Spiekermann Travel for planning this great trip!
A few things to tell you: There are large, modern universities throughout eastern Turkey. Young men must serve some time in military training. There has been no access to Wikipedia for several years; President Erdogan didn't like some things that were reported, so now - no wiki. Several dams have been constructed, sometimes burying ancient architecture below the water. But the big benefit from those dams is that farmers now can irrigate their fields in this hot and dry continental climate and grow cotton, pistachios, so much beautiful produce. Everywhere we travel has been walked by civilizations since 9000 BCE, maybe earlier. All of this area was a part of the Silk Roads. The museums we have visited have been large modern buildings with great collections. Due to a bum knee and lack of fortitude, I excuse myself from many of the climbs up many stairs. But our pal Anne, well, she's tough and strong and will go anywhere to get a good picture. We see a lot of road and bridge construction. I told Orhan that we see many big projects in Europe being sponsored by the E.U. He tells us that Turkey is receiving some funds from the E.U. and also from the USA. We see a lot of John Deere farm equipment. Oleander is lovely here.
On Sunday 9/1, we are 3km from the Syrian border as we drive to awesome Gobeklitepe, a site estimated to be from 9000 BCE. Buried underneath layers of sand and rubble for 11 centuries, Gobeklitepe is a collection of individual circles with massive T-shaped columns carved with various animals and human figures. The site was rediscovered by a farmer who was trying to clear rocks from one of his fields. Eventually he and his son were able to remove a large piece of column, saw some carving, and contacted a museum and then an archeologist working in the region. He was no longer able to farm that field, and it is now a marvelous exhibit. His grandsons now work at the site. Excavation is continuing. We have had delicious lunches everywhere the guys take us. We try some hot peppers, but mostly we watch Murat and Orhan eat them and then mop their heads. In a restaurant today, we see an old woman with her family. She has a tattoo on her forehead between her eyebrows, some at her upper and lower lip, and another on her left wrist. Orhan tells us these tattoos indicate which village she came from and perhaps how many sons she has born.
9/2: We visit the large modern Ataturk dam on the Euphrates forming a beautiful large lake. The lake covers 20 former villages. We travel to a UNESCO site at the top of Mt. Nemrut (well, the 3 of them do) to see colossal statues of Antiochus I of Commagene and his gods. They climb up 800+ stairs, and they walk back down them. Anne did get good pictures. For lunch, we are treated again to a BBQ at a riverside. They are so kind to us. We then stop to see a Roman bridge that was used until about 20 years ago when a modern bridge was built.
9/3: On our way to Shanliurfa, we see several large Syrian refugee camps along the Euphrates. We visit Harran, from 1000 BCE, with its castle and beehive-shaped mud houses and Arabic population. We go to what is believed to be the birthplace of Abraham.
9/4: We travel to Gaziantep to see a large mosaic museum with huge mosaics from Roman and Byzantine times. It's the second largest in the world. This is the second time we've had to show our passports at a security checkpoint. The man checking them told the guys he's with a Turkish organization like the CIA or FBI. Maybe. Woo, it's 102° in Gaziantep. There's another terrific bazaar. We lunch in a nice restaurant where we try an innocent-looking green pepper. Well, looks were deceiving. It was hot. This Imam Cagdas restaurant is famous for their baklava, and we had been looking forward to trying it for the last 16 days. We weren't disappointed! We thanked the owner for a tasty meal and leave with some baklava. Our pleasant Anadolu Evleri Hotel is next to this restaurant. We tell Murat we already miss him, we thank Orhan and Murat for a memorable experience. We say goodbye to eastern Turkey. We are so glad to have visited.
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