Honeymoon pt. 2: Turkey
Istanbul
Istanbul is a city that both Hayden and I have visited before—Hayden while biking across Europe and me on a solo trip through the Middle East. We added this stop specifically for Hayden to get Lasik eye surgery, since it’s drastically cheaper than getting it done in the states. It also helped that to get to Asia, Istanbul is an easy layover.
One of the joys of revisiting a city is that there isn’t any pressure on having to see the sites. So our first morning in Istanbul Hayden set off for his consultation at Dünyagöz Eye Hospital and I set off for a site visit at the Four Seasons. While I was sitting along the Bosphorus at the Four Seasons bar, drinking a glass of rosé, Hayden texted to let me know that he qualified and they would be performing the surgery in a few hours. I took a taxi back to our hostel, gathered everything we’d need for one night in the hospital, and headed over to Dünyagöz. By the time I got there, Hayden’s Lasik was complete and he was sitting in his room with sunglasses on. The whole procedure took about 10 minutes! We spent the night in twin hospital beds where I put a rotation of eye drops in his eyes every 30 minutes until midnight.
Hayden post LASIK!
The following morning, Hayden woke up with 20/20 vision! While he had a follow-up appointment with his doctor, I had signed myself up for a traditional Turkish hamam. I chose Kılıç Ali Paşa Hamamı, which was build in 1580 and was absolutely gorgeous inside. If you don’t know what a traditional Turkish hamam is, it’s essentially a spa treatment where a heavyset Turkish woman in crocs exfoliates and washes your whole body. I can only imagine that when the spa switches from women only to men only in the afternoons, that it is a heavyset Turkish man in crocs doing the same. You're also in a room with a bunch of other confused yet relaxed spa-goers getting the same treatment done.
Kılıç Ali Paşa Hamamı lobby
I left the hamam feeling clean and relaxed. Hayden then informed me that our hostel had stolen from us while doing laundry and that Trey and Molly were on their way from the airport. Equal parts good and bad news! I let Hayden handle getting our money back from the hostel front desk and made the walk back to our hostel to meet him there. After a little while, Trey and Molly arrived and we set out for dinner. Afterwards, we got ice cream and took a quick visit to the Blue Mosque before going to bed. The next morning, we were heading to Cappadocia.
Inside the Blue Mosque
Cappadocia
Our Cappadocia crew was Hayden and myself, Trey and Molly, and Trey’s friend Matt and his wife Rebecca. I previously visited Cappadocia in 2019 on a solo trip through the Middle East and it’s one of the coolest, most unique destinations I’ve ever visited. I was so excited to be there with Hayden and our friends.
If you don’t know, Cappadocia is home to an otherworldly landscape. Strange rock formations formed by volcanic rock that has eroded over thousands of years dot the landscape and cave homes dot the strange rock formations. The cave homes were built in the Byzantine period in the 9th through 13th centuries. There were whole cities here! Some caves were homes, others were churches, monasteries, grave sites, wineries, and more. Perhaps the coolest part is that you can explore many of them on your own. Most people head to the open air museum in Göreme, which you have to pay for and is very crowded. But right across the street, you can explore endless caves all on your own without any other people around. And we did just that.
Old cave home in Cappadocia—this one is still being actively used as a stable!
Exploring these caves of course led us to the question of when did people move out of the caves?? The answer is a few elders still live in caves today, but the vast majority became empty in 1923. Which led us to learning about The Great Population Exchange between Greece and Turkey in 1923—essentially 1.5 million Turkish Orthodox Christians moved from Turkey to Greece and 500,000 Muslim Greeks moved to Turkey. Which is a very uneven exchange and so left many many caves empty across Turkey and left Greece feeling quite stuffed. The move was compulsory, so many people were stripped from their home and forced to move to a foreign land.
Exploring inside the caves. The little cubbies were homes for pigeons!
We also took a visit to Derinkuyu—an underground city in Cappadocia that goes down 8 levels! There are over 300 underground “structures” in the Cappadocia region, but 2 main underground cities. This particular underground city was where the Christians took to escape persecution. It’s said to have been able to hold 20,000 people as well as food, supplies, and livestock.
In the tunnels of the underground city.
What Cappadocia is perhaps most famous for, is their hot air balloons at sunrise. So of course, this was one of our top goals for our time there. However, Trey had a super secret second goal as well—proposing to Molly! The sunrise was spectacular and of course Molly said yes :)
Post engagement picture!
Turkey was an absolute blast and it was even better having friends with us. Next stop: Albania!
Beautiful sunrise in the hot air ballon!
