A rainy day

Ortahisar,

Saturday, May 30.

I wake up about 5am and hear what sounds like the firing roar of a balloon. I race out and, sure enough, there are one or two around. It is a lovely morning with the sun just over the horizon. But there is a heavy and dubious front advancing. The balloons are drifting in different directions, heights and speeds. Clearly the atmosphere is a little unstable this morning. There is one balloon which has risen so high that it has almost disappeared into the clouds. I hope the people in it are warmly dressed, apart from not seeing very much from that height. Perhaps it is just as well that we did not get up this morning.

We were hoping to be in one of those this morning.

It is almost hard to believe that the small dot in the centre of the picture is in fact a balloon.

It is turning out to be a very Melbourne sort of day. One moment it is raining, the next the sun promisingly and temptingly shows itself. In any case, we delay our action plans until we have had a family Skype conference at 9.30am. We link up and discuss matters which are on our collective mind.

Not looking too good from our front porch.

Our host Fatma has booked the bus for us for Antalya on Monday. We catch the local small shuttle to Urgup and pay for our tickets and collect them. It is about half an hour’s ride away. It also gives us a chance to see the rest of Ortahisar as the bus meanders through the fringes of town, collecting passengers. It is finally full. Ortahisar has a population slightly over 8000. There are clearly apartment buildings further out. We are informed that during certain parts of the year, the population is swelled by various seasonal workers, related to the rural production.

It is not the best in Urgup either.

Fatma has written down our disembarkation instructions for Urgup in Turkish. The driver puts us off near the main bus station. However, we go on a wild goose chase trying to locate our Metro bus company’s small office. All is well. They share a small shop with a few other bus operators. The various small business people are most helpful and obliging with their directions and almost no English. With a smile and suppressed inhibitions, one need never be lost.

We would like to have strolled around Urgup a little longer but it is raining too hard for it to be pleasant, even though we have our collapsible umbrella (which is on the point of collapsing completely). We might as well go back. However, we are suddenly not clear where to pick up the bus. We did not take enough care to note landmarks. Finally, we find a substantial bus shelter by which our bus would surely stop. One other lady passenger with a young child hears us reference to Ortahisar. Suddenly she tries to explain that the Ortahisar bus does not go past here. As we are too illiterate in Turkish to understand, she risks missing her own bus and takes us almost literally by the hand, carrying her  child, to the place where the bus starts from, not very far away. How very good of her to do that.

Our bus is right here!

These are small oven cooked stews with the lids well sealed with dough.  Pity they are available only in Urgup and, in any case, we are not quite ready for them.

Back in our home town, we might as well have some freshly baked lunch of a meat pide from our favourite pide ‘salon’, as they call it. It is very tasty with some drinking yoghurt. It is in fact the Turkish equivalent of a pizza. The idea of making a full meal as part of bread baking is probably as old as bread itself. In a sense, the ‘pirags’ (a mix of chopped bacon with onions, wrapped inside some dough) is the Latvian equivalent.

It is still raining. The one thing that draws me out is the momentary glimpses of the grand mountain far away. At least the rain has cleared the atmosphere and during breaks in the clouds, it is tantalisingly picturesque. We are told that it is Erciyes Mountain, Turkey’s third highest (nearly 13,000 ft.) and generally has some snow all year round and is South of here, about 80km by road. It has the classic conical shape of a volcanic outlet which millions of years ago spewed volcanic ash all around here. It got compressed which ultimately, by erosion, created the thrilling and beautiful landscapes around here. All that also explains that despite the soil looking literally like ash, it is fertile. (From some Roman coinage records, it may have erupted as recently as 253BC)

We almost cannot see it except with the help of the camera.

Ortahisar has some very deep caves which are used to store various fruit from many parts of Turkey, in particular lemons. We are told that when lemons are picked just because they are considered ripe and then stored in the caves, over a few months they not only fully ripen but by absorbing moisture from the air, double their weight. As well as that, they can be preserved fresh for up to 12 months. The temperature in the caves is low and stable, perfect for keeping various produce for a long time without refrigeration. Thus, it is quite a big industry here.

One of the lemon storage caves.

From time to time, some get spoiled and are dumped nearby.

A bit more writing and blogging between glasses of tea and chats with our hosts. The showers keep coming and going. It is 16C at 5.30pm and tomorrow’s ballooning does not look too promising.

We have made friends with our neighbours, a Dutch family of three. In discussing dinner plans, they highly recommend the restaurant next to the Pide Salon in the middle of town. There is nothing like a personal recommendation. It is one of the unassuming and no frills places still here where the burly and weathered locals eat. We order two different kinds of their clay pot meals. It is cooked, from scratch, in the big bread oven, in a very thick based (about 30mm) clay bowl without a lid. It arrived on the table still radiating heat from the pot, just what we needed on this coolish night. With it came a big plate of chopped cucumber and tomato salad with a tasty but simple dressing, together with about a metre length of freshly baked Turkish bread. It was absolutely delicious local style cooking. We have eaten much too much bread, simply because it is so fresh and tasty. It was almost embarrassing to be paying only 30tl for it all.

Most of this came out of ............

............. here. Bread cannot be fresher than this.

While dining, we cannot help notice the electioneering broadcast on the TV. Turkish election campaigning is certainly considerably different from ours. It is a very long live broadcast of an open air rally in obviously a big town or city. It is the drum beating of the party presently in power. The crowd is very big, waving national flags and party colours. There is lots of cheering, may be spontaneous, probably scripted and directed. The Prime Minister as well as the President both speak assertively and passionately without notes or prompts. The light blue stage is enormous with an equally huge backdrop. Towards the conclusion, some of the ‘props’ are shown closer up which are people dressed in various ethnic gear but mostly carrying period arms and wearing old style pointed Ottoman helmets. They are clearly stirring national passions. Live barnstorming appearances still seem to be a big thing here. We will see how they all go on June 7.

Some of the countryside is seriously hilly and rugged. It attracts equally serious mountain bikers. This bunch is from Germany.

Another interesting phenomenon is that in a town the size of Ortahisar, there are loudspeakers strategically placed around the town centre which periodically spruik commercials. Perhaps that explains why there are not too many billboards and other graphic material. 

And so to early bed as we have been told that a balloon flight is expected for a 4.20am pickup. We are hoping third time lucky.