After a couple of days in the city we were in need of fresh air. Also, if we want to reach China this year we need to keep going. Our next stop would be Cappadocia but that will take about 10 hours. We found two nice stops along the way. One would be Burj al Babas.
Burj al Babas
Burj Al Babas is a residential development located near the Turkish town of Mudurnu. The homes in the development are designed to resemble miniature chateaux.
They started construction in 2014 and was originally successful. However, sales stalled causing the developer to enter bankruptcy. As of January 2019, 587 of the planned 732 homes were started but none were finished.
We visited the sight, couldn’t enter though but did enjoy the view. And quite close to it happened to be a very nice location to stay for the night. And another night. Not planned but we felt we needed a day ‘off’.
A day to clean the van, read a book, enjoy the sweetness of doing nothing. Only one day and we felt reloaded. Reloaded for the rest of our journey East.
Tuz Gölü
The second stop on our journey to Cappadocia would be one of the most underrated tourism attractions of Turkey. At least that’s what we think. The way too it was uneventful. Some mountains, grass plains and not so good roads. We saw lot of migrant workers which was interesting. Most of them live in tents near where they work.
Anyway, after quite a few hours (6 or 7) we finally reached Tuz Gölü, also Salt Lake. It’s not only a salt lake it’s also the second biggest lake of Turkey. There are some stops next to the road but those are very crowded and touristy. We had other plans. So we continued a bit further, drove the worst Turkish road we had up to now and found our spot. Alone at the lake. The lake stretches in front of the car, everywhere we look we see White and a little bit of pink. The lake turns pink due to the algae. And the algae are eaten by no other than the pink birds of course, flamingos. We didn’t see the birds, neither did we see the lake in pink. Nonetheless it was still very impressive.
We watched an amazing sunset, a million stars and had a great nights rest.
In the morning we walked quite a while on the salt lake. Not much water in it at the moment so one can walk pretty far into the lake.
Cappadocia
Finally we arrived in Cappadocia! Not hidden, not untouristy but a gem. 10 years ago I, Milene, graduated from university with a thesis about this magical place. My thesis was about finding a way that a cultural heritage and historically important place like Cappadocia can also hosts tourism. During my time in Cappadocia I researched it’s history, explored it’s culture and started understanding its value. Besides it being a natural and cultural place which needs to be preserved, tourism is the main economy of the area. Luckily one can live with the other and the outcome of my thesis was hopeful. Hopeful of the local community, tourism organizations and government branches work together.
In the next post we’ll see if it all worked out.
Love Milene & Yuri
